“I’ve been waiting for the opportunity to do something like this. I’m a big soccer fan. I’m glad I got the opportunity. I put a lot of time and work into this poster,” says Madison artist Rodrigo Carapia, whose artwork is being featured on posters promoting tonight’s Forward Madison FC game. “I think this is something that artists really need. We need opportunities in these kinds of spaces, especially with a lot of fans like this. We can really show what we are capable of doing to so many people. We can show our skills and our passion for art.”
Carapia devised the soccer match poster for tonight’s Madison Forward FC game versus New England Revolution II that will take place at Breese Stevens Field at 7 p.m.
“I worked on this for different days a little bit by little bit. It took me 20-30 hours total,” Carapia tells Madison365. “It took a while to bring the whole idea together with the flamingos and the soccer and the colors. The flowers represent the Latino community and I wanted to make sure we had that in there, too. A lot of the Latino community likes those kinds of flowers. My art uses a lot of flowers, too, so it was important to me to add them.”
Carapia also added the logo of New England Revolution II for the promotional poster. “Usually, it would be the mascot but the other team doesn’t have a mascot so I was able to add their logo on the bottom underwater,” he says.
Dane Arts initiated creating game day posters with Forward Madison FC back in 2019 and Carapia was able to make the connection to commission this artwork for the Flamingos through Mark Fraire, director of Dane Arts.
“It is always an honor to support creative individuals like Rodrigo who are both highly professional and innovative in their work proving once again the impact of the arts: the arts heal, the arts build community, and the arts save lives,” Fraire tells Madison365.
Carapia was born and raised in Mexico City and immigrated to Madison 12 years ago when we as 17 years old.
“I’ve been painting since I was 12 years old. I used to do street art in Mexico City,” he remembers. “I moved here to Madison and I started to paint on canvas because there wasn’t a lot of walls to paint on. It’s a completely different art scene than in Mexico City.”
“I still do murals and things like that and I can design just about anything,” he adds.
You can see the many works of Carapia here.
Flamingo fans are encouraged to stop by Forward Madison fan services before tonight’s game to pick up an official #MADvNE match poster.
“I think this is a great combination combining art and soccer – two things that I really love,” Carapia says. “I feel really happy to be a part of this project and I hope that other artists will have this same opportunity that I had to do this because with more opportunities, people will be more excited and we can create more beautiful art. I think every artist needs something like this.”
