Bob Masse is a
Canadian artist from
British Columbia. Masse has been designing concert posters since the 1960s. While attending art school in
Vancouver, British Columbia, he began doing posters for the folk acts that came through town. Masse was greatly influenced by the art and music scenes in Los Angeles and San Francisco, where he lived in the late 1960s, producing posters and album covers for various bands of the day. Masse now produces pieces for contemporary performers such as
Tori Amos,
the Smashing Pumpkins,
Neil Young and others.
Biography
After graduation, Masse went on to attend art school in Vancouver; a fixture at local coffee-houses, he was asked to design posters advertising upcoming folk music performances. With the rise of folk-rock, Vancouver played host to concerts from the
Grateful Dead
The Grateful Dead was an American rock music, rock band formed in 1965 in Palo Alto, California. The band is known for its eclectic style, which fused elements of rock, Folk music, folk, country music, country, jazz, bluegrass music, bluegrass, ...
,
Jefferson Airplane
Jefferson Airplane was an American rock band based in San Francisco, California, that became one of the pioneering bands of psychedelic rock. Formed in 1965, the group defined the San Francisco Sound and was the first from the Bay Area to ac ...
and the
Steve Miller Band, with Masse contributing increasingly psychedelicized artwork for their appearances. In 1966 he travelled to San Francisco. Direct contact with the poster art of
The Fillmore and the
Family Dog exerted a profound influence on his subsequent work.
Returning to Vancouver, Masse, now a
Scientologist, befriended the local band the Collectors, and when they travelled to Los Angeles to make a record he followed, spending the final years of the 1960s living in the Laurel Canyon area. In 1969 he returned to Vancouver, producing a series of posters for local venues including the Retinal Circus, Moose Valley Farms, and Gassy Jack's. During the 1970s Masse undertook commercial work, illustrating for
McDonald's, the Expo Space Station, CP Air, Lock-It Guitar Straps, and others. Masse additionally designed numerous business logos, among them an orange fox for radio station C-FOX.
During the 1980s, Masse created posters for films including
Total Recall and
Back to the Future Part III
''Back to the Future Part III'' is a 1990 American science fiction Western film and the final installment of the ''Back to the Future'' trilogy. The film was directed by Robert Zemeckis, and stars Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Mary Stee ...
; he also worked on the television series
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. As rock concert art began to enjoy a surge in popularity during the following decade, however, Masse returned to poster design for the
Smashing Pumpkins
Smash may refer to:
People
* Smash (wrestler) (born 1959), professional wrestler
* Moondog Rex, another professional wrestler who briefly wrestled as the original Smash, before being replaced by the above.
* DJ Smash, DJ and music producer
Art, ...
,
Red Hot Chili Peppers,
Tori Amos,
Alanis Morissette
Alanis Nadine Morissette ( ; born June 1, 1974) is a Canadian-American singer, songwriter, and actress. Known for her emotive mezzo-soprano voice and confessional songwriting, Morissette began her career in Canada in the early 1990s with tw ...
, and others.
References
Further reading
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External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Masse, Bob
Album-cover and concert-poster artists
Psychedelic artists
Canadian poster artists
Artists from Vancouver
Year of birth missing (living people)
Living people