NYC

Mr. Toll On The Streets

Mr. Toll On The Streets

Williamsburg streetwalkers have recently discovered a new cluster of Mr. Toll’s hand-painted clay sculptures on the streets of Brooklyn after a prolonged absence. His style has evolved a little, adding more detail and fluidity perhaps, and so have his subjects and interests. Prolific when he’s producing, he’s known to touch on difficult and topical issues such as immigration, environmental degradation, and systemic racism. His work sometimes has the punch of a political cartoon; direct and to the point but with a sense of humor.

Quality, craftsmanship, and a DIY ethos ; its all here with Mr. Toll.

Mr. Toll (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Mr. Toll (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Mr. Toll (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Mr. Toll (photo © Jaime Rojo)
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How & Nosm Studio Confessions

How & Nosm Studio Confessions

It is an age of self-discovery, and the twins continue to be surprised by what they find as they attack huge walls with zeal and precision in New York, LA, Miami, Stavanger, Prague, Las Vegas, Rochester, Philadelphia, Rio – all in the last 12 months. Now while they prepare for their new pop-up show, “Late Confessions”, to open in Manhattan in a couple of weeks, the combined subconscious of How & Nosm is at work, and on display are the personal storylines they will reveal if you are paying close attention.

How & Nosm. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

It’s a crisp sunny Saturday in Queens and we’re in the studio of a secured elevator building with cameras and clean floors and air thick with aerosol. Davide (or is it Raoul?) is on his knees with a tub of pink plastering goo, applying and smoothing and sanding this large oddly-shaped structure. When it is painted it will debut in the newly renovated Chelsea space whose walls were destroyed during the flooding of falls’ super storm “Sandy”. The gallery space of Jonathan Levine wasn’t large enough for the scale the brothers have grown accustomed to working with, so this more cavernous temporary location will take on a feeling of being part exhibition, part theme park.

How & Nosm. At work on a sculpture. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The impermanent sculpture of pressed cardboard is rocking between his knees as he straddles the beast and chides his dog Niko for jumping up on it. Rather than a sculpture, you may think it’s a prop for a high school play at this phase, but soon it will become a shiny black beacon of psychological/historical symbolism culled from the collection of objects they gather in travel. Born from the imagination of the brothers and affixed with bird decoys, clock faces, large plastic blossoms, and a rotary dial telephone, these rolling clean lines and saw-toothed edges of these sculptures will glisten under a heavy coating of midnight lacquer soon.

How & Nosm. Detail from a sculpture. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Like so much of the work HowNosm choose for their sweeping street murals, these new pieces may be read as undercover confessions of artists on display, but you’ll need to figure that out on your own.

How & Nosm. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

As you walk through the high-ceilinged studio, the excited twins talk continuously in their deep baritones at the same time at you around you and in German to each other. The barrage of stories are spilling out and trampling and crashing like cars off rails; An energetic parlay of authoritative statements and direct questions about work, walls, gallerists, graffers, cops, trains, toys, techniques. All topics are welcomed and examined, sometimes intensely. Sincere spikes of laughter and sharp swoops of fury act in concert: clarifying, praising, and dissing as they swirl in a rolling volley of goodness, pleasantly spliced with a caustic grit.

How & Nosm. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Looking at the precise lines and vibrant patterns at play in their work today, there is a certain cheerfulness and high regard for design in the compositions and sense of balance. Both of them site influences as wide as early graffiti, later wild style, cubism, and the abstractionists in their work. Fans are attracted to the confident and attractive illustrative depictions of scenes and characters, appreciating the ever strengthening free-hand command of the aerosol can and stencil techniques that HowNosm have demonstrated in their machine-like march through the streets of world over the last decade plus.

How & Nosm. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Though they estimate they have visited over 70 countries, they still love New York and both call Brooklyn their home right now.  And while the work they do hits a pleasure center for many viewers, time with both reveals that the stories within can be anything but cheerful. Raoul characterizes their work as dark and negative, born from their shared past, the adversity of their childhood.

“Negative sounds… I don’t know if that’s the right word for it,” says Davide, “but it’s not the bright side of life.”

