Australian Street Artist Reka was in town in the wake of the hurricane named Sandy and he found his plans for painting disrupted by flooded train lines, but eventually got up in three places in Brooklyn. On tour from his native Melbourne since July, Bushwick is just one more name to be tacked onto the list of places for Reka (or Reka One or James Reka) along with Amsterdam, Berlin, Bristol, London, Milan, Paris and the countryside in France.
REKA. Bushwick Five Points, Nov, 2012 NYC (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Here he brought his signature abstract portraits rendered in ochre, beige, moss, brown, black, white, rusted crimson and spice red. Typically illustrative of the female form, these figures are full of action with limbs and hands and elbows akimbo, gesticulating into air, flustered and animated with limbs bending from rivets at the joints. With wavelets of the darkest hair spilling and often with breasts barely pinned in or spinning free to make waves, Reka’s ladies in Brooklyn are unhinged consternation, contemplative and concerned, somehow heavy in their cubist side/front viewed expressions.
REKA. Bushwick Five Points, Nov, 2012 NYC (photo © Jaime Rojo)
The forms photographed here by Jaime Rojo may be cognizant of the destruction that New York is still dealing with, where homes are being bulldozed, many school buildings are permanently closed, checks are lost in the mail, and many families are reliant on others for food and shelter. Rendered in colors we associate with autumn, these new Reka figures are of this moment in Brooklyn, even as the artist moves on in search of his next spot to paint.
REKA. Bushwick Five Points, Nov, 2012 NYC (photo © Jaime Rojo)
REKA. Bushwick Five Points, Nov, 2012 NYC (photo © Jaime Rojo)
REKA. Bushwick Five Points, Nov, 2012 NYC (photo © Jaime Rojo)
REKA. Bushwick Five Points, Nov, 2012 NYC (photo © Jaime Rojo)
REKA. Bushwick Five Points, Nov, 2012 NYC . Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
REKA. Bushwick, Nov, 2012 NYC (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Other Articles You May Like from BSA:
Where are the Wild Things in Brooklyn? Just hang out on the sidewalk. Just spend a day and a half on the sidewalk painting a big mural and you'll be met by a barrage of noise - audio and visual - tha...
“All's Well That Ends in Impeachment #ShakespeareInTheTrump” “The empty vessel makes the loudest sound.” “Twelfth Bankruptcy #ShakespeareintheTrump” New York’s jewel of free theater in Central ...
Thought provoking, curious, underplayed. There is a certain circumspect quality to the Street Art scene in this seaside city in Spain that ranks third in population but which may be vying for the Stre...
This week BSA is in Moscow with you and Urban Nation for Artmossphere 2016, the 2nd Street Art Biennale, a group exposition introducing 26 Russian and 42 foreign artists who were shaped by street ...
We had a question going into the BSA Talks program at Urvanity in Madrid earlier this month: How deep is the street? Turns out it's very deep. We had 10 minds from different countries and discipl...