Jesus Is My Homeboy Official Original

Product Information

He got with another friend of his, named Chris, and they started working together making new shirts. Chris was dating a woman who was a wardrobe stylist for movies at the time, so I think she maybe gave the Jesus Is My Homeboy shirt to some people. David LaChapelle was born in Connecticut in 1963 and attended high school at North Carolina School of The Arts. Originally enrolled as a painter, David began to experiment in the medium of photography developing an analogue technique of hand-painting his own negatives to achieve a sublime spectrum of color before processing his film. For an artist who regularly turns convention upside down, I find it interesting that LaChapelle chose to represent Jesus in such a traditional way—open-armed, stoic, and glowing like a nightlight (and unmistakably white). The choice was intentional, no doubt; I’m just trying to figure out what purpose it serves, because I feel that that sort of Jesus doesn’t fit comfortably into a modern-day context—he’s too rigid and inapproachable. In the photos, Jesus isn’t really hanging with his boys (or with his homegirl, Mary M.). Instead, it looks as if he dropped in from another planet. Any thoughts?

He responded, “This is detective so-and-so. I need to talk to you. We got an anonymous phone call that said you were involved in a robbery a few years ago.” Once everything had calmed down, I just kept thinking, ‘Jesus is my homeboy’ saved my life. I gotta do something with that. He stood down, and one by one the rest of the crowd stood down as well until Van Zan understood that if he stood up and walked away, he would not be beaten down again.By purchasing the original prints and other products, you are helpingVan Zan to keep the “Jesus Is My Homeboy” Movement alive. What’s the answer? “Well, I haven’t achieved enlightenment,” he laughs. “But I guess it’s balance. We have to get ourselves in alignment.” Does he not miss some of the whirlwind of those earlier chaotic days, the adrenaline? He nods a no. “You know Epictetus, the Greek philosopher? He’s like, we all have a role in life – play your role and live it to the fullest.” Eventually, she told me to give her a call after she got out of work. She worked at some hospital where the shifts were from 2 in the afternoon until 10 at night. She said, “Come on by. I’m gonna take my bath, and by the time I get outta my bath, you should be here.” I was like, “booty call,” you know?

One moment in a man’s life. One connection made between two men. One message heard around the world. You may think you know all about “Jesus is My Homeboy”.You’ve seen the image on t-shirts, hats, and badges. It is the iconic design worn by celebrities too numerous to mention. You might be wearing a “Jesus is My Homeboy" shirt right now. It doesn’t matter. Unless you have already read this story and are reading it again from the beginning because it’s so amazing, you know almost NOTHING about “Jesus is My Homeboy”. At age 17, LaChapelle moved to New York City. Following his first photography show at Gallery 303, he was hired by Andy Warhol to work at Interview Magazine. I was freaked out. All I could see was blood forming underneath his head on the concrete. I immediately left the scene, aware that my out-of-state plates that read “VAN ZAN” were an easy tell if anyone had seen what had happened.Eventually, I got to my sisters’ house. My date had called them and told them I may have gotten jumped, so they were relieved to see me. I guess my date had spotted the scene of the second robbery while driving around looking for me, but she couldn’t see who was going into the ambulance. My sisters had already started calling trauma centers.

When fashion and fine arts photographer David LaChapelle saw someone wearing a “Jesus is my Homeboy” T-shirt in 2003, he was touched by the simplicity of the message. It made him wonder who Jesus’ original homeboys (the twelve apostles) were—or rather, who they would have been had God chosen to incarnate himself in twenty-first-century America instead of in first-century Palestine.I came to L.A. to start a singing and acting career around 1980. Three of my sisters and my baby brother had all moved here from Texas. I stayed in Oklahoma for nine or ten months right before that, and in that time, I had about five jobs. There was a lot of prejudice there. I worked at a plant with the son of the county’s grand dragon, the leader of its section of the Ku Klux Klan, and we got into a fight.

When we did, my lawyer said, “Van Zan, tell them your story,” which I proceeded to do. Then my wife went off. She was like, “How dare y’all take his stuff and make it your own? He has nightmares about this.” When she finally got out of breath and couldn’t talk anymore, I said, “I wanna thank you for what you’ve done, ‘cause it doesn’t matter to me how Jesus’ name gets out. What matters is that it got out, and you guys took it to places I couldn’t. So you guys are the messengers — just like everybody who wears the T-shirt — but it saved my life.” Soon after, we signed a deal.Jesus is My Homeboy” is way more than just an image.It is an epiphany. A revelation. It was not developed by a big fashion entity focused solely on making money. It was not created to cash in on a trend. “Jesus is My Homeboy” was born from a challenge that led to salvation; an inspiration fueled by a real life situation. He opened his mouth to plead with them, but they didn’t seem to hear his words. They only became more excited by his distress, and they circled around him and closed in like the mouth of a great, hot beast. “Kill him, homeboy! Kill him!” said the throng of faces that blurred together in Van Zan’s waning vision. Van Zan put his hands up, palms to the sky, and he said, He said, “Jesus is MY homeboy. And he’s your homeboy, and your homeboy,” and he pointed at random faces above him and he continued, “and your homeboy. Jesus is my homeboy and he is all of yours too. He is your homeboy.” Like many of the great masters, LaChapelle has been inspired by the classic nativity scene. While the artwork of Western religious narratives often glorified the church and portrayed Jesus in a more European mien, LaChapelle reimagines that tradition in this image, set in Africa. Here, the Virgin Mary holds the baby Jesus, sitting on the sand, surrounded by symbolism. In lieu of an ox, which represented patience in the Old Testament, LaChapelle features a man in an ox mask, nodding to the use of masks in religious and cultural ceremonies around the world. A bird replaces the traditional depiction of an angel on the scene, representing fertility, freedom, and the human soul. A leopard, considered to be the animal of a ruler, is represented, too, in the man drumming over the newborn, painted in spots.