How & Nosm. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

And so goes the duality you’ll find everywhere – a study of opposites intertwined. One paints a skull in the half circle, the other paints it’s reflection alive with flesh. You’ll see this split throughout, unified.

“We came from one sperm. We split in half,” says Raoul. “Life, death, good, bad. We’re one, you know. We used to do pieces by ourselves with graff – you know I would do “How” and he would do “Nosm” – then with the background we would connect.  Now we would just do pieces with our name “HowNosm” together as one word. I never do a How anymore, really.”

Their early roots in graffiti are always there, even as they became labeled as Street Artists, and more recently, contemporary artists. But it’s a continuum and the line may undulate but it never leaves the surface.  Davide describes their auto-reflexive manner of moving from one icon or scenario to another seamlessly across a wall and he likens it to a graffiti technique of painting one continuous stream of aerosol to form a letter or word.

How & Nosm. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“It’s like a ‘one-liner’,” he says, referring to the graffiti writer parlance for completing a piece with one long line of spray. “That’s kind of far from what we are doing right now but it is all kind of one piece. The line stops but it kind of continues somewhere. We are refining and refining, and it takes time to develop.”

Blurring your eyes and following the visual stories, it may appear that a spiral motion reoccurs throughout the red, black, and white paintings of HowNosm. Frequently the pattern draws the viewers eye into the center and then swirls it back out to connect to another small tightening of action. While we talk about it Raoul traces in the air with his index finger a series of interconnected spiral systems, little tornadoes of interrelated activity.

How & Nosm. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

This technique of creating inter-connected storylines is a way of intentional communication and storytelling, and how they describe events and relationships. It is an approach that feels sort of automatic to the brothers. “Our pieces make you think. You look and look and you find more images and you try to understand the whole concept,” says Davide. “I think you can spend quite some time just looking at one piece. You start somewhere and you can develop a story around it but you go somewhere else in the piece and you may do the opposite.”

Would you care to make a comparison to those other well known Street Art twins, Os Gemeos? They are used to it, but aside from being brothers of roughly the same age who began in graffiti and work on the streets with cans, they don’t find many similarities.

“Our stuff is more depressing,” says Raoul, “and way more critical. We talk about the negative aspects and experiences in life.” How much is autobiographical? As it turns out, it is so autobiographical that both brothers refer to their painting historically as a therapy, a cathartic savior that kept them out of jail and even away from drugs growing up.

“We kind of had a very disturbed childhood,” explains Raoul, “Welfare too, so…. I smile a lot and shit but in my paintings I think it is more important to express myself with what most people want to suppress and not show, you know? There’s a lot of love stuff, too. Like heartbroken stuff, financial situations – about myself or other people.”

How & Nosm. The sun goes through a hand cut stencil. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Davide agrees and expands the critical thinking they display in these open diaries to include larger themes they address; deceptively rotten people, corporate capitalism, familial dissension, hypocrisy in society, corruption in government.  It’s all related, and it is all right here in black and white. And red.

“Ours are continuing lines,” Davide says as he traces the canvas with his fingers, “Like this knife here is going to turn into a diamond.”

Niko provides security and inspiration at the studio. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

How & Nosm. Detail of a completed sculpture. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

How & Nosm. Detail of a completed sculpture. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

How & Nosm (photo © Jaime Rojo)

How & Nosm’s pop-up exhibition “Late Confessions” with the Jonathan Levine Gallery opens on February 1st.  at 557 West 23rd Street, New York, NY 10011. Click here for more details.

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Chris Jordan “Locost Queue” Debuts from a Tower in Queens

New Yorkers will stand in line for many things; heavily frosted confections from the Cupcake Cafe, the new iPhone 17, or the chance to rub against a sweaty stranger on a light-crazed dance floor while paying 8 dollars for a plastic cup of ice. Since the superstorm Sandy hit last month, many of us have stood in line for food and blankets, and since the banking superstorm hit in ’09, many more have passed hours on the unemployment line. While we stand, sometimes we can feel time passing, the hands of the clock slowly waving past us incrementally as we fill out our forms or scroll through our electronic devices.  Light artist Chris Jordan is illuminating and projecting our waiting plight in his new installation at the top of a 14 story tower of a former bank in Queens.

