May 2014

Chris “Daze” Ellis in Dialogue with the Collection at The Addison

May 19, 2014 Artists

The NYC Graffiti Artist joins Whistler, Homer and Pollock at The Addison

Currently the Addison Gallery of American Art in Massachusetts is hosting New York 1970s graffiti writer DAZE in Street Talk: Chris Daze Ellis in Dialogue with the Collection. At the exhibit opening a few weeks ago, a number of New Yorkers, including other writers and bombers from that period, friends, family, a few historians and curators took the trip to Andover to see Mr. Ellis receive recognition for his contribution to the graffiti art canon as well as to give witness to how his evolution as studio artist continues. Today photographer, writer, poet, and alchemist Todd Mazer takes BSA readers to the show and talks to Daze about his personal route through NYC to this station in MA. Daze (photo © Todd Mazer)

Inside a historic museum which houses one of the most significant collections of American Art a wide range of patrons gather. Some are still learning how to tie their shoes while others have likely built a lifetime of things with out the aid of an internet tutorial look on at works that seem to speak universally. What they are gazing upon is Street Talk: Chris “Daze” Ellis’s exhibition featuring his recent work in a dialogue with the Addison Gallery of American Arts expansive collection.

Daze (photo © Todd Mazer)

One observer is Maria Muller, Deputy Director of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. “I feel like the practical need to work quickly on the trains in his early career seems to be reflected in the dynamic style and sense of motion and speed in his images.”

As Daze gets mobbed up for photo ops in front of his piece entitled “View to the Other Side”, he reflects upon his identity and the initial spark that has led up to this moment. “People don’t realize when I was painting trains that it wasn’t a cool thing to do and it wasn’t socially acceptable,” he says.

“I began painting in 1976 after meeting a bunch of writers at The High School of Art and Design in New York. I was learning things in school but this was something outside of art school that was completely unconventional that I found incredibly creative and exciting. It is something that still fascinates me to this day. There is something very addictive about it.”

Daze (photo © Todd Mazer)

This graffiti addiction seems to be spreading to museums as well. Since 2011’s “Art in the Streets” exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Arts in Los Angeles, which was billed as “the first major U.S. museum survey of graffiti and street art”, more museums have begun to embrace this movement. Current exhibitions like “City as Canvas: The Martin Wong Graffiti Collection” at the Museum of the City of New York and the Addison’s “Loisaida: New York’s Lower East Side in the 80’s” also both prominently feature the work of Daze, for example.

Allison Kemmerer, The Addison’s Curator of Photography and Art after 1950, explains what is bringing these two worlds together. “One of the strengths of the Addison’s collection is its wealth of urban imagery from all periods and in all media.”

“Daze’s drawing from the vocabulary of both the contemporary world of graffiti and street art and the tradition of urban realism, this is exactly what attracts the Addison to him. We are always mindful of the continuum that exists between historic and contemporary art and the way objects speak back and forth to each other across media and time.”

Daze (photo © Todd Mazer)

Daze. Detail. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Daze’s journey to lead up to this point has clearly been an evolving process. “Almost all my paintings now are a mixture of mediums, each medium has it own characteristics and its own kind of history attached to it and you have to be patient to be able to deal with and find a way for them to all coexist in one picture frame. I had to work with them for a long time separately before I felt like I could combine them and come up with something that looked new.

Daze. Detail. (photo © Todd Mazer)

As Daze has matured as an artist, he has also discovered there is more to being a successful artist than just painting a ruggedly pretty picture. “The art world was and still is a really hard place to navigate through and some people are able to do a better job at grasping it then others,” he explains.

“I think in a lot of cases collectors have a lot more power with museums than even artists and play a very important role in all of this, somebody like John Axelrod who is very passionate about this art form, has the ability to start dialogs with these museums and I’m grateful he’s chosen to amplify voices like mine.”

From left to right Sean Corcoran, Jayson TERROR161 Edlin, DAZE, and Charlie Ahearn (photo © Todd Mazer)

Daze (photo © Todd Mazer)

As the crowd begins to thin out, Daze expresses the magnitude of this personal milestone “Even at a young age, I was always going to the library or museums so now it’s kind of mind boggling having my work in them because I still remember what it felt like to be that kid walking through the Brooklyn Museum.”

