Grateful Dead

“The inspirational significance that I found for this piece represents the band’s impactful 60 year journey. The band’s music and live concerts represent many decades of sunshine filled positive light and energy, that the music has given to so many people.

The roses symbolize our deep love of the Dead. Inside the 60 I used a diamond like card, inspired from the gambling songs like Loser and Deal. The rays not only pull from Sunshine Daydream, but I used inspiration from previous Dead iconography and art, also represented in the font. The bigger semicircle was an abstract way to represent the number 60, as it is 60% of a full circle (the full sun). The aged patina on the red and blue also represents the 60 years of this unbelievable musical journey.

This logo is meant to pull from GD lore, yet be a contemporary interpretation for where we are now. I purposefully listened to a wide array of the Dead from early - to middle - to later years to help inspire what I was working on. As an artist I went on my own musical journey while I was creating this piece."

- Chris Benchetler

Mountains of the Moon, an immersive experience being produced in collaboration with the Grateful Dead, is coming fall 2025. The project pairs the improvisational connectedness that the Dead express musically with evocative visuals that push nonlinear visual-storytelling to its absolute limit. Learn more at chrisbenchetler.com.