We speak to Patrick Galvin AKA Hollow Bones about his fascination with nostalgia, Canberra’s creative underbelly, and the appropriate age for a child to watch Chopper.

If you’re the type of person whose algorithm slides in the odd Sopranos scene or a line drop from, say, Wake In Fright, you may have come across Canberra-based designer Hollow Bones before. If you haven’t – you’re welcome…

The company, which is helmed by Patrick Galvin, has built a reputation for bootleg shirts featuring iconic film and TV scenes and stars, designed in that very ’90s screen print style. They’re the kind of shirts that you dream of stumbling across in a vintage shop (but never actually do), and yes, in case you were wondering, they are strictly black. He’s also worked with a ton of awesome musicians like SPEED, Parkway Drive, AB Original and heaps more.

Often when you find a gem like this on the internet, one of the first things you wonder is, “Who is the person behind this?” And now that we live in a day and age where the BTS is just as important as the actual content, it’s only fitting that we slid into Patrick’s DMs and hounded him with some questions. Check the results below and head here to shop at Hollow Bones now!

How long have you been in this game? Tell us about your past (design no need to include any skeletons in the closet)?

I’ve been designing in a semi-professional manner for about 20 years now. I’ve had no real schooling or proper training but I designed a couple shirts for hardcore bands in 2006 and it’s been a downhill descent ever since.

Any skeletons in the closet you DO want to include?

I actually never intended on being a designer. I went to film school and had lofty dreams of being a filmmaker but that involved living in Sydney and honestly I hate Sydney. So I moved back to Canberra and sort of fell ass-backwards into design because it was something I knew how to do.

I gather you’re Canberra-based from your IG – is Canberra, contrary to popular belief, a creative hub of inspiration?

There’s actually a really sick creative underbelly to Canberra. I think because on the surface everything is so buttoned down and conservative, the weirdos and creatives have had to work in the shadows to create the scene and I think it’s all the better for it. It’s true counter culture.

How would you describe the Hollow Bones style?

I like to walk the line between clean design and grit. I don’t like anything looking too clean but also want there to be a level of clarity in the work I do. But blunt aesthetics aside – I think I wear my influences on my sleeve. I’m clearly a huge fan of film and music, pop culture as a whole and I like to weave my tastes into everything I do.

Why do you think we love nostalgia in art and design?

I think the easy answer is life is hard. The current day; every day life is fucking difficult and the easiest respite is to look back at better times. The bills are piling up? Just chuck on an old movie and forget it for a minute – there’s no real harm in it. But I do try to be mindful of too much nostalgia. Art can’t and shouldn’t exist on “hey remember this?” alone.

It’s a great tool in the arsenal to be able to dredge up memories within the viewer and make them feel something comfortable, but you also want to be able to create new feelings and thoughts for your audience, otherwise you’re just going backwards.

You’ve designed shirts for some epic hardcore and punk bands, and even dropped an insightful how-to vid (hehe). What sort of music do you listen to?

I come from and have been raised by the hardcore scene. I got into punk when I was 9 or 10 and hardcore came from that. I became active in the hardcore scene as a teenager and have been ever since. My design career only came about because I wanted to help out bands I listened to or knew. I think just about everything good about me has come from the hardcore scene in some way and I’m always trying to pay that back somehow. That’s how hardcore thrives.

Dream bands/musician you’d love to make a design for and why?

I’ve worked with some bands I could never have dreamed of and I feel incredibly lucky about that, but I would love to work with some of the greats one day; Merauder, Madball, Hatebreed. It would be amazing to do something with bands I’ve listened to for decades. This is me putting it out into the universe that I want to work with them haha.

What’s your favourite film out of the one you’ve made shirts of?

A real bucket list moment for me recently was partnering with Umbrella Entertainment to do a capsule of merch for the classic Australian film Wake In Fright. We treated the fictional town and pub from the film as if they were releasing merch to bank off the fact a movie was made there, so we did shirts, a tea towel, schooner glasses and even a commemorative spoon. I’m still so chuffed about that one.

What’s your favourite film that you are yet to make a shirt of?

One of my favourite films is the 1973 classic The Wicker Man. Influence from that movie works its way into my art regularly but I would love to do something proper because I just love it so much

What’s the one movie quote that gets the most use in your day-to-day life?

During the COVID lockdowns my partner put on a little movie screening for me because I obviously couldn’t go to the movies. She put up curtains, made popcorn, printed tickets and played Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and I didn’t realise it until then how much of my every day vocabulary is influenced by that movie. I must have watched it a hundred times as a kid.

One line that is always rattling around my head is Ferris doing a terrible job of playing the clarinet and saying “never had one lesson!”. I feel like that sums up who I am.

I see you’re a family man. What is the appropriate age to introduce your child to ‘Chopper’?

I was a kid that saw some pretty brutal 80s action movies when I was way too young and I still haven’t figured out if that’s a good or bad thing. My main goal with my son is to not fuck him up the ways I was, so maybe I’ll hold off on Chopper for a bit. I’ll wait til he’s 6 at least.

What other challenges do you face as a small business owner?

My beef currently is actually pretty Canberra specific. Years ago in Newcastle there was an initiative, I don’t know if it was local government or council or whatever, but there was a strip of abandoned shops in a prime part of town so businesses were offered very cheap rent to open shops to revitalise the area. Eventually they went on to pay full rent and so on, but it was an incredible idea and a great way for small businesses to get a leg up and do things for the local culture and economy and I want to see more of that.

Lately my partner and I have been trying to find either studio or shop space in Canberra because there’s a billion empty shops and every real estate agent won’t negotiate on price and it’s just untenable for a business like ours to take that next step here.

I think my point is, local government loves to cash in on the culture small businesses create but do fuck all to actually help them thrive and I’d love to see that changed.