Mario Amaya's Logo Mashups

Brazilian graphic artist Mario Amaya created a series of visual puns on corporate trademarks, tweaking text and logo elements of two separate brands to arrive at a compelling hybrid. Some of the logo mashups work so well that you have to look twice to realize what's been changed.


Although these graphic novelties were originally made for fun on his personal blog, they've made the rounds of cyberspace a few times over and do a great job of illustrating the power of corporate branding and psychological association. Even when the text accompanying a logo is completely contrary, the image still triggers familiarity in the mind.


Amaya recently added another batch to the series, and all links to all three pages are available below. His commentary on the whole project is worth reading as well.

Part 1 (April 2008) / Part 2 (May 2008) / Part 3 (December 2008)

Oliver Laric's 50 50

Berlin based artist Oliver Laric scoured YouTube for uploaded amateur videos of people singing, mugging, and dancing along to the music of rapper 50 Cent. He then edited fifty of those clips into a seamless medley of the hits "In Da Club," "Candy Shop" and "How We Do." The end result is a sublime mash-up of pop music fandom, from starry-eyed posing in suburban bedrooms and basements to jubilant sing-alongs at karaoke clubs and car stereos. Laric has done two versions of this project, using different clips for each.


50 50 - Original 2007 Version (2:06) / All-new 2008 Version (2:05)

He employed a similar technique to an installation piece on the Red Hot Chili Peppers song, "Under the Bridge." A note-for-note reconstruction of the radio hit was meticulously edited together from amateur instrumental versions found on video-sharing websites. An excerpt of the video piece can be seen at Laric's own website.

Girl Talk is a PC

Illegal Art's laptop mash-up maniac Girl Talk (a.k.a. Greg Gillis) appears in a commercial for Microsoft's recent "I'm a PC" ad campaign, in which he avows that making music with software and computers is the most punk rock thing you can do. His hotel room testimonial is interspersed with footage of him covering his laptop with plastic cling wrap in pre-show preparation as well as crowd-surfing on a sea of dancing fans. Microsoft briefly aired the spot on Comedy Central before uploading the 80-second ad to their official page on YouTube.

Update: Microsoft's done with the campaign but you can still watch the ad elsewhere on YouTube.