BA, Art (Design Studies)
General Business Minor

Artist Statement

Hi! My Name is Ryan Sperry, and this art piece is my 2020 BA design project. My work is an artistic representation of how popular sports athletes are marketed, particularly through social media. As social media has taken over our culture and country over the last decade or so, most professional franchises began using this as an opportunity to engage with fans and further market their own players to a larger population. In doing so, the two worlds of sports and design collided, creating engaging and prideful graphics of athletes, that convey their skill level, accomplishments, and personality.​​My piece, done using a mixture of the adobe creative suite programs Photoshop andIllustrator, depicts a local sports star that has been taking the NBA by storm the last few seasons. Giannis Antetokounmpo has been one of the most exciting, dominant, and successful athletes of any sport in recent years. It was my goal to create a design that depicted his talents and accolades, while also helping to strengthen his brand and marketable image by showing an element of his life, his family, that isn’t often necessarily a common aspect of an athletes image. For Giannis, however, his loyalty and love for his family and Greek heritage is well known by fans across the country. ​Both graphic design and sports have long been passions of mine. I hope to in time find a way to combine these worlds, and in doing so have the opportunity to forge a career along those lines, as this has always been a goal of mine. In this design, it is my intention for the viewer to enjoy the visual aesthetic of the piece itself, while also giving them new information and knowledge about Giannis, his family, and his many phenomenal accolades.