“Let me find a quiet spot. I forgot we were chatting,” says Mr. Bingo, as we get on a confirmed scheduled call for our interview. “I don’t like planning things because it seems more free and interesting. And I feel that plans will weigh you down.”

Mr. Bingo’s plan makes perfect sense to me, since he’s a guy who also says he has no idea how he’ll make money this year.

According to the man’s bio, he was “born in 1979. By 1980, he was drawing.” To draw in any capacity at a toddler’s age is fascinating, which at least partly explains Mr. Bingo’s allure.

Then came 2011 when Mr. Bingo, an illustrator by trade, quit taking on clients. On Twitter, in a spur-of-the-moment kind of deal, he tried something.

“I came up with this silly idea to see if people wanted me to send them offensive postcards. It was a test to see if people would actually say yes. And they did.”

The response was overwhelming. He sent over 1,000 uniquely written insults and, in 2015, it turned into a Kickstarter-funded book titled “Hate Mail.” He raised over $150,000 for the project. It also came with a rap video (in the cube above).

“The Kickstarter changed everything because I realized, without sounding arrogant, I was quite popular with the general public,” he says. “And I could make silly ideas and sell it to people and make a living out of it.”

Mr. Bingo’s vision is similar to other artists in a way. Extraordinary to us, ordinary to them. His work and the press that follows has a provoking feeling, so it’s only right some may call him a disruptor.

“I don’t mind being called a disruptor. I don’t consider myself to be disruptive. I guess I find most of life quite boring and so anything I do a lot of people consider to be extremely out there, wacky or disruptive. A lot of people often say to me ‘I really like you because you say the stuff that we wish we could say but we don’t feel we can.’ Which is really sad to me. Essentially, everyone is constantly editing themselves. People are being a little dishonest sometimes in work, social and public life just because they’re scared of saying the wrong thing cause you’re not allowed to. Might get you in trouble. I think a lot of people like it and see me as the kind of voice, a pipe, saying the stuff they think but I somehow get away with it because I’m not linked to any companies or brand so I literally don’t care.”

This unpredictable life as an artist can be scary to some, but not to Mr. Bingo. While describing my admiration for his influence using words like brave and risk-taker, he politely cut me short.

“I don’t think it’s that risky but a lot of people do because you never quite know. I don’t know what I’m going to be doing in two weeks time. But, at the same time, I don’t really worry too much because, firstly, I’m privileged. I’m a white male in his late 30s who lives in London and has had a kind of easy upbringing and easy life. Unfortunately, that probably puts me in a position where I can afford to take more risks. I feel guilty about that but that’s just a fact.”

Many industry-raised artists, for various reasons, avoid speaking openly about how their race positively impacts their quality of life compared to others.

“I think the more open you are, the less you can avoid being criticized. I suppose the racial part is a good example. Anything to do with race people just avoid, they just don’t want to mention it,” he says.

But when you view Mr. Bingo’s work, you just laugh. It doesn’t rile you up or offer some deeper philosophical meaning, which Bingo says himself. “Well, you can if you like,” he says on taking away deeper meaning. “Im really just trying to make work to make people laugh. That’s the whole thing for me. Just comedy. Just trying to make the world a bit more fun.”

And in a way, that is a kind of deep.

Mr. Bingo has since moved on from sending out hate mail, at least that iteration of it. Today, just like the last sixteen years during which he’s worked for himself, his work is as it comes. That includes a Valentine’s Day project he launched a few weeks ago.

“I sold a hundred Valentine’s Day cards to strangers. It’s for single people and they can choose three different categories from romantic, creepy or filthy. It’s a similar way of working. It’s just strangers paying me and then giving me their name and address.”

And when not sending postcards, he finds other things to work on. I can remember when I visited Facebook’s New York headquarters in 2015, and saw inspiring signs on the wall that read “Work Hard and Be Nice to People.”

So when I came across a piece of art from Mr. Bingo that read “Work Hard and Be Shit to People,” it’s only right I laughed. Of course he’d find a way to disrupt a beloved quote!

An original from Anthony Burrill, Mr. Bingo says he “texted him one day” and Burrill agreed that Bingo could remix his work.

“I was looking at his print and thinking ‘Yes, it’s true if you do work hard and you’re nice to people, it’s likely you’re gonna do better in life by applying that mantra. But I’ve managed to prove the opposite by working hard and being not nice to people. And he agreed, which was brilliant.”

Maybe Mr. Bingo is on an extended vacation, or perhaps this is his lifelong career, but whatever it is he’s the envy of his designer peers. All for the sweet opportunity to create without limits.

Mr. Bingo is appearing at PromaxBDA Europe 2017, held March 13-14 in Amsterdam. Register to join us here.

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