All posts tagged: Geoff Hargadon

Cash For Your Warhol (CFYW) Says “No Questions Asked” in Philadelphia

April 9, 2015 Artists, Interview

“No Questions Asked” says Hargo of this slyly-named collection of Cash For Your Warhol pieces opening this week at a small gallery in Philadelphia’s Fishtown neighborhood. But you may want to ask a few questions of your own.

The large CFYW billboard outside Penn Station in Philadelphia is more than an appeal, and less. Cash For Your Warhol. Philadelphia, PA. April, 2015. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

That’s the typical response that most viewers have when they see his printed plastic signs on telephone poles in desperate parts of town from Boston to New York to Miami to Los Angeles and many points in between. For six years the foxy Street Artist has been happily perplexing inquisitive and inquiring minds with evolving iterations of the sign he first placed on the lawn of Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachussets at the height of the financial crisis.

“So it was in March of 2009, it was the bottom. It was also the time when the Rose Art Museum at Brandeis was having tremendous financial difficulty and they had announced that they were going to be selling their art collection.”

He says these are the sorts of signs that appear in the more desperate parts of town. Cash For Your Warhol. Philadelphia, PA. April, 2015. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“It is one of the best university art collections in the country, and people went nuts,” Hargo explains in a lumberjacked-cuffed-denim-bearded-flannel-plaid-drip-coffee shop a couple of blocks away from the newly installed show.

“So the first sign that I installed was actually on their lawn,” he says with a certain glint in his eye. “That sign got taken down and it is currently in the Rose Museum in the employee lunchroom I’m told. ”

Image © Hargo

He knows his signs are collected directly off the street by all types of people – including a board member of the Warhol Foundation. Once the message catches the eye, certain people also feel compelled to call the number, which he eventually changed and connected to an answering machine. Listen to the messages on the phone installed at “No Questions Asked” and you’ll hear a randomized collection of the hundreds he’s collected so far. Sometimes they are simply confused, other times irate, or self aggrandizing. They warn him about vandalism or insult him for a variety of reasons.

Sometimes they inquire about selling art.

Cash For Your Warhol. Philadelphia, PA. April, 2015. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“I think the Cash For Your Warhol thing is funny, and I think it’s okay for art to be funny. Sometimes people think that it has to be all serious and intellectual,” he says as he discusses the more surface emotional aspects of turning the low cost sales medium on its head – a continuous source of entertainment and education for the artist and those who follow his work. He doesn’t mind if people don’t get it or if they literally take the signs for themselves. He has amassed a collection of similar signs himself, and some of their designs are mashed together in a handful of one-of-a-kind pieces in the show as well.

BSA: What kind of signs do you collect and how many do you have?
Hargo: I have a couple hundred – I only want the ones that are plastic signs that are printed – and only those that have a phone number.

Cash For Your Warhol. Philadelphia, PA. April, 2015. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

BSA: So even with those narrow parameters, it comes out to be 200 signs. That’s crazy.
Hargo: So wherever I travel – like I was in Florida and I collected a dozen of them. Before I go home I go to a UPS store and I mail them to myself. So I have “Cash for Your House’, “Cash for Your Junk Car”, um, but also “Tattoo Removal” is prominent. I have “Divorce $299”, “Insurance For Diabetics”, signs for Karate lessons, sports camps, dancing lessons.

BSA: Do the dancing lessons signs have a silhouette of a couple in a romantic embrace?
Hargo: Yeah, they’re like doing the tango or something.

BSA: So it is good that you are using these different signs to mash together in your own work.
Hargo: Yeah I think the last thing the people who made these signs expected was that someone would take this sign deliberately and blend it into one of these works.

Cash For Your Warhol. Philadelphia, PA. April, 2015. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Part conceptual, part culture jamming, sociology and anthropology, many iterations of his signage is on display in this brief but tightly packed overview of the entire short career of CFYW – including the special new one in Spanish that features green and red ink referencing the Mexican flag.

“It’s sort of the full collection,” he says, “and I made the new Spanish sign, which is larger format than previously but two sided. Each side is slightly different because when you pull the screens the ink is slightly different.”