Chris Jordan. “Locost Queue” LIC, Queens, New York. 2012. From the group exhibition “How Much Do I Owe You” Street view. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“I’ve been working overtime on this installation, which on the surface is incredibly simple,” he says of his piece entitled ‘Locost Queue’, which debuted in darkness in Long Island City last night.

The forms are photographed silhouettes of people from the local neighborhood, marching slowly across the four 11-foot diameter clock faces. Describing the low cost piece that will run for 3 months as part of a group exhibition curated and produced by No Longer Empty, Jordan reveals some of the back story effort and planning that went into making this glowing show above Queens.

Chris Jordan. “Locost Queue” LIC, Queens, New York. 2012. From the group exhibition “How Much Do I Owe You”. For this installation Mr. Jordan fashioned a handmade four-way projector with a “reel” of silhouettes in continuous motion, projected on the four walls of the clock tower of the former Bank of Manhattan building. Indoor view. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“This has been anything but simple to accomplish, due to numerous constraints – including having to haul all the gear up three stories by rope, through a narrow hatch,” he says as he describes the grimy ladder and port-holed room. With an extremely limited budget, the resourceful designer had to forgo the powerful high cost projectors he is accustomed to working with and devise a decidedly old-fashioned approach to light projection. Ironically, as one stands in this dust-covered belfry on a chilly winter night it looks completely appropriate for a tower built in 1927, two years before last century’s bank-caused depression.

“Despite the challenges,” he says proudly as he surveys the shadows inside the drafty illuminated room, “it’s running, and looking pretty fantastic.”

Chris Jordan. “Locost Queue” LIC, Queens, New York. 2012. From the group exhibition “How Much Do I Owe You” Indoor view. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Chris Jordan. “Locost Queue” LIC, Queens, New York. 2012. From the group exhibition “How Much Do I Owe You” Indoor view. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Chris Jordan. “Locost Queue” LIC, Queens, New York. 2012. From the group exhibition “How Much Do I Owe You” Indoor view. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Chris Jordan. “Locost Queue” LIC, Queens, New York. 2012. From the group exhibition “How Much Do I Owe You”. Tenth floor view. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Chris Jordan. “Locost Queue” LIC, Queens, New York. 2012. From the group exhibition “How Much Do I Owe You”. Street view. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

View of NYC from a broken panel on one of the clock faces. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Chris’ installation is part of the group exhibition titled “How Much Do I Owe You” curated and produced by No Longer Empty. To learn more details about this exhibition, the complete list of participating artists and about the programs and mission of No Longer Empty click here.

Viewing every evening from dusk to midnight through March 13, 2013.

This installation depicts a queue of people moving through the four clock faces at this historic clock tower in Queens Plaza. The speed correlates with the population increase of New York City.

Best viewing is from the park across the street from the building.

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Klughaus Gallery Presents: Rime & Toper “Snap Back – Dangerous Drawings About New York” (Manhattan, NYC)

Rime and Toper

RIME / TOPER
Snap Back – Dangerous Drawings About New York

Opening Reception: Saturday, December 15, 2012 from 6-10pm
Location: 47 Monroe Street New York, NY 10002
RSVP: rsvp@klughaus.net

In celebration of Klughaus Gallery’s one-year anniversary, we are thrilled to announce “Snap Back – Dangerous Drawings About New York,” a dual artist show featuring Brooklyn natives RIME (Jersey Joe) and TOPER. “Snap Back” will feature illustrations and paintings that integrate elements of the artists’ past experiences living in New York City; each piece is inspired by a personal story. “TOPER is one of my oldest friends and a very talented guy with a very interesting life experience,” says RIME. “This show aims to tap into our life experience coming up in New York.”

Best known for his explosive use of color combined with dynamic lettering and innovative characters, RIME started painting graffiti in Staten Island in 1991. He spent many years mastering his style throughout New York and New Jersey and had achieved international recognition for his distinct aesthetic by 2003. In 2005, RIME moved to Los Angeles to concentrate on fine art. It was also in 2005 that he became a member of the legendary crew MSK. This marks the first time in almost a decade that RIME will be headlining a show back in his hometown.

