Oliver was stabbed near-fatally last August in an unprovoked attack by a group of youths in East London and spent over four months fighting for his life in a life-support machine. Oliver’s family and friends rallied around him and Art Against Knives was created to rise awareness of knife crime, lead by Oliver’s friend and a textiles student Katy Dawe.

What started as a mare effort to help Oliver’s recovery, has now grown into something more profound thanks to support from big fashion and art names like Vivienne Westwood, Richard Nicholl, Giles Deacon, Tracey Emin, Banksy, Rankin and many others.

A class of Central Saint Martins students customised T-shirts donated by Topshop with heart-felt personal messages to Oliver. Shoreditch Town Hall’s underground space served as the gallery for many art and fashion pieces donated for the cause this Monday, followed by an auction in Shoreditch House last night, all to raise funds to make sure Oliver, who is paralysed from neck down, will be able to get the quality of life he needs.

The Magic Airplane by Tim Walker

Dame Westwood donated from her archived collections while fashion photographer Rankin had gone for an illustrious image of a knife with ‘Fuck This’ written in graffiti over it.

Heart-breaking story of a young man who’s life, who was tipped as an upcoming designer talent, has so dramatically changed due to no fault of his own, and even more poignantly he is one of us fashionistas, not some knife-wielding gang boy. It’s just proves that no one is immune to the horrendous knife crime that is sending shockwaves through our city and ruining lives.

Art Against Knives is only at its first milestone with more to come to prove that art and fashion do have a positive power.

For more information visit www.artagainstknives.com.

By Karolina Kivimaki

Wednesday, 06 May 2009

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