At this point, the Dunny Azteca II series is to the vinyl toy world what Dr. Dre's Detox is to rap enthusiasts — a highly anticipated, near-mythical release shrouded in secrecy. Fortunately, we've seeing more signs that the Azteca II series will, in fact, drop in the near future — even if the exact release date remains TBD. Over the holidays, the blogosphere was a-buzzin' thanks to leaked preview images of four designs from the collection by Marka 27, Oscar Mar, Jesse Hernandez and The Beast Brothers.
The Marka 27 design is consistent with many of the artist's illustrations, which covey a toughness derived from the hip-hop generation and yet reference ancient Mexican aesthetics, particularly ancient Aztec warriors and their take on body art and physical adornments. The Marka 27 Dunny design, then, features ear spools along the lobes, turquoise stripes meant to symbolize war paint, an elaborately sculpted headdress that frames the figure's head like a crest, and intricate tattoo-like body paint, including an arrow running down the center of its forehead — all in a punchy aqua, chartreuse, fern green, black, and gray color scheme.
The Jesse Hernandez design, meanwhile, features paisley-like red swirls with a shadowy outline to give them depth and dimension, as well as white vortexes symbolizing eyes. To give the design a more primal feel, Hernandez gave it a toothy grin by hand-painting curved fangs in an upturned smile arch.
Monterey, Mexico-born Oscar Mar went for a Skeletor-like, comic book-inspired feel with his Dunny design, which is significantly more ghoulish than the other two pictured above. The figure features long brown hair tied into a top knot, like the type of style sported by Otomí warriors, as well as blackened, hollow eye sockets, crooked teeth, and a skeletal outline. The greenish brown and black colors used to detail and shadow the Dunny's head add to the earthiness of the figure, giving it a weathered feel.
Stay tuned for more news on when these will drop!
