Not only that, he lived right around the corner from this new giant likeness. “He was born in Odense and the mural is located across from the house where he grew up, in the direction he is looking,” says the artist.
“Made in Oaxaca” Shifts Street Art Eyes to Historic Mexican City
Museo de Arte Contemporáneo Oaxaca (MACO) Show Features Pedro Alonzo and Friends
Already a cultural capital of a quarter million, the city of Oaxaca itself is a World Heritage Site and sits six miles east of Monte Albán, the Zapotecs city that is traced back to 500 BC. For MACO to invite curator Pedro Alonzo to create a show inside and outside on the streets is a stroke of inspiration and the quality of the selection of artists for the exhibition only confirms the inspiration.
Swoon. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
Today on BSA Roberto Shimizu, who owns and oparates MUJAM (Antique Toy Museum of Mexico), shares with us the images he took while checking out the installations last month on the street and in the museum. Roberto has invited a number of Street Artists to Mexico City in the past to create works and to participate in community-building projects so he was very excited to learn about this pretty remarkable event happening so near to him.
“We heard that great Street Artists from around the world were having an exhibition only two days before the opening so I made the six hour trip from Mexico City with my girlfriend and two other friends the following day. Some of the best artists in the world from México, Brazil, Germany, Italy, USA and the magical Oaxaca itself gathered in the streets of this beautiful colonial town to leave striking pieces of public art,” he says.
The list includes Date Farmers, Dr. Lakra, How & Nosm, Lapiztola, MOMO, Nunca, Retna, Saner, StenLex, Swoon, Vhils, and Yescka and represents a nice blend of local and international. “To see the How & Nosm twins painting those perfect lines and then turn your head and look into Santo Domingo´s Cathedral is something that made this adventure worth it,” Roberto tells us. “Seeing Swoon posting over top some RETNA calligraphy was also an “historic” moment.”
Swoon. Installation in Progress. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
Swoon. Installation in progress. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
Swoon. Installation in progress in collaboration with RETNA. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
RETNA at work on his wall. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
How & Nosm. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
Saner at work on his wall. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
Dr. Lakra at work on his wall. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
MUSEUM INSTALLATIONS
La Piztola. Detail. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
La Piztola. Detail. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
Date Farmers. Detail. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
Dr. Lakra. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
RETNA. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
NUNCA. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
How & Nosm. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
Sten & Lex. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
Yescka. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
Swoon. Detail. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
Swoon. Detail. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
Swoon. Detail. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
Swoon. Detail. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
Swoon. Detail. Hecho En Oaxaca. Oaxaca, Mexico. July 2013. (photo @ Roberto Shimizu)
For further information regarding this exhibition click HERE.
With much gratitude with Roberto Shimizu, Director of Museo Del Juguete Antiguo De Mexico, MUJAM for his photos.
Here’s our weekly interview with the street, this week featuring 2Easae, Alana Dee Haynes, ASVP, Dain, DALeast, ECB, Faith47, Jason Wilder, Jeice2, Lea Rizzo, Missy, ND’A, and SKI NYC.
Alice Solo and New Video of Group Painting on a Moored Boat
New work from Alice Pasquini in Shoreditch, Sydenham, Camden, and boatside along the River Thames where mud boots are required and someone to hold your ladder is appreciated .
Jessica Stewart shares these images with BSA readers of Alice in distinctly different areas of London, where the responses to the sight of an artist painting on your street vary greatly.
In Shoreditch, Alice was taken rather as part of the expected show, says Jessica. “Shoreditch is the hub of Street Art and Alice got everything from random reporters to a guide who does street art tours walking by,” says Jessica. The fellas in the spot next door seem particularly unimpressed of the lady on the ladder as they discuss the news of the day.
In Sydenham, a neighborhood that is newly embracing art to illustrate its vibrancy, the response was welcoming. “In Camden, which funnily enough doesn’t get painted much, people were much more fresh in their observations and really excited to see something go up,” observes Stewart.
Then in the muddy moorings of a dry dock barge in Bermondsey, just up river from Tower Bridge, Alice worked alongside Miss Van, Ciro Schu, Sheryo, and The Yok painting on the side of a boat while the water raised and receded and at times the artists felt like they might get sucked into the earth and the water.
“It was a crazy few days of racing against the tides to get in painting time,” says the photographer as she recalls the hotly humid air and continuously changing conditions. In the video of the boat painting party below that was shot and edited by Ben Grubb, it’s good to see Alice alongside the others even while the water rises.
Our weekly focus on the moving image and art in the streets. And other oddities.
Now screening: Dylan on Deitch: Reinventing the Experience of Art, and SANER MXDF .
BSA Special Feature: Dylan on Deitch:
Reinventing the Experience of Art
“The best art re-invents art for the next generation, but in addition, it references the long tradition that goes before.”
Jeffrey Deitch for President! In this new video interview with the departing director of Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (MOCA), film maker Jesse Dylan (yes) creates a warm and human six minute re-iteration of Deitch’s core appreciation for the magnificence of art and its power to transform. The video, popping somewhat out of nowhere a week after his announced cordial departure, is not quite “A Town Called Hope”, but you can imagine this running over a bed of thoughtfully plinking piano keys just before soaring with the eagles and the candidate emerging onto a starkly lit stage to the swelling of applause.
A polarizing figure in the art world for people who questioned his appointment there from the beginning and the appropriateness of a commercially successful gallery owner/showman taking over the helm of such an institution, from this perspective it looks like Deitch has stayed true to one of his core interests – exposing new work to new audiences and challenging conventional wisdom on how to engage, and who with. Much of our own abiding love for Street Art and graffiti is based on the concept that traditional purveyors of wisdom or art criticism have no place in its curation whatsoever.
“Art in the Streets”, although obviously a programmed exhibition, succeeded in mowing down the protests of many who steadfastly resisted giving such formal recognition to the impact and backstory of graffiti and Street Art on the culture and accepted canons of art. Everyone knew it would be a messy endeavor, and given the entrenched classism, racism, and gatekeeping that tripped wires for months, it succeeded on many levels nonetheless. So, this marriage didn’t work out, and in this country more than half of them end. No one will deny his unique vision and given his comfort with discomfort and curiosity for how people can engage with art, only a fool would think Deitch won’t be breaking new ground for exploration in the future.
“Art creates community experience, spiritual experience. The best art absolutely affects the way people see, understand the world and builds a sense of tolerance, openness, appreciation for different points of view.”
And in that same vein, prepare to be blown away by Mexican artist Saner, who embodies the true sense of inquisitive engagement and reverence for history while exploring new ways to connect. Through his own observations and study and romance with the Mexican mural art tradition, graffiti, Street Art, and his sense of magic realism, Saner shows us how to be fully engaged and question our own motivations.
In the translation here he says, “If you do not know what you are doing, or don’t have something to tell or say; a piece of yourself, a gift to the people, then what you are doing is cold, lifeless.”
Directed & Edited By Colin M Day, shot by Colin M Day & Kapta, additional footage by Gral Treegan & Jasso. Shout out to Ethel Seno and John Toba – excellent work.
Various and Gould have been hitting up billboards in Berlin this summer purely out of the love of the sport. Today take a look at the homage they are doing to a basketball legend – with a V&G twist of course.
“We are aware that Johnson is wearing the wrong team colors,” says Various while recounting the magic of their second collaboration with CHULA this season. Their inquisitive natural discovery method means they have a general idea how it might come together, and like playing with Earvin Johnson, hands can go anywhere but you just better keep your eye on the ball.
BROOKLYN STREET ART LOVES YOU MORE EVERY DAY