Daze. Detail. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Daze (photo © Todd Mazer)

Daze having a word with Jackson Pollock. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Daze (photo © Todd Mazer)

Our special thanks to Todd Mazer for sharing his take on this this story with BSA readers. To learn more about Todd’s work, please click HERE and check him out on Instagram.

Street Talk: Chris Daze Ellis in Dialogue with the Collection
May 3 – July 31, 2014
Addison Gallery of American Art
Andover, Massachussetts

Street Talk: Chris Daze Ellis in Dialogue with the Collection

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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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BSA Images Of The Week: 05.18.14

May 18, 2014 Artists, BSA Images Of The Week

Here our weekly interview with the street, this week featuring AEON, Arturo Vega, Bio Tats Cru, Balu, Bifido, COL Wallnuts, Crash, Federico Cruz, JMR, Kram, Kronik, Labrona, LMNOPI, Meca, Moby, Muro, Nick Walker, Stinkfish, TRN, Txemy, and Vexta.

Top Image >> Rooftop piece by Crash, Bio Tats Cru and Nick Walker. The shot was taken from a higher rooftop. A straight shot would have landed this photographer in the slammer and that would mean missing happy hour. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Crash, Bio Tats Cru and Nick Walker. Detail. Same piece as above taken from the street. See what we meant? (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Bifido new piece in Naples, Italy. “Don’t Forget to Play” (photo © Bifido)

TRN…what can we say? (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Moby…yes that Moby. “Receiving” Dedicated to the memory of artist Arturo Vega. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Moby. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Balu (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Ever feel like you need a mint? Vexta (photo © Jaime Rojo)

A clamoring collaboration of color from Txemy and Muro. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Txemy and Muro collab. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Why, you little green eyed devil, you. KRAM (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Labrona new piece in Montreal, Canada. (photo © Labrona)

Detail of a wall with a variety of wheat pasted art. Artist(s) Unkown, though we think we see Stinkfish in there. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Cruz (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Stinkfish . Meca . Kronik (photo © Jaime Rojo)

JMR and Col Wallnuts revisit the spot where a JMR rode for a few years, and now expanded and redefined it. The Bushwick Collective. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

LMNOPI (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Untitled. Brooklyn, NYC (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Graffiti and Street Art Show Some True Colors in NYC

May 17, 2014 Artists

“This really made my day honestly,” says Cope2, the Bronx bomber as he finishes his new rainbow striped iconic bubble letters in the Boogie Down. It’s a sunny, warm perfect Saturday in New York, and he writes on his phone as he puts it up excitedly on his Instagram, “It’s international day against homophobia this ones for my GLBT brothers and sisters!!”

Cope2 in the Bronx in front of his brand new rainbow striped tag. “Love is all we need”. May 17, 2014

He instinctively knows he’s bracing for some negative comment on his feed – this is New York after all and this is a guy some people in the graffiti scene call a “King” with a 30+ year history on the street as well as an established gallery career. And yes, there is a scattered disapproval and disbelief among the majority positive responses. “Why, Cope, why?!”, asks one, and “Fuck tolerance shit,” responds another. Earlier in the day someone had written “that SHIT gay as fuck boy,” and another “Fuck fagz bun a batty man” – but these voices were more or less drowned out by shows of support and thanks throughout the day.

“So clean and freshh”, “Beautiful,” “Memeo contigo”, “Great stuff bro,” “LOOOOOVEE!!!” and “maybe the haters will shut the fcuk up now. Way to take the high road.”

That last comment was probably a reference to the firestorm that erupted as he took on the big Houston Street Wall this past week and his own past use of homophobic slurs and insults on social media called into question his attitudes toward folks, and the meaning of his choice for this iconic Manhattan location that has hosted many big names including the openly gay Keith Haring . The discussions were hot and a genuine volley eventually took it in the wrong direction for all parties before finally public apologies were made and some people have granted forgiveness. But bruises still exist, and Cope wants to do his part to at least build some bridges.

On a day like today Cope is on top of it and for all his GLBT friends and fans he says he wants to make clear his position on gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender folks once and for all. “Love is all we need!!”…and we’re probably just going to go ahead and agree on that one.

A screenshot of Cope2’s Instagram page shows a number of the things that have been on his agenda lately.