Cash For Your Warhol. Philadelphia, PA. April, 2015. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“I think a lot of people in Philly are not familiar with his work but they are getting excited about this show,” says LMNL Gallery curator RJ Rushmore, who tells about a further irony where a deli in Fishtown saw one his signs on the street and sent out a tweet about it. Hargo saw the tweet and sent them a sign as a gift – which they promptly put in the front window.

“I just find it so surreal,” says Rushmore, “that an actual store is displaying it in their window display – an artwork that is an advertisement for an art show about a guy looking to buy art.”

Cash For Your Warhol. Philadelphia, PA. April, 2015. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The longer he continues with the CFYW project, the greater the layers of irony and commentary, and the more fulsome is the tribute to the projects namesake Warhol, who became famous by appropriating and elevating the mundane for consideration as art.

“There are numerous ways in which the viewer could relate to CFYW,” he explains, “and I don’t want my views to narrow or shift that experience. It’s part prank, yes, but also part outsider art, part art as commodity, part commentary on the 1%, part performance, part interaction with the viewer, part parody, and, as you pointed out, part Warhol homage. It can be light and funny, or complex and serious – take your pick. I want the viewer’s experience to be open-ended.

“It’s a street art project in the literal sense, because it often goes on the street, but I deliberately don’t abide by traditional street art ‘rules’ because some of those are kinda silly, and I don’t feel I need to follow them in order for the project to succeed. Ideas around permission, fabrication, acceptable media, a gallery presence, hanging off a building with a roller – I feel that sorta stuff doesn’t apply to me because I’m not actually trying to be a street artist.”

Okay, if you say so. No questions asked.

Cash For Your Warhol. Philadelphia, PA. April, 2015. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Cash For Your Warhol AKA CFYW “No Questions Asked” will open on April 10 at the LMNL Gallery in Philadelphia. Click HERE for further details.

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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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MOMO Paints Massive Work Across Lobby in Boston

March 24, 2015 Artists, Interview

Corporate Space, Happy Universal Shapes, and Additive Averaging

Two unusual aspects distinguish todays’ posting. One is that the featured project by the remarkable street artist MOMO is not actually on the street, rather it is in a corporate lobby – a quasi public/private place far removed from the origins and ethos of most Street Artists’ work. Secondly, the interview is conducted by our guest Kate Gilbert rather than us. An artist, curator, and creative strategist, Kate directs a Boston non-profit that curates and produces independent public art projects. We really enjoyed the conversation that she and MOMO had while he was in the midst of a two week installation – and we knew you would like it too.

~ by Kate Gilbert

In February the Brooklyn/New Orleans street artist MOMO arrived in Boston in the midst of Snowpocalypse ‘15, an unrelenting series of snowstorms and freezing temperatures that left Boston under 93” of snow. Undaunted by it all, MOMO completed a massive 250’ x 34’ mural over eighteen nights in the lobby of Boston’s iconic John Hancock Building bringing his signature combination of blending techniques, harmonious colors and universal forms to warm up the austere lobby and its wintery surrounds.

MOMO (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

The following is an excerpt from an interview I had with MOMO on his fourteenth night of painting, which followed a brief talk he gave with project curator Pedro Alonzo.

Kate Gilbert: So it’s 20 degrees in Boston tonight and the thermometer is stuck at 20 degrees. The snow isn’t melting, and there’s ice everywhere; it’s permanent. So first of all I want to thank you for bringing this to us. It’s great color and smart design.
MOMO: Cool, I’m glad you like it.

KG: One of the things I wanted to bring back from your conversation with Pedro is this idea of universal shapes and appealing colors. That’s something we don’t usually hear coming out of the mouth of an artist who originally started in the street.
MOMO: Pedro’s first question took me off guard because I hadn’t quite heard that from anyone. He said the murals made him feel good, and why was that. I didn’t quite have an answer ready then but I’ve thought a lot about it since and it reminds me that I have this great love for David Hockney’s swimming pools. A sunny landscape has a certain key of colors and mix of shadows and this variety of things that feels like it’s at the peak spectral combination of all these formal things like shade and value, and it lets us know it’s a sunny landscape.

Something about that really appeals to me. At different moments I’ve wished my art could be associated with swimming pools, cabanas, and beach towels – those things that are, for me, a godsend in terms of mood and inspiration.

