Artist Edrick Garcia of South Bend, IN, didn’t sleep for three days. He had a deadline to meet. Over the course of those 72 hours—each one precious and fleeting—the challenge of working with a new and complicated medium persisted.
Garcia, who draws using pen and ink, was designing a beer can label for Evil Czech Brewery in Mishawaka, IN. The label, which appeared on cans of a black lager dubbed Fatal Flaw during September, is one in a series the brewery has scheduled over this year and next. Every two months, the brewery is releasing a new beer featuring an original label by a different artist. The artists, many of whom are Evil Czech patrons, also give input on the brew.
For Garcia and other artists involved in the series, the shape of the beer can has been a visual challenge. “You need to keep in mind that the audience will be at some point looking at an area [of the can] that won’t show the entire image,” he explains.
To keep his design interesting from every angle, Garcia depicted Medusa, the snake-haired mythological figure, vainly admiring herself in a mirror amid a backdrop of Greek motifs. Printed hop flowers blended with the background patterns hint at the beer’s bitterness, while Medusa’s snakes reveal the bite of habanero infusion in the lager.
The series has been coordinated by Bryan Corey, head brewer at Evil Czech, and Olivia Pesek from the brewery’s marketing team. Corey has immersed himself in the project, taking delight in the opportunity to work with other creatives—“like-minded people,” he calls them—in a process that involves art and artisanship in more places than on the labels.
“We sit down with each artist. I pick their brain about what they like to drink and what they might like to drink,” Corey says. He gets the artists thinking about ingredients—fruits they enjoy, even vegetables—and how those ingredients may influence their final piece of art.
Artist Katie Neece of South Bend, whose July beer, Peach Plaza, was sold out before the summer ended, found working with Corey and the staff helpful and fun. “[Corey] helped me come up with and agree upon a flavor description to fit my visual interpretation for Peach Plaza. I think discussing flavors as they related to visual appeal, and vice versa, was critical in making this beer work and succeed.”
Neece, who works with oil paints, was surprised at the response to her beer. She’s a patron of Evil Czech, loves its beer selection and truffle fries, and was excited about the “very positive reviews” of Peach Plaza from her own followers and even craft beer enthusiasts.
Other beers have included Abduction, a pomegranate-infused New England pale ale, and Imperial Youth, a red IPA infused with blood oranges and a 10.5% ABV kick. Many of the brews in the series have labels designed by artists contacted by the brewery, but some artists reached out to Evil Czech to participate.
When the brewery began the series in July, it had intended to release one new beer each month. But the response has been so strong that Corey decided to change the pace of the production schedule and add a month between new beers. That means the series will run through the end of 2019, and perhaps longer if more artists in the community express interest.
It also means a longer run of donations to Art Road Detroit, a nonprofit organization bringing art curriculum back into classrooms in southeastern Michigan. Ten percent of the profits from the art series beers goes to Art Road.
Stop into Evil Czech to try each new selection, available on tap and, of course, in a can.
Evil Czech Brewery & Public House
3703 N. Main St.
Mishawaka, IN
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