Last time I introduced you to the work of Australian pop artist Ben Frost it was to share with you his fabulous hand painted McDonalds french fry containers. Now he’s added to his repertoire by painting directly on pharmaceutical packaging – as well as new large scale paintings and giclées on the same theme.

Generic and brand name Valium, Fentanyl, Morphine, Oxy, Viagra and other popular pharmaceutical packages are emptied, flattened and embellished with acrylic paints in Ben’s style of pop art. Lichtenstein-inspired women, retro-looking illustrative children and pop culture characters from The Simpsons and Peanuts.

Large Scale Paintings and Giclées
The following large scale paintings were created using stencils and aerosol paints and measure 40″ x 40″. Many are also available as giclee prints from the Soze Gallery:

Burns Viagra:

Paxil Don’t Store In A Dark Place:

Down the Rabbit Hole:

Botox Lover:

More large scale paintings:

Some of the above works  can be seen in his show, Supermarket Sweeps, at the No Walls Gallery  or in his solo show, Know Your Product, at the Soze Gallery.

Four Color Screenprints

above: Ben Frost, life – 100 tablets (pink), four colour screenprint on fenner colorset 350gsm, signed and numbered, edition of 50, 50cm x 50cm

Ben says, of the screenprint “Life” (shown above) “In this image, I’ve evolved my previous work with pharmaceutical packaging and reduced the concept into its most basic elements. The melancholy character exists within a pre-packaged and controlled pharmaceutical regime: ‘Life’ (registered of course). She further contemplates the span of her ‘Life’ to be of 100 tablets (the ‘as advertised’ human age limit). The horizontal pink bar in the background, which is a common design element on drug packaging, mimics liquid – such that she is only just ‘keeping her head above water’ as the progression of ‘Life’ slowly fills the page to consume her.”

And in blue:

above: Ben Frost, life – 100 tablets (blue), four colour screenprint on fenner colorset 350gsm, signed and numbered, edition of 50, 50cm x 50cm

Ben Frost’s provocative work takes well known brands, packaged goods, symbols and logos and manipulates or parodies them to achieve a sort of propaganda against them and the media.

If you never saw my previous post on Ben’s painted McDonald’s French Fry containers, be sure to check that out.

You can find available packaging paintings and other artworks at: https://www.benfrostisdead.com/

Prints of Ben’s work can also be found at www.stupidkrap.com

images courtesy of Ben Frost, Ben’s tumblr site, Ben’s facebook page, Ben’s instagram account,  No Walls Gallery, and the Soze Gallery