I spent a lot of time in the south and I love a tropical climate and things like that feel really alive and vital. It’s no coincidence that I take so much inspiration from Jamaica. Not just the nature there but also their culture seems to respond to this vivid set of conditions. I want to put that in the paintings and I hope that is what’s coming through in what Pedro mentioned about being happy.

MOMO (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

KG: I think so. It’s happy and, especially at this time of year in Boston, we’re all keyed in to anything that’s happy.
MOMO: Good. I realized quite late that I respond well to warm climates and it’s why I stay in the South primarily. And I do think a majority of these forms keep repeating. They’ve come up in different ways through the years.

KG: Are they forms that you’re testing on the street? When you say universal, are they universal in your artistic vocabulary, or do you think for they’re universal for all of us?
MOMO: They’re meant to be simple and universal so the audience might enjoy these as their own, being just colors and lines, spectrums and harmonies.

For instance I’m relying heavily on just the impact of red. Or the right orange-red which I feel is lit by sunlight. It’s not so much a narrative or a meaning implied on top, it’s the concrete materiality of the work that has to carry the oomph.

MOMO (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

KG: Picking up on this idea of materiality, the space has this well, let me just say, it’s pretty unique. Have you ever worked in a space like this before?
MOMO: No, this is the best architectural chance I’ve ever had to do something, indoor or outdoor.

KG: What are you responding to in this space?
MOMO: The chrome columns are undeniably weird and fun and that’s led me to make the fat lines somewhat in scale with them, or in-and-out of scale with them. There’re a lot of vertical bands. Down there [pointing to the NE side] there’re a lot of noodly ones that are just going their own way. It struck me that having a conversation with those floor-to-ceiling forms was an obvious way to respond.

MOMO (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

KG: There’s this sort of forest effect going on.
MOMO: Yeah, there’s a forest! They have a gesture. Everything in here is real straight lines and clean and feels like it’ll last for the ages. But the columns do have a gesture and it’s right in front of the painting.

Besides the columns, everything in the lobby is a super straight, flat surface. I’ve tried to play off of that with soft forms so the building can show off. I’m doing something complementary in a way.

MOMO (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

KG: You’re creating a visual conversation with the architects. I’d love to see you in a room with I.M. Pei’s office. What would you say to them?
MOMO: I’d be interesting to see how this building has grown or developed on its own because it’s probably not the way the architect left it. They’ve designed security in a way that wasn’t part of the initial pedestrian flow.

KG: There’s this great performance going on here with people entering and leaving through the security desk, even now at 6 pm.
MOMO: And cleaning crews! It takes a huge staff to keep the building up to its standards.

MOMO (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

KG: So did you consider this audience or who’d be coming and going when you were making the work?
MOMO: Yeah, of course. First thing, I tried to identify was where people would see the wall the most frequently, or where they’d spend the most time. Because the wall is framed by the columns, you get a grouping of available vignettes.

I took the ends to have special significance. At one end there are tables and chairs where you can relax in a communal café area. I thought those areas should be dressed up in a way so you could look at them for longer periods of time. Then the center, I kept things more serious and somber because it has this stately serious pretense with the check-in desk and security being there. I tried to look at the space anthropologically.

KG: So the painting in the center is more serious? Is that represented in the darker, gray pinstripes created through…what do you call it, additive averaging?
MOMO: Yes, the particular color theory we’re working with when we add these gray tones is called additive averaging. I guess they just happened in the center by chance. The center is where subtle mixes are happening and the darker colors are coming through. In general, I want the whole thing to feel light but it needed to be grounded somewhere, especially there, so it didn’t seem silly.

MOMO (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

KG: I don’t think your work could ever be interpreted as silly.
MOMO: Oh that’s good because I want to take it right to the edge like a dance performance. Certainly dance can be seen as flippant or pure whimsy. But if it is balanced and well done, somehow it can go right to the edge and still be serious.

KG: Your work is serious and I get the sense everything is very thought-out and methodical. Were there any surprises when you got here?
MOMO: We changed everything! It’s been so much work! Struggling, redesigning, you know, minutes before we go. Part of that is because we weren’t able to use the sprayers. That was my mistake in understanding how much dust they were going to dump into their surroundings. We struggled a few days trying to make it work with a spray tent and it was not possible. So without the sprayers we couldn’t do the giant sweeping color gradations.

