Biography
Justin Hampton is a renowned contemporary artist whose career spans over three decades, marked by a distinctive style that blends bold line work, sublime color palettes, and vivid imagination. Born in Santa Cruz, California, and raised in southern Oregon, Hampton moved to Seattle after high school, where his professional career began in 1990. He got his start as a freelance illustrator under the art direction of graphic designer Art Chantry at The Rocket, a seminal monthly music magazine that served as ground zero for the Grunge era.
Hampton’s early work in Seattle laid the foundation for a prolific career that would see him become one of the most recognizable rock poster artists in the world. His influences are deeply rooted in pop culture, drawing from street art, the Skate-Punk movement, comic book legends like Jack Kirby, and the Post-Impressionist works of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. Over the past thirty years, his unmistakable artistic voice has garnered international attention, with his work exhibited in galleries and Hard Rock Cafe locations globally.
His contributions to music and popular culture are extensive. Since the mid-1990s, Hampton has designed posters for a virtual "who’s who" of the music industry including Pearl Jam, Ween, Queens of the Stone Age, Soundgarden and countless more, with a list too long to include here in it's entirety. He gained further acclaim for designing the artwork for Danger Mouse’s viral sensation, the Grey Album. His work has also appeared in television and film; notably, his art was prominently featured in the TBS sitcom My Boys, and director Todd Phillips commissioned him to create a poster for the cast and crew of his record-breaking comedy The Hangover.
Hampton’s career is distinguished by significant institutional recognition. His retrospective book, Visual Feast, was inducted into the collection of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland. Additionally, Seattle’s Museum of Pop Culture (MoPOP) has archived countless prints and original pieces from his oeuvre for their permanent collection. His influence was further highlighted in the documentary film American Artifact: The Rise of American Rock Poster Art. His extensive list of clients reads like a cross-section of entertainment and media, including Rolling Stone, Guitar World, Lollapalooza, Spin, Sports Illustrated, Scion, Oakley, Target, Dreamworks, Dr. Martens, and Seattle’s historic Showbox and Paramount Theatres. Beyond commercial work, Hampton holds a unique place in the world of gaming as one of the original artists for the global phenomenon Magic: The Gathering by Wizards of the Coast.
Today, Justin Hampton resides in Portland, Oregon, with his son, daughter, and his dog, Max.