Spaceboy creates al fresco animation in Edinburgh as part of Red Stripe campaign

The phrase stop-motion conjures up images of pasty-faced obsessives hunched over their painstaking creations in darkened studios, but Scottish artist Spaceboy is reclaiming the genre with an alfresco piece just unveiled in Edinburgh.

As part of the Make with a Red Stripe campaign, which has seen the famous beer brand launching a series of public arts projects (such as a giant game of Space Invaders on a Manchester wall), Spaceboy (aka Mike Inglis) pasted his illustrations on six shutters of Newhaven Harbour.

Working with award-winning production company Blac Ionica and his students from the Edinburgh College of Art, each one was recorded to transform the unusual canvas into an eye-catching animated installation featuring a lot of old-school tape decks and an impromptu knees-up. Combining high-octane fun with flawless execution, Spaceboy is clearly thrilled with it.

The former graphic designer and current member of the Rough Cut Collective, said: “My creation is a transitional piece that explores the experimental approach to making music – it’s a tribute to the 1970s DIY recording scene which ties in with the aesthetic of the Make with a Red Stripe campaign. Essentially it’s based on positivity and the Jamaican culture that Red Stripe originated from.

“I hope the people of Edinburgh will come down to see the illustrations as well as checking out the video.”

Previous projects in the campaign include Yuri Suzuki’s lager can sound sculpture built using thousands of cans collected after the iconic Notting Hill Carnival and as it progresses it is hoped other artists will be inspired to follow suit. As Spaceboy puts it in the above video: “If enough people can see it and think ‘I could do that’ then more power to you. That’s how it should be.”

This article was produced in partnership with Red Stripe.