That meant things had to be redesigned so they’d still be exciting while staying unblended. I tried to break up the backgrounds that the stripes are going over, so there’d still be a number of colors changing. It wasn’t a solution just to switch fades for single colors, because I had to break things up in a way that’d keep them interesting.

MOMO (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

KG: That sucks.
MOMO: No, it’s okay actually. Somehow the sprays that I do outdoors are a rough thing. I don’t even know if they were working that well in this refined space. It has a texture that would be a little out of step with the high-polish feeling here.

KG: As a result, have you invented any new techniques while working here?
MOMO: Oh, that’s a good question! I’m doing this thing between all of my helpers where I’m taking screenshots off of the computer where I’m designing, sending them in emails, and then we’re all following the sketches on our phones. I feel like there’s a big potential there to synch everyone up in a detailed way. I used to print everything out and keep it in a laminated pocket which is good so you don’t drop your phone in a bucket of paint, but this is kinda better.

MOMO (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

KG: So maybe there’s a MOMO app in your future?
MOMO: Or maybe I need a phablet – a phone tablet where I can do all my Photoshopping and it hangs off my neck.

KG: All right, let’s get you a sponsor! I did want to get back to that audience question. When you’re working outside doing your posters between 3 and 6 am I assume you don’t want to interact with anyone. When you’re here, are you interacting with people? Or are you just trying to get your work done?
MOMO: We’re interacting and keeping our ears open. It’s fun to just feel what the response is like. We hear a lot from the security guys because they’re here all night. It’s been really positive from those people and other people who’ve come by and have an interest in art.

MOMO (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

KG: It is really hard to take in the mural all at once. Even from the outside because of these crazy columns, multiple doors and reflections. The most similar project you’ve done might be the Living Walls project because you could only see it all from within a car. Is there a way to see this mural? A narrative?
MOMO: I think it’s a sequential piece of artwork. Because you see pieces at a time and sorta have a chance to forget the first one that you saw by the time you get to the end. There’s not a way to see the whole composition all at once. That doesn’t exist. It’s like changing panels on any other media.

The thing in Atlanta has this opportunity for foreshortening. I tried to make it interesting if you were to stand in front of it, but also it collapsed all 1,000 feet into an instant image. Here you can’t really see everything collapsed.

It’s been fun to see how much it’s reflecting on the glass inside at night. I hadn’t seen that other times I’d checked out the spot. The chrome columns cast and catch all kinds of parts in new weird ways.

KG: Yeah, it’s going to be a really fun challenge for someone to photograph! Is there anything else you’d want Boston and beyond to know about this work?
MOMO: I feel really privileged to be working here in such a great, high-level type community and given such an amazing piece of architecture to explore. I’m just extremely grateful to everyone that made this possible and extended the necessary faith. The support has been great and Pedro’s been amazing.

MOMO (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Our special thanks to photographer Geoff Hargadon for sharing his shots of this hard-to-shoot mural for BSA readers.

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MOMO’s mural is the first in a three-part series of temporary public projects commissioned by Boston Properties and curated by Pedro Alonzo. It is on view at the John Hancock Tower (200 Clarendon Street, Boston MA 02116) now through May 31, 2015.

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Kate Gilbert is an artist, public art curator, and the director of Now and There, a new start up dedicated to creating impactful temporary public art projects in Greater Boston. When she’s not buried in snow she’s Tweeting as @kgilbertstudio and @now_and_there.

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BSA 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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BSA Images Of The Week: 02.22.15

February 22, 2015 Artists, BSA Images Of The Week

Here’s our weekly interview with the street, this week featuring Ador, Antonie Trouve, Brain Alfred, Clint Mario, Daco, Delphine Carre, Dran, EZK, Hiss, Icy & Sot, M Chat, ME, Meer Sau, Phillip Vignal, and Sweet Toof.

Top Image >> A warm embrace during our coldest week of the winter. Icy & Sot for Centrifuge Project. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Sweet Toof for Woodward Project Space. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Dran. Detail of his installation at Pictures on Walls. London. (photo © Julie A)

For our full coverage of Dran’s show “Public Execution” click HERE.

