Today, I am proud to introduce the Artist Series with my custom Beats Studio headphone, available exclusively at Apple retail stores. When I first started my art career it actually revolved around music. As a teenager in Detroit I started creating and silk screening posters for bands and DJ’s. I identified my art with music and through that, music enabled me to find my own identity. That’s where creating art began for me and that relationship has never left. I am excited about this custom Beats headphone because this is the first time I have had the opportunity to convey the role that music and sound play in my creative process.

With this custom headphone, Beats gave me the freedom to express myself in a genuine and authentic way. In doing so we created a headphone that embodies what I do in the streets on a wall and what Beats has done with sound.

When I designed this headphone I used the image of an octopus as a metaphor for being submerged, completely surrounded, and literally underwater in my creative process. The same can be said about music and sound when you put on a pair of Beats. You get submerged and completely lost in the amazing sound. Aesthetically the ear-cups of this headphone simulate suction cups from the tentacles of an octopus. So metaphorically speaking when you put Beats on, they wrap around your head and submerge you into the world of music andsound.

Art does not make sense in a vacuum; it makes sense with a viewer to complete the process. For this custom headphone, Apple and Beats are a huge part of completing that process. Beats and Apple have allowed me to express myself in an honest and genuine way, and I think people will be able to identify with that when they see these headphones.

-Tristan Eaton