my design journey
Hello! I’m Michael, let me tell you a bit about my background in graphic design and illustration.
Being raised Mexican-American in San Diego, I’ve always been exposed to cultures and subcultures in which graphics and art are very prevalent and integrated. With many relatives on both of my parents’ sides of the family being artistically gifted, it was easy to see where I got my inclination towards art and design. Inheriting this creativity and passion for arts, I was always interested in depicting my ideas through visual media, eventually earning a bachelor’s degree in Graphic Design from San Diego State University.
In my senior year at Mira Mesa High School, I took a screen printing course, and it was then when I fell in love with 2D art and printing. I was heavily inspired by the works of streetwear designers and street artists such as Shepard Fairey with OBEY and Shawn Stussy with Stussy. After graduating high school and upon entering the San Diego Community College District, I gravitated towards black and white relief prints and high contrast pen and ink drawings. These media led me into a whole new world that would further impact my style and eye for art and design.
Going back and forth between seeing myself as more of an artist or more of a graphic designer, I have come to accept my strengths and vision in both simultaneously, and I use what I have learned in one field to help me in the other. I greatly value the human touch and organic feel in the collages, illustrations, and prints that I have studied and learned from over the years. And I also thoroughly appreciate the order, functionality, and effectiveness I have seen in the well-designed websites, posters, and magazines that I have come across as well.
I am most moved by pieces and designs that are able to reach inside and connect with me on an organic level, showcasing their human-made formation, while also being meticulously crafted, showing the intent and purpose behind every word, mark, color, and textural choice to best convey its message to its intended audience. These are the designs I strive to create in my career, ones that will weather well against time and be testaments to something larger than myself that I helped bring to life.
my personal life
Now let me tell you a little about Michael Chavez the person.
I am currently living in San Diego. I enjoy watching baseball (sometimes anyways, Padres… need I say more?), watching basketball, reading books about inner growth, spending time with loved ones, and whatever else anyone would say they like to do.
Some things I really love to do and am fascinated by, though, are spending hours on Google Maps exploring all the places I have never imagined myself being able to see into, reading for hours about all the historical events and cultural groups Wikipedia has to offer, producing hip-hop instrumentals, writing lyrics to then record over said hip-hop instrumentals, watching/playing/reading any piece of Star Wars media I have access to, and experimenting in the kitchen.
All of this is aside from creating anything art or design related. I do love to consciously dedicate time to creating new pieces of course. My main passion project is Dissolve, a project I created at the end of 2021 as something for me to devote my creative energy to and keep me busy. Initially, Dissolve started out as a creative outlet to release thematically and aesthetically cohesive illustrations relating to ideas of community and how I viewed the world around me with deliverables created such as posters, zines, stickers, and digital prints. Dissolve then morphed into an entity that incorporated all these elements into a clothing brand, while still retaining the original goal and idea. Now, over two years later, I have started a web mag under Dissolve, dedicated to showing the world the great creative talent all around us from the people and places we would not have expected. At the end of it all, I know Dissolve will keep evolving into something more, and more, and more. It has been and always be a reflection of myself and how I synthesize all my experiences and world views, and that’s what I love most about it.