37, also known as 37 LDN, is a London-based independent art brand, founded by Ocean Lewis in 2017. It serves as a place of reflexive artistic expression for model, athlete and artist, Ocean, as she transforms her timeless artworks into moving prints and high-culture apparel. With every new product, the art is redesigned and restyled for each medium, making 37 home to a process of constant creative renewal and growth.
Ocean’s artistic journey was inspired by her interest in Rotten Fantom, an artistic duo who specialised in stippling. A labour-intensive process of drawing one dot at a time, Ocean experimented with the style and found it meditative and even therapeutic at times, compelling her to increasingly integrate it into her approach to art. Although her art style went unrewarded while she was studying art at school, it became a firm process of self-expression and experimentation that now defines Ocean’s artistic identity.
Through her art, Ocean relays her interest in the occult, the natural world and tattoo traditions. She seeks to memorialise the subjects of her work, transforming the perverse into the beautiful and simultaneously, the beautiful into the perverse. Fundamentally, her work seeks to interrogate the natural vigilance against darkness and all that is held within it.
In recent years, her vision and technical skill has expanded, leading to her incorporating oil and acrylic paint as well as digital manipulation techniques in her most recent art pieces. This development has led to art works that are increasingly striking, blurring the boundary between contemporary and traditional practises to create an inimitable and distinct style.
In 2019, Ocean was approached to develop apparel for 37 and received outstanding reception. Although the brand had existed for two years at that time, it marked a real turning point for Ocean’s artistic career and motivated her into transforming 37 LDN into an established company. Now, 37 stocks everything from prints to tote bags to candles boasting Ocean’s very own artistic works. Realising Ocean’s desire to bring her art into the everyday world, 37 is the perfect intersection of purpose and aesthetic flair.
www.oceanlewis.com