EZK in Paris. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

HISS (photo © Jaime Rojo)

M Chat in Paris. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Meer Sau in Paris. (photo © Meer Sau)

Mark Samsonovich is finding new ways to get his work out onto the street. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mark Samsonovich (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Ador. New piece in the French country side. (photo © Ador)

Phillippe Vignal in Paris. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Brian Alfred (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Clint Mario . Me . Ad Takeover in Manhattan. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Daco in Paris. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Antonie Trouve and Delphine Carre in Paris. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Untitled. NYC. February 2015. (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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Paris Street Art Update : “Je Suis Charlie” and “Pochoirs à Vendre”

February 19, 2015 Artists

Cash For Your Warhol. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Street Artist Combo says he was beaten for his street art advocating religious tolerance and naturally there has been a series of Je Suis Charlie variants appearing in the streets of Paris since we last checked in with this hot spot on the Street Art scene, so you know that many newly appearing works are charged with socio-political relevance. In these new images you will also see some fresh ideas from new names as well as long-term players, so those are encouraging signs of a vibrant scene as well.

You may also note an increase in the professional/commercial quality of some of these pieces and murals and begin to question how long a free-wheeling organic Street Art scene can last before low level opportunists cash in on it and turn it into a sad strip mall selling tchotchkes or derivative works by anonymous artists like a machine. Ah, capitalism, of thee we all sing.

The London scene has elements of this, so do New York and Melbourne, but we didn’t see it so obviously until photographer Geoff Hargadon returned from Paris with these excellent photos for BSA readers and gave us his account of a store he wandered into. Enjoy his account further along in this posting.

In the mean time, long live Paris and it’s many players on the street!

Love or money? Mygalo (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Philippe Herard (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Kashink . Bault (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Philippe Vignal (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Don’t slip! Not a Clet banana peel, but it easily could be. Cash For Your Warhol (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Ender (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

VHILS (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Jerome Mesnager (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Combo (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Invader (It is a fake Invader we heard) . Mega Matt (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Invader (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Una Vida (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Graffity…sans graffiti (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Bault (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Bault . Artist At Ome AKA Atom (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Fred le Chevalier (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Alaniz . Sebr (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

C215 (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Berns . FKDL (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Michael Beerens (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

We couldn’t ID this artist. It bears a certain resemblance to ALIAS but we can’t say for sure. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Tragic Optimist . Gzup . Le Diamantaire . Mega Matt . Monsieur BMX (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Tragic Optimist (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Suriani (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Sebr (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Sara Conti (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Nemo (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Madame Moustache (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Michael Kershnar (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Monkey Bird . Le Diamanataire (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Hopare (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Geoff’s account of his discovery in a heavily trafficked area known for Street Art in Paris recently. “Rue Déyonez is an active street for street art, with de facto legal walls on each side showing work from the most prolific Parisian artists. So I was walking up Rue Déyonez and this door was half open. I would not say it was exactly inviting but somehow I wiggled my way in. This guy named Pedro was in there with a friend, drinking tea.”

A quick scan reveals Warhol, Hendrix, Obama, Woody Allen at the clarinet, Freud, and of course Rosa Parks. Rosa Parks? Pedro’s Gallery (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

“I looked around and saw that the room was completely filled with stenciled paintings of (mostly) American figures such as Warhol, Obama, Hendrix, Marilyn Monroe, and lots of Jimi Hendrix. The smell of aerosol was intense, and I quickly concluded my host had never worn a protective mask in his working life. Pedro probably set up camp to capitalize on the flow of visitors to this concentrated display of street art. I didn’t quite catch where he was from originally and I don’t think it was France. He was certainly cordial. I poked around his rooms full of literally hundreds of stencils while he allowed me to ignore the PAS DE PHOTOS sign on the pole. I left with a (overpriced) stencil on a Paris map.”

Pedro’s Gallery (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Our sincere thanks to Geoff Hargadon for his contributions and for sharing with BSA readers his unique perspective and talent.

For more Street Art from Paris:

Paris Street Art : Spencer Elzey in Europe

Towering Gallery Full of Art to Be Demolished : “La Tour Paris 13″

Paris: A Mid-Summer Mural Art Dispatch

Touring the Other Side of Town, A Taste of Asheville Graffiti

May 24, 2014 Artists

When you first pull into a new town you have to trust your personal barometer; a series of individual metrics you have devised over time with which to measure its personality and state of mind.

