The art of the arcade
By James Acrow
Fingerprint Gallery was thrilled to present "Future Past - The Art of the Arcade" by James Acrow. The opening reception was held on Friday, March 27th, 2026 from 6pm-9pm.
We couldn't have been more pleased to have James present the first show in the newly renovated Fingerprint Gallery space, and to kick off a great series of programming through the rest of 2026.
"Future Past" was an immersive solo exhibition of fully custom retro arcade machines and the original artwork that brought them to life. Each piece was handcrafted — merging illustration, design, and interactive sculpture into playable works of art.
The show explored the emotional power of nostalgia while transforming it into something forward-looking. Inspired by comics, vintage gaming, skate graphics, graffiti, and tattoo culture, Acrow's machines and artworks revived the energy of youth and discovery — without simply replicating it. Instead of recreating history, Future Past reinterpreted it, reshaping familiar aesthetics into bold new forms.
Future Past invited viewers to step into a space where play, history, and reinvention collide, and where the feeling of the past becomes something new again.
About the Artist
James Acrow is a multidisciplinary artist based in Vancouver, BC. Emerging from Vancouver's early hip hop scene as a prominent graffiti artist before building a successful career in tattooing, Acrow is now evolving his practice, exploring new mediums including painting, custom arcade builds, and mixed-media works.
A fully custom, fully playable cocktail-style arcade cabinet by James Acrow, built for "Future Past" at Fingerprint Gallery. Acrow's original Luchador artwork — a love letter to lucha libre masks, comic-book bravado, and the bold flat colour of vintage arcade flyers — wraps the entire cabinet top to base. The cocktail format invites two-player sit-down play, the way arcades were originally designed to bring strangers across a table.
Hand-built by James Acrow in Vancouver, it features all custom artwork. Signed by the artist. One of one. Includes a curated selection of 500 classic arcade titles preinstalled and free to play. Ideal centrepiece for a games room, restaurant, hotel lobby, lounge, or studio. Local Vancouver delivery available; shipping quotes on request — please email jack@fingerprintgallery.com.
"Dragon" comes out of "Future Past," James Acrow's solo exhibition at Fingerprint Gallery, where comics, vintage arcade aesthetics, graffiti, and tattoo culture share the same air. The dragon is one of the great recurring characters of that lineage — a creature drawn a thousand times on biceps, sketchbook covers, and arcade side art — and Acrow gives it the bold-line confidence and saturated colour that only comes from decades behind a tattoo machine and a spray can.
This is the original artwork that became the side art for the Dragon Cocktail Custom Arcade, now available as a standalone painting. A working Vancouver artist with deep roots in the city's hip hop and graffiti scene, Acrow signs every piece. One of one. Available now at Fingerprint Gallery.
"Escorpian" is classic Acrow — a tattoo-flash icon brought up to date, drawn from the visual world of "Future Past," his solo exhibition at Fingerprint Gallery. The scorpion has been needled into more arms and inked across more denim than almost any other figure in tattoo history; Acrow handles it with the affection of someone who has actually drawn it a thousand times, and pushes the colour and line into territory that feels closer to a comic-book splash page or an arcade attract screen.
A working Vancouver multidisciplinary artist with deep roots in graffiti and tattooing, Acrow signs every piece. One of one. Available now at Fingerprint Gallery.
"Mantis" is one of the smaller mythologies running through "Future Past," James Acrow's solo exhibition at Fingerprint Gallery — a creature pulled from the same iconographic well as kung fu cinema, comic-book sidekicks, and the borderless arcade graphics of the eighties. Acrow renders it with the steady line of a tattooist and the confident colour of a graffiti writer.
Acrow emerged from Vancouver's early hip hop scene as a prominent graffiti artist before a long career in tattooing; he now paints, builds custom arcade cabinets, and works across mixed media from his Vancouver studio. One of one. Signed by the artist. Available now at Fingerprint Gallery.
"Panther" stalks out of "Future Past," James Acrow's solo exhibition at Fingerprint Gallery — a body of work that pulls comics, skate graphics, and tattoo flash into a forward-looking vocabulary. The big cat has lived on tattoo arms, jacket backs, and arcade marquees for half a century; Acrow knows the lineage by heart and pushes it somewhere new. Sleek, taut, and fully alive on the surface.
