Mambo Artists: The Artists Behind the Madness
Mambo was never just about clothes. It was about giving artists somewhere interesting to put their ideas. Preferably somewhere very visible. From suburban prophets and farting dogs to politics, pop culture, surf, sex, religion and the occasional deeply questionable joke, Mambo's artists created one of the most distinctive graphic languages to come out of Australia.
Meet a few of the people responsible. Please don't encourage them.
Prefer your art out in the world? Explore Mambo graphic T-shirts, hoodies and sweatshirts, or posters for walls with questionable taste.
REG MOMBASSA
One of the defining visual voices of Mambo. Reg Mombassa turned Australian suburbia, religion, dogs, landscapes and everyday absurdity into a wonderfully strange universe of art.
His unmistakable drawings helped give Mambo its irreverent visual identity — where the ordinary became surreal and absolutely nothing was too sacred to poke with a stick.
PAUL McNEIL
Artist, designer and enthusiastic troublemaker, Paul McNeil brought a graphic, pop-cultural energy to Mambo. Surfboards, cartoons, logos and wonderfully questionable ideas all became part of his playground.
His extensive series of Mambo surfboard graphics is documented in the Mambo Hardcover Book : Still Life with Franchise.
JIM MITCHELL
Jim Mitchell helped make the Mambo world a stranger and more interesting place.
Illustration, graphic design, humour and Australian cultural references collided in work made to be noticed rather than politely admired from across the room.
JEFF RAGLUS
Artist, illustrator and musician Jeff Raglus was almost genetically engineered for Mambo. Colourful, naïve, musical and funny, his work has the loose spontaneity of something drawn because it needed to exist — not because a marketing department had scheduled a meeting about it.
His 1993 Strange Brew pinball machine is represented in the wider Mambo archive.
BOB TILLERY
Bob Tillery was another member of Mambo's broad church of illustrators, artists and graphic mischief-makers.
His work contributed to the enormous visual vocabulary that made the brand feel less like a clothing company and more like a slightly unhinged Australian cultural institution.
For the bigger picture, read the Mambo story.
