A Tribute to Michael Jackson

His face is known everywhere. His walk is more famous than any march. His silhouette, like his music, belongs to everyone.
How else could we say goodbye to the king of pop, possibly the very word made flesh, without using his own key features, the traits that made him an icon in every corner of the globe?

Colors, the magazine “about the rest of the world”, pays homage to Michael Jackson with a tribute created by a group of young artists at Fabrica. Through his shapes and his things, Colors uses a new, contemporary 'online' language both in the magazine's look and in its approach to communication. This same "viral" language simultaneously bounced the news of the king of pop's death through photos and videos spreading from one end of the planet to the other. 

The first "viral" issue of Colors emerges as a new, mutant personality of the magazine, its first stage a homage to the genius and legend of the King of Pop in Rolling Stone Italia.

The King does not die. He survives through the poetic and provocative short-circuits of the symbols and gestures that carved his image into our collective memory. 

Erik Ravelo, the creative director of Colors, led the initial research into the visual aspects of the Jacko legend, exploring images and video materials, as well as the graphic production of the new issue. 

Colors engaged in a process of letting Michael's 'all-time' face take shape. Having become a hidden mask over the years, almost an enemy of its own host, Colors attempts to restore it to the intimate, human dimension of passing time, placing the king of pop alongside the legends who live on in our collective imagination: Elvis, Marilyn, Che Guevara, John Lennon. 

Likewise, his two-tone shoes, which strode with silent resolution from soul to rock to pop through the pages of music history, become the unforgettable icon of his gift for dancing. From here to his unmistakable moonwalk, imitated in the dance steps of millions, is no great leap but Colors takes the analogy further with a star spangled banner at half mast on the moon, mourning its unreachable fellow American.
That similar sense of failed contact is repeated millions of times over in the grief of his fans holding vigils all over the world. The fans, representative of his essence and true reason for living, outline his profile with hundreds of candles lit in the darkness, reminding us that so long as his memory lives on, the king never dies. 

Creative Director: Erik Ravelo (Cuba) 

Contributors: Kiré (Cuba), Lorenzo Fanton (Italy), Alizée Freudenthal (Francia), Bryce Licht (USA), Lars Wannop (Australia).