TOPER grew up painting alongside such legends as Dash Snow (SACE), REVS, DG, SETUP, SCOPE, and of course, RIME, after the two met growing up in Staten Island. TOPER’s name has been known and respected in the New York graffiti art scene since the mid-to-late 1990s as a writer known for his distinctive New York street-motivated style, a technique he is now channeling into his fine art.

Klughaus Gallery

47 Monroe St.

New York, NY 10002

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Jaye Moon Builds Lego Housing Units on the Street

Street Artist Jaye Moon is doing a diminutive deed to alleviate New York’s ongoing housing crisis by leaving new buildings cradled in the limbs of trees, or wrapped around their trunks.

Street Artist Jaye Moon gets a hand from kids in Seoul, South Korea, where she has brought her distinctive tree houses from New York. December 2012. (photo © Jaye Moon)

Using Legos as building materials, the blocked geometry of her architectural construction is carefully considered and engineered to allow for the expansion of tree limbs and cautious to avoid damage. A Korea-born Brooklyn fine artist with gallery representation doing other work, Moon has more recently expanded her art practice to the street, and her multi-colored housing units have been catching the eye of curious New Yorkers – and thoroughly captivating their kids. Since we first discovered and debuted her work on the web in September 2011, she has also garnered a new collection of Street Art fans.

Jaye Moon. Seoul, South Korea. December 2012. (photo © Jaye Moon)

Moon says she chose Legos as a medium because they are ready-made objects that mimic industrial , mechanical uses and because they summon a certain childlike innocence and sense of play. When you discover one of her tree houses on the street, your mind jumps up to a fascinating miniature world above your head and your hand may reflexively reach to swing open one of the Lillipution doors or to tap your finger on a wee window. During a (aptly named) residency program last week in Seoul, Moon found a few small volunteers who offered to help with her latest Street Art installations. Experts on the intricacies of Legos, her young  assistants schooled her, which she says isn’t unusual. “Passersby love to join to help make my tree houses,” she says.

Jaye Moon. Seoul, South Korea. December 2012. (photo © Jaye Moon)

While Moon is not the first on the street to use the popular children’s building blocks – there have been a handful in recent years– she is the only one to take this architectural approach and to expand upon it so extensively. Each carefully planned construction is site specific and is carefully secured so that any attempts at removal will effectively destroy the piece. So while she is fascinated by the idea that housing could easily become mobile and portable, don’t try it with these installations. In addition to the ongoing housing project Moon has also been leaving colorful placards glued onto walls or under nooks, each spelling out phrases, secret missives, and colorfully vulgar words. But primarily for Jaye Moon right now, da house is in Brooklyn!

 

Jaye Moon. Seoul, South Korea. December 2012. (photo © Jaye Moon)

Jaye Moon. Seoul, South Korea. December 2012. (photo © Jaye Moon)

Jaye Moon. Seoul, South Korea. December 2012. (photo © Jaye Moon)

Jaye Moon. Seoul, South Korea. December 2012. (photo © Jaye Moon)

Jaye Moon in NYC. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jaye Moon in NYC. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jaye Moon in NYC. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jaye Moon in NYC. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jaye Moon in NYC. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jaye Moon in NYC. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jaye Moon in NYC. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jaye Moon in NYC. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Please note: All content including images and text are © BrooklynStreetArt.com, unless otherwise noted. We like sharing BSA content for non-commercial purposes as long as you credit the photographer(s) and BSA, include a link to the original article URL and do not remove the photographer’s name from the .jpg file. Otherwise, please refrain from re-posting. Thanks!