This is the original artwork that anchors the Panther Custom Stand Up Arcade — your chance to own the imagery that became one of the show's playable centrepieces. A working Vancouver artist with deep roots in the city's hip hop and graffiti era, Acrow signs every piece. One of one. Available now at Fingerprint Gallery.
Drawn from "Future Past," James Acrow's solo exhibition at Fingerprint Gallery, "Storm Demons" channels the lightning-strike mythology of old-school tattoo flash and skate graphics. Lines move with the looseness of a graffiti throw-up; colour hits with the saturation of a vintage arcade marquee. It's an image about energy that won't sit still — restless, electric, half spirit and half static.
Acrow built his name in Vancouver's early hip hop and graffiti era before a long career in tattooing, and that lineage runs through every mark here. A standalone original from the same visual world as Acrow's fully custom arcade cabinets — a way to bring a piece of the show home at a more accessible scale. One of one. Signed by the artist. Available now at Fingerprint Gallery.
A fully custom, fully playable stand-up arcade cabinet, hand-built and showcasing 100% custom artwork by James Acrow for "Future Past" at Fingerprint Gallery. The Panther artwork — taut, predatory, instantly recognizable — wraps the cabinet in original Acrow side art, marquee, and control panel design. This is an interactive sculpture in the truest sense: a working piece of furniture that transforms a household into an eighties arcade and a contemporary gallery in the same moment.
Includes a curated selection of 5000 classic arcade titles preinstalled and free to play. One of one, signed by the artist. Ideal centrepiece for a games room, lounge, restaurant, hotel lobby, or studio. Local Vancouver delivery available; shipping quotes provided on request — please email jack@fingerprintgallery.com.
A fully custom, fully playable stand-up arcade cabinet by James Acrow, built for "Future Past," his solo exhibition at Fingerprint Gallery. Original Storm Demons artwork carries across every visible surface — side art, marquee, bezel, and control panel — turning the machine into a wraparound canvas. Each cabinet in the show was hand-built in Vancouver by Acrow himself and features 100% custom artwork, giving the work the kind of one-of-one craftsmanship vintage arcades never had.
Includes a curated selection of 5000 classic arcade titles preinstalled, ready, and free to play. Signed by the artist. Equally at home in a private games room, hospitality space, restaurant, hotel lobby, or studio. Local Vancouver delivery available; shipping quotes provided on request — please email jack@fingerprintgallery.com.
A fully custom, fully playable cocktail-style arcade cabinet by James Acrow, built for "Future Past" at Fingerprint Gallery. The cocktail format — sit-down, two-player, glass top — is the most social cabinet in the arcade canon, and Acrow's Dragon artwork wraps the entire surface in the same original iconography that anchors the show. It plays like an arcade and reads like a piece of contemporary art, exactly the collision the exhibition was built around.
One of one, signed by the artist. Includes a curated selection of 500 classic arcade titles preinstalled and free to play. Drops naturally into a games room, lounge, restaurant, lobby, studio, or office. Local Vancouver delivery available; shipping quotes provided on request — please email jack@fingerprintgallery.com.
"Winnipeg" is one of the more personal beats in "Future Past," James Acrow's solo exhibition at Fingerprint Gallery. Place sneaks into the show the same way memory does — through type, colour, half-remembered logos, and the visual furniture of a particular era. Acrow brings the same fluency to it that he brings to his big cats and dragons: tattoo-line confidence, graffiti palette, comic-book composure.
Acrow is a Vancouver multidisciplinary artist who emerged from the city's early hip hop and graffiti scene before a long career in tattooing, and now paints, draws, and builds custom arcade machines. One of one. Signed by the artist. Available now at Fingerprint Gallery.
"Zoar" is one of the anchor works in "Future Past," James Acrow's solo exhibition at Fingerprint Gallery. Where his smaller paintings function like singles, "Zoar" reads like a long-form piece — denser, more layered, the kind of work that rewards living with it. It draws from the same wellsprings as the rest of the show — comics, vintage arcades, skate graphics, graffiti, tattoo culture — but stretches them across a bigger compositional canvas and a richer palette.
Acrow built his name in Vancouver's early hip hop and graffiti era before a long tattooing career; this is the kind of painting that signals where his practice is going next. A statement piece for a serious collector. One of one. Signed by the artist. Available now at Fingerprint Gallery.