For example, you may see how good the grilled cheese and tomato is at the diner, inquire whether there is an organized bowling league, ask if there are any dive bars with jukeboxes. Also is there an Olive Garden, can you buy fireworks, do children wear helmets when riding bikes, do tween girls wear Uggs, how many confederate flags are in the windows, what is the overall ratio of skaters to jocks, choppers to fixies, lawnmowers to yard furniture, tacos to fish-n-chips, tracksuits to chinos, tattoos to sports bras, pigtails to pigs?

It’s a personal formula, a mix of criterion that helps you to measure the world, and if we could be so bold, would help somebody else measure you.

Nekst and Gus Isrich’s portrait. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Our featured photographer today is known for checking out things like home made and semi-professional signage that announces important stuff in front of the VFW, Bob’s Big Boy, the car wash, and Latoya’s House of Hair.

Of special interest are those illuminated roadside box signs with the easy-slide letters that are always falling off – like the ones preaching hellfire out front of The First Baptist Church of Baconbit. Clever upcoming sermon titles aside, if the church is offering marriage counseling on Thursdays at 6:30 or concealed weapons classes every second Monday at 7 pm or the Men’s Pancake Breakfast coming up on Saturday, Geoff feels like he’s getting some very important information to parse together about a community.

Naturally, he also likes to sample the local graffiti. And that is why we are here today, dearly beloved.

Cash4, Avoid, Valet and Rezu (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

When Hargadon told us he was heading to Moogfest in Asheville, North Carolina a few weeks ago he also surmised he might check out its graff spots. Organic and locally grown, this aerosol outcrops on certain spots around town, especially the abandoned warehouses and back alleys in the River Arts District. Geoff loaded up his camera card and came back with a treasure trove. Not only that, he found local graffiti expert Mr. Zen Sutherland, who himself is a gold mine on the subject of aerosol and who helped ID the creators of these fine graffiti images.

Our sincere thanks to both for this great taste of Asheville. Burp.

Nomad offers this petulant ascertainment on a post (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Dogman (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

This area is known locally as Trackside Gallery. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Valet, Stuk, Ahgen, Trek, Unknown. Also a car that might have a pack of Salem 100s in the glove compartment. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Berth. In the foreground and installation by a sculptor who studied at the University of Blairwitch (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Ahgen, Uret, Dogman (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

TFL Crew, Gus Isrich and helpful handle and hashtag. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Fisho, Amanda Wong, Sicr, Sjay (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Uret, Valet, Relek (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Firey Hell and damnation with Berth, GTB, Gyser, Gus Isrich, Wins. In the background the original burning monk by Dustin Spagnola. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Gus, Tribute to Hal, Valet, Fowl, Ahgen, Houla. On the background Dustin Spagnola’s tiger. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Fowl (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Uret (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Eaws (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Still Life with Chairs and Graff. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Marze, Fowl, Ruin (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Kagn, Valet, Tribute to a fallen artist. Building 10 (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Connie, Valet, Aside, Dogman (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

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New Shots from Open Walls Baltimore 2

April 8, 2014 Artists

Open Walls Baltimore 2 has begun and only a few pieces have been completed but we thought you’d like to take a look, courtesy photographer and BSA Contributor Geoff Hargadon, who was tooling around one afternoon.

This spring Baltimore will be hosting a list that includes Zbiok, Anttu Mustonen, Ozmo, Nanook, Logan Hicks, Lesser Gonzalez, LNY, El Decertor, ECB, D’metrius Rice, Ernest Shaw, Escif, Gaia, Jessie and Katey, and Betsy Casanas.

Gaia (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Clearly! Baltimore (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Nether at work on his wall. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Nether. Detail. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Santtu Mustonen (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

What’s the 911? A police mini-bunker features Open Walls Baltimore 2 posters. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Click HERE to learn more about Open Walls Baltimore 2

Images Of The Week: 01.05.14

January 5, 2014 Artists

It’s been weeks since we had an “Images of the Week” posting with you, due to the end of the year spectacular we presented for 13 days; a solid cross section of the talented photographers who are documenting this important moment before it passes.