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Weldon Arts Gallery Presents: Robyn Hasty AKA Imminent Disaster in Collaboration with Alex Pergament “Dark Corners, Savage Secrets” (Brooklyn, NYC)

Robyn Hasty

DARK CORNERS, SAVAGE SECRETS

Referred to as perverse, neurotic, or bestial, our sexuality is often inhibited by fear and judgment. In “Dark Corners, Savage Secrets,” Robyn Hasty, in collaboration with Alex Pergament, reveals the most intimate moments of her sexual relationships, openly tearing apart these inhibitions in an interactive exhibition of photography, sculpture, and performance. Questioning the le- gitimacy of our socially-dictated taboos about sex, Hasty invites her audience to reveal their hesitations about sexual candor and transcend them.

Tucked away within a found wood installation, suitcases open to reveal nude photos taken clandestinely in the MoMA’s painting galleries, collodion tintypes suggest scenes of sexual dominance and vulnerability, and a nook with a slide projector allows the viewer to advance through an explicit slideshow of Hasty having sex with her partner. Opening night, the large-scale anthropo- morphized headdresses shown in her tintypes come to life atop semi-nude women chained to the gallery walls.

By offering up these intimate moments to the public eye,

Hasty defies our entrenched taboos about sexual transparency. Whether her work debases the moments of intimacy it records or whether this exhibition reveals a fundamentally

human connection is left to the judgment of the viewer. Will we choose to reinforce these taboos or to resist them?

Robyn Hasty, a.k.a. Imminent Disaster, has rafted the Mississippi River with the Miss Rockaway Armada, crossed the Adriatic Sea on a junk boat to attend the 2009 Venice Biennale, designed and built the sets for Jeff Stark’s “Sweet Cheat,” designed murals with the Philadelphia Mural Arts program, and collaborated with Swoon. Her work has been exhibited throughout the US and internationally. She has been featured on NPR for “Homeland,” a project which led her across 15,000 miles of the United States taking wet-plate collodion portraits. Her work has also appeared in The New York Times, New York Magazine,The Wall Street Journal, Juxtapoz, and The Village Voice. In 2013, she will be a resident at the Bronx Museum of the Arts.

Weldon Arts is a contemporary gallery in Bushwick promoting the work of emerging and street artists, and cre- ating a dialogue with the public about the relationship between art, culture and community. For more information, visit www.weldonarts.net.

Opening Reception: Saturday, December 15, 6–9pm
Exhibition Dates: December 15, 2012–January 12, 2013
Location: 181R Irving Ave., Bushwick, Brooklyn.
Hours: Friday and Saturday 12-6pm, and by appointment.
Directions: L to Dekalb Ave.; M to Knickerbocker Ave.; gallery is located between Stockholm St. and Stanhope St.

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Low Brow Artique Presents: “First Worldwar in Silkscreen” A Group Exhibition. (Brooklyn, NYC)

Low Brow Artique

XOXO in Sao Paulo had asked different artists in each of the cities to recruit artists to do  an edition of 20 silk screen prints all 11x 17″, 5 prints of the edition by each artist available for each of the 4 cities (1 print edition of 20 by each artist, 5 available for each of 4 cities=20). All the prints at Lowbrow will be under 50$ and will make a great presents for the holiday season!

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Josua Liner Gallery Presents: Dave Kinsey “Everything At Once” (Manhattan, NYC)

Dave Kinsey

Joshua Liner Gallery is pleased to present Everything at Once, an exhibition of over thirty intense, high-energy paintings and works on paper by Los Angeles-based artist Dave Kinsey. This is Kinsey’s second solo exhibition with the gallery.

As the show title suggests, Kinsey attempts to convey a world gone mad with media, perpetual conflict, and a sense of the mounting struggle between the urban and natural worlds. Kinsey creates this new body of work through a brash synthesis of materials, textures, and aesthetics, conjuring multilayered abstractions with traces of figuration which create dynamic transformations of images within images.

Akhal-Teke (War Horse), a large mixed-media work on canvas layers fragments of a galloping horse interposed with hard-edged bands of bright color and pooled washes of darker hues, evocative of deep internal conflict. Congotropolis layers transparent outlines of human and primate skulls with the profile of a classical figure head, playing up the similarity and contrast of competing species, surrounded by a frenetic atmosphere of high-contrast color. In Metropolis, Kinsey strips away all figurative elements and introduces an exclusively abstract approach to his work—a graphic composition of intersecting planes, blasts of color, and bursts of geometric line. In addition to these and other paintings, smaller collage works will be on view as well as a study of hands interpreted from classical images in ink and acrylic on paper.

