9 years is a long time on the internet. Before Twitter, Facebook, iPhone or android… back when Myspace dominated the web I created Squadup.net, my first major art website. The domain is named after a North Carolina rapper, Pety Pablo’s song and the chorus goes: “Let’s Roc, let’s roll, squad up!”. I took to that, yelling “squad up!” is much like: roll out, buckle up and let’s do this. Just starting my art carrier, I was inspired to put in work and dive head first into a carrier of making shit.
I teamed up with Entire Cataglogue, a Portland, OR design firm to design a custom backend management system to upload, organize and manage the site.
Visually I was drawn to making close up crops of my works to create these thumbnails, which displayed in horizontal bars to allow the viewer to interact with the work. The websites minimalism and flexible backend management system allowed it to age very well for a website. It really started showing it’s age with the advent of HD resolution devices such as tablets and phones. Also post-facebook, it became common to click an image to scroll to the next one. I always loved this simple system of browsing images and for years had some website envy.
