A modern, streetwise collaboration bridging Tokyo and New York.

Curtis Kulig ("Curtis")Velour is especially like me. Tweed is one of my favorite fabrics, but velour is my personal favorite. The bright red color is also nice, isn't it?

Curtis.I have known Bebetan (Mr. Masashi Watanabe) for about 10 years now. For the past few years, we have been friends as well. Three years after I returned to New York, Bebetan contacted me to ask if he could use my drawings at Bedouin. We started out making casual clothes such as T-shirts and sweatshirts, and then moved on to classic suits and other high and low fashion items. Bebetan is in Tokyo, and I am in New York, so we send each other ideas, and this time, we brought the best of both worlds together. It was very easy to work with each other, and I think we make a good team.

Curtis.I met him in New York when Shady, a photographer, introduced me to him. When I first met him, I thought he was very sophisticated. Like the brand, Bebetan is amazing in the way it keeps the classics and continues to push refinement and new things every time.

Curtis.The pants are a collaboration with Dickie's, and I often wear them myself because the fabric is strong. The woman holding a candy cane saying "LOVE ME" on the T-shirt is a picture of Robin Byrd, a famous porn star from the 1970s. The man peeking through the door is Lou, an important figure downtown, about 70 years old now, but a native New Yorker who grew up in downtown New York and has lived on Elizabeth Street all his life. I used to go to the same coffee shop as him, and one day he asked me, "Who are you? and we became friends. I took the picture for this T-shirt, and he was very happy when I gave him the finished T-shirt.

Curtis.Target is a series of monthly paintings I've done for the past 15 years, and it's been 3 years and 11 months since I started doing the paintings you see on the t-shirt. The source of the idea for Target is that target from the punk scene, but it represents the emotional part of me each month. I especially entrust each one with my eyes. I've been doing this for 15 years now, so I have 180 targets.

Curtis.I wear black Levi's® denim, a T-shirt, and tennis shoes or loafers. It's very simple. I like to wear J.M. Weston loafers, which are made in France, and they are the best loafers for me. In winter, I wear a sweater, jacket, and scarf.

Curtis.I am still based in New York City, but two years ago I moved into a studio in the middle of Lafayette and Kenmare Street ...... Soho in Manhattan. I moved to a new studio two years ago in the middle of Manhattan at Lafayette and Kenmare St. in SoHo, within sight of my current studio.

Curtis.I need to have a lot of things within walking distance of me. Manhattan is expensive and a difficult place to live. It is very difficult for new artists coming to New York to find a place to live and to set up a studio in the downtown area. Many artists have moved to Brooklyn because they can rent a larger space for the same price. But I've been in this area for a long time now, and the community is very important to me. The area where the studio is located (Soho to the Lower East Side) has been a huge influence on me because it has a different kind of energy than anything else in New York City. Even now, I have to do more! It's a place that makes me feel like I have to do more.

Curtis.This year, I became interested in the movements of the human body. I was particularly interested in the boxer's movement, and I did an art show of my drawings for about a month this November under the title "PRIZE by Curtis Kulig" at the "agnès b" gallery in New York. I made drawings and sculptures of boxers and exhibited them, and I also showed a video in front of a large oil painting at the gallery. I also showed a video in front of a large oil painting at the show.

Curtis.I myself am a yoga practitioner, but in yoga I tend to move my body in the open, whereas in boxing I do the opposite, bending my body inward. I felt the difference in movement, and I have also been fascinated by the proportions of a boxer's body for the past several years. What I wanted to depict this time was the pause between when someone punches and when they fall down. I wanted to draw the time between when someone punches you and when you fall down, and when you are in the state of wanting to get up. Not all of the drawings were standing, but only those that were on the verge of falling, not completely on the ground. If you look at it with your eyes, it's just a moment in a very fast movement. By the way, my father's brother is a boxer, and he opened the door to my life. He was a great influence on me when I was young.

Curtis.I wanted to convey the emotions that people's movements give off. I believe it is meaningful to paint pictures to motivate myself.

Curtis.People, the city of New York, traveling, reading books, watching movies. My life is always influenced by something.

Curtis.I feel that the evolution of technology is somehow changing the way artists and people feel. The existence of art in relation to the natural evolutionary flow of the world. Whether it is good or bad, it is certainly an exciting time.

Curtis.I plan to return to New York City, spend Christmas in New York City, and take a New Year's vacation in Montego Bay and Negril, Jamaica. After the vacation is over, I plan to start working on commercial work, and in parallel, I plan to start working on a summer exhibition. But right now, I'm all about the vacation (laughs).

Watanabe (Japanese newspaper)There is a photographer in New York named Shady, and she was the kind of person who cared about youth and hooked up with young kids in the same community. So she introduced me to a young, interesting graffiti guy, and that was Curtis. Curtis used to work as a doorman at La Esquina, a popular Mexican restaurant near the Supreme store in Manhattan. I met him when I was shooting for Bedouin in New York with Kunichi Nomura (訓ちゃん), and he happened to come to Tokyo five years ago to visit, and he left some graffiti in my office. I asked him later if I could use it, and he said yes. I later asked him if I could use it, and he said yes. From there, we decided that Curtis had a very interesting sense of style, and that it would be a good idea to have him direct not only the art, but also the clothes, and so the collaboration series began.

Watanabe (Japanese newspaper)The velvet look really suits Curtis. I thought it would be cool if he wore this suit and sandals in the summer. In any case, it was created within his worldview, so it's not something that I'm trying to sell or create with an eye toward selling. I think it is a suit that can be worn at any age, not because it is trendy, and even if the velvet eventually becomes tattered, I sometimes wonder if that would be a good thing, as it would add to the taste. For this series, I shot at classical hotels such as the Chelsea Hotel and the Lafayette Hotel in New York, and I think I was able to capture the feeling of Curtis's own survival as an artist. The photos were taken by Vanina Sorrenti, the sister of photographer Mario Sorrenti, using young people from Curtis's studio. You can see them on our social network.

Watanabe (Japanese newspaper)We make everything from T-shirts to suits for Bedouin, and Curtis also creates artwork, from graffiti to classical paintings. With these similarities between us, at first we only made velvet suits, suits made with textiles from a fabric manufacturer that is also used by CHANEL, and ties, but during the process of making the clothes, we thought it would be better to make clothes using his iconic style. I thought it would be better to make clothes featuring his iconic parts. I think that the second, casual version of the collection is a clean, raw, graffiti-style item with a unique graffiti feel. In such cases, brands tend to think of designs in small increments, but in his case, I thought, "It's better to go all out! I was also amused by that.