Through his work, Kinsey explores themes of data domination and distortion, political upheaval, and the search for genuine identity in an age of virtual (or illusory) reality. According to the artist, “Collectively, the developed world is swimming in modern media; we’re learning to navigate this landscape every day while becoming unwittingly addicted, for better or worse. And that’s simultaneously exhilarating and a little scary. Throw in climate change and you’ve got a scenario worthy of our attention.”

Reception Thursday December 13 from 6-9pm

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The Superior Bugout Presents: “Kids Eat For Free” A group Exhibition. (Brooklyn, NYC)

Kids Eat For Free

What: Kids Eat for Free
When: Thursday December 13, 2012 from 6 to 10pm
Where: The Tender Trap 245 South 1st street between Roebling and Havemeyer
How much: FREE

On Thursday December 13, 2012 The Superior Bugout presents the opening night of “Kids Eat for Free” with artwork from North Carolina’s infamous NGC crew.  Artists FISHGLUE, MTN, RODA and Thomas Bachman share their photos, sculptures, and diatribes of tales from their travels and mischief.  Much of the work appeared in Miles Michaels’ 1480 Gallery in Detroit, MI earlier this year in August, and has now traveled with additional new work to Brooklyn.

The artists’ work documents the past Summer, traveling across America’s northeast corridor, southern and mid-western states and New York City stealing freight train rides and paint.  Along the way they’ve reworked the visual landscapes of the towns they passed through with colorful signage, roller pieces, and urban scrawlings.  The show will be on display throughout the new year.

Accompanying the artwork will be an experimental sound set with MIND DETRGNT BKF playing eclectic samples and sounds from his vast collection of tape cassettes.

The Superior Bugout seeks to bring a synergy of sight and sound, combining visual elements of the streets with contemporary sound visionaries. The party aesthetic comes from Brooklyn based multimedia artist Andrew H. Shirley, who’s work “Fuck Bike #001” is currently on display in the window of The Museum of Sex in New York City.

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Munch Gallery and Just Seeds Present: ‘Sowing the Seeds of Love’ A Group Exhibition (Manhattan, NYC)

Just Seeds

Justseeds Sowing the Seeds of Love
Opening Reception: Friday December 7th, 7-9 pm
Exhibition runs December 7-23, 2012
 ‘Sowing the Seeds of Love’ by collective group, Justseeds, is the newest exhibition in conjunction with Munch Gallery. Each artist has created a unique piece specifically for the gallery, and all original work will be accompanied by limited edition work. The exhibition will also include a site-specific collaborative mural. We are excited to present the first Justseeds group exhibition in New York City.
Artists include:
Jesus Barraza, Kevin Caplicki, Melanie Cervantes, Santiago Doesntsitstill, Alec Dunn, Molly J Fair, Thea Gahr, Nicolas Lampert, Josh MacPhee, Fernando Marti, Colin Matthes, Dylan Miner, Roger Peet, Jesse Purcell, Pete Railand, Favianna Rodriguez, Shaun Slifer, Chris Stain, Meredith Stern, Mary Tremonte, Bec Young.
Justseeds is a union of 24 artists, who bring together their individualistic opinions to collectively establish a certain perspective on their worldly views. Justseeds continues to collaborate with artists and other collectives from around the world, and the artwork is a forward attempt in discovering the issues and compliances of the human spirit in this world.
Founded in 1998, and originally the graphics distribution project of Josh MacPhee, Justseeds made the transformation into a worker-owned cooperative in 2007 – the original network being largely in place through past collaborations and friendships. In May 2010, Justseeds moved their distribution center from Portland to a new and larger base in Pittsburgh. Justseeds is a conglomerate of creative minds, whose artwork offers viewpoints on different social, environmental and political stances.
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Munch Gallery
245 Broome Street (between Orchard and Ludlow Streets)
New York, NY 10002
212.228.1600
Wednesday through saturday 12-7 pm
Sunday 1-6 pm
And by appointment
Subway: F or M to Delancey/Essex Street or D to Grand Street
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The Couch Sessions Presents: “Nuance” A Hotel Room Designed by Icy and Sot. (Brooklyn, NYC)