As a collection 13 From 2013 exemplified the unique and eclectic character of Street Art and graffiti photography today. Each person contributed a favorite image and along with it their insight and observations, often personal, very individual, and with a real sense of authenticity. Each day we were sincerely grateful for their contributions to BSA readers and to see the street through their eyes.

Thank you again to Yoav Litvin, Ray Mock, Brock Brake, Martha Cooper, Luna Park, Geoff Hargadon, Jessica Stewart, Jim Kiernan, Bob Anderson, Ryan Oakes, Daniel Albanese, James Prigoff, and Spencer Elzey for 13 from 2013. Also if you missed it, that list kicked off just after our own 2013 BSA Year in Images (and video) were published here and on Huffington Post, all of which was also a great honor to share with you.

And so we bring back to you some documentation of moments before they passed – our weekly interview with the street, this week including $howta, Appleton Pictures, ASVP, BAMN, Chase, Dceve, Doce Freire, EpicUno, Hot Tea, Jerkface, Judith Supine, Leadbelly33, LoveMe, Meres, Olek, Rambo, Ramiro Davaro-Comas, Square, and Swoon.

This weeks top image is a reprieve from the winter we’ve been enduring – a small hand cut frog clinging to a verdant fern – created by Swoon and snapped during a visit to her studio over the holidays. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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13 from 2013 : Geoff Hargadon “Girl on a Skateboard”

December 24, 2013 Artists

Happy Holidays to all you stupendous and talented and charming BSA readers! We thank you from the bottom of our socks for your support this year. The best way we can think of to celebrate and commemorate the year as we finish it is to bring you 13 FROM 2013 – Just one favorite image from a Street Art or graffiti photographer that brings a story, a remembrance, an insight or a bit of inspiration to the person who took it. For the last 13 days they will share a gem with all of us as we collectively say goodbye and thank you to ’13.

Geoff Hargadon is a photographer and periodic contributor to BSA who takes his shots from the perspective of an artist, collector, and unabashed fan of the Street Art scene. Affable and engaged with his surroundings, Hargadon’s wizened perspective is often looking for something that says more than what it appears to and in the process can be revelatory.

Girl on a Skateboard, An Avatar in Wynwood 2013

~Geoff Hargadon

With 400 million photos a day being uploaded to Facebook and Instagram alone, it gets harder and harder to shoot photos that stand above the crowd. I think this is no different in the street art world – maybe it’s even harder. This year I shot fewer street art photos than in years past because I don’t see much sense in capturing work that’s already been captured well by others. There is little to add. Instead I’ve been patiently waiting to document moments that come to me – it could be a random person entering the frame, a shift in the light, a changing composition. In this digital world, where others rush to be the first to capture and post something new, and where time is their enemy, I try to put time on my side.

Let me start with what I think is wrong about this photograph, shot in Miami on December 6, 2013, at 1:20am on NW 2nd Ave, between 24th and 25th: it’s dark, out of focus, the subject is not facing the camera, and, perhaps to the great disappointment of BSA readers, there is no art in the frame.

This is what I think is right about this photograph: it’s dark, out of focus, the subject is not facing the camera, and there is art happening all around the frame, very much responsible for creating the scene itself.

There are only a few of nights out of the year when Wynwood is this chaotic, and at this time of the year it’s because of the massive art scene happening around the art fairs. All of this helped to create the moment when I spotted this girl weaving her skateboard freely between taxis that were hopelessly motionless. She seems carefree, risky, happy, ethereal – many of the things that have drawn me to street art in the first place. She is an Art Basel Miami avatar.

(Further, taxis are so scarce in Miami that I challenge anyone to come up with a photo of four of them in a single frame.)

Location: Wynwood District, Miami. 2013

#13from2013

Check out our Brooklyn Street Art 2013 Images of the Year by Jaime Rojo here.

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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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Graffiti Coast-To-Coast on a Fleet of Trailers

December 10, 2013 Artists

It’s a rolling Street Art / graffiti museum as you fly down the highway and your car is suddenly surrounded by a fleet of 20 18-wheeler trucks all completely covered with pieces and tags.

