Houston graphic guru Zachary Hunt unveiled the new studio for his Crisp and Raw firm Friday night, celebrating the web design and branding company's freshly-refurbished headquarters at Summer Street Studios with a Cuba-themed launch party that drew scores of friends, clients and art collectors.
The 3,000-square-foot space will house not only Crisp and Raw, but also the designer's fine art studio — taking the firm's vision of fusing the rigidity of careful graphic design work with the unfettered processes behind Hunt's artistic output.
With Crisp and Raw, owner Zachary Hunt attempts to fuse the rigidity of careful graphic design work with the unfettered processes involved in creating his innovative art.
"When the company was started four years ago," the artist explained Monday, "I wanted to find a way to balance that sort of 'denying' aspect of design you need to create crisp, clean projects with that raw side of creativity. We've really had a chance to expand upon that idea at Summer Street."
During the event, Hunt's swirling abstract canvases of acrylic and epoxy covered the south wall of the studio, just to the side of a bar serving up healthy doses of Macallan Scotch and Brugal Rum. Across the room, were a series of figurative portraits by James Perez, another designer-artist whose interior finishes company Cueto James shares a portions of the loft space.
"Though visually our work is very different, James and I felt we pushed boundaries in the same way," Hunt explained, noting the manner in which Perez uses portraits to explore notions of religion while his own artistic techniques shape everyday materials like resin and scrap metal into surprising new forms. (See photo slideshow, upper right, for his seemingly frozen explosions of metal shavings.)
Contact Crisp and Raw online or at 832-377-5715 for more information on Hunt's art and graphic design work. For a range of innovative interior finishes and murals, contact Cueto James through its website to schedule an in-depth consultation.