Icy & Sot

NUANCE…The Nu Hotel’s Launch of “The Couch Sessions Room” 
Designed by Iranian Streetartists Icy & Sot 

The Couch Sessions and the Nu Hotel present NUANCE, a creative series of ongoing hotel room installations highlighting the country’s most sought out artists and designers. NUANCE transforms four hotel room walls into blank canvases, allowing a hand selected series of artists the ability to create breathtaking mural designs. Each room project will also be matched with a custom music playlist curated by The Couch Sessions.

Iranian street-art brothers and stencil artists ICY AND SOT kick off the series with an exclusive event on December 7th, 2012 from 6 – 10PM. The event, sponsored by vodka brand Nuvo, will allow the media and the general public access to view the hotel room and meet with the artists.

Hailing from the city of Tabriz in North West Iran, brothers ICY AND SOT continue on their creative crusade to traverse pre-conceived perceptions of traditional Iranian art’s brevity through their highly intricate yet striking stencil artworks. Despite Iran’s cultural flourishing since the 2009 uprisings in Tehran, the challenges faced by creative free expression in the country are a constant struggle for its artists and society today. It is an oppressive force that provokes the Iranian art scene to fluctuate between an inhibited elegance and raw underground energy. This ambiguity is reflected in the vulnerable yet hopeful deep-set imagery of ICY AND SOT’s street art.

Date: Friday, December 7

Venue: Nu Hotel

Address: 85 Smith St, Brooklyn, NY 11201

Opening: 6:00 – 10:00pm

Free Entry

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Jonathan LeVine Gallery Presents: VINZ “Batalla” Solo Exhibition. (Manhattan, NYC)

VINZ

Vinz
Batalla
Solo Exhibition

December 1—29, 2012
Book Release: Friday, November 30, 7—9pm
Opening Reception: Saturday, December 1, 7—9pm

Jonathan LeVine Gallery in association with Sara & Marc Schiller of Wooster Collective are pleased to present Batalla, a series of new works by Valencia-based artist Vinz, in what will be his debut solo exhibition in the United States. In conjunction with the exhibition, Vinz Feel Free, a new book published by Wooster Collectivewill be released at the gallery on Friday, November 30 from 7—9pm, followed by an opening reception on Saturday, December 1 from 7—9pm.

Batalla features a series of mixed media collage works, paintings and sculptures. The central theme is a rebellion against governmental, corporate or religious impositions placed upon society to establish social order at the expense of personal freedom.

Vinz uses a multi-step process to create his unique imagery. He first photographs nude models, either isolated or orchestrated in small groups. He then paints animal heads onto large-scale prints of the human figures, creating hybrid subjects with a system of symbols attached to various species—birds signify freedom and fish represent consumerism while frogs and lizards convey authority.

In 2011, the artist began applying this series of work—the Feel Free project—to the walls of his native Valencia and other European cities using wheatpaste. Taking a more delicate approach to his studio work, Vinz collages paper ephemera into a background texture, as a base to print the figures onto, before painting details in enamel or gouache.



“Tapping into the question ‘What is Freedom?’ with arresting images in mixed media, Vinz is one of the most important emerging artists from Europe today.” — Sara & Marc Schiller of Wooster Collective 

ABOUT THE ARTIST Vinz was born in 1979 in Valencia, Spain, where he is currently based. He received a BFA in 2003 from Universidad Politécnica in Valencia. In January of 2012, his work was included in Hybrid Thinking, a group exhibition curated by Sara & Marc Schiller of Wooster Collective at Jonathan LeVine Gallery. Vinz was recently invited by esteemed fashion photographer Mario Testino to collaborate on two images which were published as spreads in the December 2012 issue of VOGUE Spain, for which he was guest curator.

Jonathan LeVine Gallery is located at 529 West 20th Street, New York, NY 10011.

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