– Or it will be as soon as a certain events company based in Denver, Colorado finishes plans to paint its entire fleet of 20 trailers with graffiti. It began last week in the Wynwood District in Miami when graffiti artists looking for a big slab of flat wall to paint asked the owners if they could get up on the three trailers parked outside one of the fairs.

Greg Lamarche, or SP One, told photographer Geoff Hargadon about his truck while he was up on a ladder spreading his signature pile-up of collaged letters across it while other guys were breaking out the cans on theirs. According to Hargadon, the event company liked the results so much that now they plan to extend the invitation to other artist in Los Angeles and San Francisco. “The plan now is to do the entire fleet,” says Geoff, “So…. imagine driving down Interstate 95 and you see a fleet of graffitti’d trailers. It would be f-ing AMAZING.”

It would be sort of like painting entire freight train cars, but out on the pavement. Just think of all the small pristine towns and villages that don’t have an opportunity to see large complex burners suddenly seeing a mobile gallery of graff one day and then, faster than you can sing a verse of “Travelin’ Man”, they’re headed up the road.

I’m up high and rolling coast-to-coast baby!

Breeze 5317 at work on his piece collaborating with CZR PRZ on the right. Wynwood Art District, Miami Art Basel 2013. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

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Snapping Street Spirit at Miami Art Basel 2013

December 9, 2013 Artists

Miami was sunny and warm all weekend! New York had two snow-related car pileups overnight and a two-hour snow/sleet delay for schools this morning.

Thus we explain the attraction of an annual art circus that swims through the balmy Miami streets and fairs and beaches in early December called Art Basel. Each year it is better and worse than the year before, depending on who you got to dance with, or how much money you made, or how many walls you painted.

For Street Art there is now a bit more glam and glitz than in the past as the circling investors/collectors/brands are poised to ponder and plunder the possibilities presented – and there are the looky loos with cell cameras clicking, posing with friends and sometimes the artist if you are lucky. And there is still the basic pleasure of hitting up a wall and hanging out with your friends regardless of who sees it or not.

But hopefully somebody sees it.

For photographer Geoff Hargadon the pilgrimage is one more art fair, and one more opportunity to get off the beaten path to see what’s going on in the margins. An observer of behavior and communications and anthropological behaviors, Geoff captures some of the art on the walls, sure, but he also is looking at the trappings and the detritus and associated meanings.

“I don’t see any sense in taking pictures of all the stuff that had already been shot by the rest of the world,” says Hargadon of these fresh shots from Miami that he shares with BSA readers today. “I was trying to capture the spirit and the chaos of the street scene in a different way while being true to the art, the artists and their work.”

STIK on London Streets and Walls

March 12, 2013 Artists

London Street Artist Stik has breathed a relaxed at-ease quality into the familiar stick man of your childhood and expanded his reach across walls, boarded windows, doorways, and buildings. Working on the street (and sometimes living on it) for the last ten years, the former live art-school model has grown in stature on the scene with his ability to imbue this archetype of the human with some measure of humanity, while keeping it purely graphic.

“The Street Art scene is a dialogue. It’s more than a dialogue – it’s a whole forum,” he says in the video posted below, a promotion for a new issue of Big Issue, where his figure is given center stage.

Here are a couple of photos recently taken by photographers Jaime Rojo and Geoff Hargadon as well as a look at the new figure from Stik that he says is “perfect… balanced.”

STIK ON THE STREETS

Lister Gives You a Look in Snowy London

January 26, 2013 Artists

Brooklyn by way of Austrailia Street Artist and fine artist Anthony Lister continues to communicate with the eyes. His disembodied faces and features appear on walls and corrugated surfaces on the streets, like these recent London installations, without context and full of expression. At turns mythic, gothic, and comic, the true intentions may not be clear but the (multiple) eyes say it all.

A new snow in the city blanketed and quieted clattering, chattering public spaces last week, giving a distilled quiet arena to quickly pass through. For the intrepid urban explorer, it can be a quiet city all your own to discover while others huddle inside cooking a winter stew, doodling in a journal, or maybe playing “catch me catch me” with a playmate. The newly pristine coating keeps the public away, but these Listers continue to grapple, grip, and clutch at you who walk by, giving you a look.

Special thanks to photographer and BSA contributor Geoff Hargadon for sharing these exclusive photos with BSA readers. Stayed tuned on Monday for more from London.

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