Pink Levi’s denim jacket with hand-painted Body Count artwork, embellished by Chains as a teenager, circa 1998.
Category: Curated
File Under: #BodyCount, #IceT, #90sCrossover, #HardcorePunk, #AntiAuthoritarian, #DIY
Description
If this jacket looks like it was made by a 16-year-old, that’s because it was.
Painted and assembled by Chains as a teenager in the late 1990s, this jacket documents an early encounter with anti-authoritarian aesthetics filtered through music, subculture, and limited political clarity. The back features a rough, hand-painted reproduction of Body Count album artwork by Body Count, the crossover metal group fronted by Ice-T. The band drew international attention—and backlash—with the 1992 track Cop Killer, which was pulled from distribution after intense political and media pressure, becoming a flashpoint in debates around censorship, violence, and artistic expression.
Additional patches extend the same lineage: an MDC chest patch referencing MDC (Millions of Dead Cops), and a heavily distressed arm patch for Crass. Together, they situate the jacket within a 1990s ecosystem where hardcore punk, hip-hop, and metal overlapped through shared opposition to authority, often expressed more viscerally than coherently.
The jacket itself is a pink, garment-dyed Levi’s men’s small, worn hard and modified by hand. It reflects a period where anger preceded analysis, and symbolism stood in for understanding. Preserved now as an artifact rather than a statement, it marks an early point in a longer trajectory of making, thinking, and revisiting.
Laundered, intact, and signed by the artist.
Pink Levi’s denim jacket with hand-painted Body Count artwork, embellished by Chains as a teenager, circa 1998.
Category: Curated
File Under: #BodyCount, #IceT, #90sCrossover, #HardcorePunk, #AntiAuthoritarian, #DIY
Description
If this jacket looks like it was made by a 16-year-old, that’s because it was.
Painted and assembled by Chains as a teenager in the late 1990s, this jacket documents an early encounter with anti-authoritarian aesthetics filtered through music, subculture, and limited political clarity. The back features a rough, hand-painted reproduction of Body Count album artwork by Body Count, the crossover metal group fronted by Ice-T. The band drew international attention—and backlash—with the 1992 track Cop Killer, which was pulled from distribution after intense political and media pressure, becoming a flashpoint in debates around censorship, violence, and artistic expression.
Additional patches extend the same lineage: an MDC chest patch referencing MDC (Millions of Dead Cops), and a heavily distressed arm patch for Crass. Together, they situate the jacket within a 1990s ecosystem where hardcore punk, hip-hop, and metal overlapped through shared opposition to authority, often expressed more viscerally than coherently.
The jacket itself is a pink, garment-dyed Levi’s men’s small, worn hard and modified by hand. It reflects a period where anger preceded analysis, and symbolism stood in for understanding. Preserved now as an artifact rather than a statement, it marks an early point in a longer trajectory of making, thinking, and revisiting.
Laundered, intact, and signed by the artist.
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