But why bring it up to begin with, some would ask. Isn’t this sort of beyond the point of aerosol and bubble tags and graffiti and art? One of Cope2s Instagram commenters says, “cuz we don’t ignore shit that is wrong.” Truth is, there are a lot of folks victimized every day everywhere, and like a guy with a conscience Cope2 knows he has a voice on the street where it can matter.

“Given his stature in the graffiti community I think it sends an important message,” says Luna Park, the well respected photographer and documentarian of the graffiti and street art scene, particularly over the last decade. Park says that when a revered graff writer and artist takes a position on any issue like this, it has an impact on the peers and kids who idolize them.

“It is a signal. And from my perspective it is welcomed. I don’t think you can underestimate the importance of sending signals like that. And if you look at the feedback he has already received in social media – there is an immediate positive impact. He has an enormous platform and a lot of people look up to him and regardless whether you personally like his work or not, the fact is that it is important how he uses his platform.”

Street Artist Olek created this public performance installation directly in front of the Houston Street Wall today to mark International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia (#IDAHOT).

“So many kids are looking up to him,” says Street Artist Olek, known for her crochet street installations that have taken her around Europe and the US, covering the Wall Street Bull sculpture and even landed her in the Smithsonian. The Polish born Brooklynite wanted to do her own installation today by the Houston Street wall to show support of a community she feels close to, so she staged her crochet camouflaged models in front of it with rainbow crocheted cans in hand.

Street Artist Olek created this public performance installation next the Houston Street Wall today. The words read “Respect The Rainbow.com” – referring to a webpage she created for it also. (#IMAHOT).

“This is subject that I want to stand by,” she says by way of reclaiming some of the negativity that has been associated with the Houston Street wall that was once actually covered by one of the first openly gay artists painting in the street back in the 80s and 90s. “I want to be part of it and to make a statement and encourage positive vibes.”

Throughout the day there has been a lively banter about these new developments on the street and on social media and in private offline conversations. Most think that a page has been turned, at least a little one, and that some bridges recently burned may yet be built.

Street Artist Gilf! reposted her 2010 piece online called “Empower Equality”, saying “Today is International Day against Homophobia and Transphobia. It’s time to celebrate love, instead of honoring hate. We live in a world that exponentiates your energy.”

Cope2 tells us he has his eye on generating some positive energy in the graffiti and Street Art scene and with his new piece he’s telling us “Love is all we need!!”. We’re down with that.

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(Ready2)Rumbl in Rotterdam, The Netherlands

May 17, 2014 Artists

Cartoonist and illustrator (Ready2)Rumbl from The Netherlands is also a graffiti artist who likes to hit up walls. Sure he has done t-shirts and even layered wood sculptures of his various characters, “But the thing I like to do most is making big murals, the bigger the better,” he tells us. Full of movement and swooping line, his tight style keeps it light and on the move and deceivingly simple.

(Ready2)Rumbl new work in Rotterdam, The Netherlands. (photo © Ready2Rumbl)

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BSA Film Friday: 05.16.14

May 16, 2014 Artists

Our weekly focus on the moving image and art in the streets. And other oddities.

Now screening :

1. KATSU’s Drone Painting
2. Brandalism 2014
3. Pow! Wow! Hawaii 2014
4. Mural Festival 2014. (teaser for Montreal)
5. Herakut: Colors of Resilience

BSA Special Feature: KATSU’s Drone Painting

Bombing, spying, delivering Amazon packages. Gosh, what CAN’T you do with a drone? With an ominous soundtrack peppered with occasional blips and lots of, uh, droning, this video appears to show Katsu in a white hazmat suit diving and bobbing while driving his remote control spraying device.

Aside from the novelty and associated cool factor, it appears that the contraption may be even more unwieldy than a fire extinguisher – something Katsu knows something about. It’s all a big experiment at this point, something that happens often with art on the street, but only occasionally are the changes fueled by new technology.

Who knows what the practical applications will be for this technique of painting? Actually we all will eventually.

BRANDALISM 2014

It all looks so clean and efficient, this culture-jamming / media-jamming that just took place in Europe. Now apparently christened brandalism, this hi-jack of the ad message continues to gather fans an practitioners as people question both the message and messenger in public space.

This very large scale project replaced hundreds of paid advertisements with art, and probably some subvertising as well. The soundtrack makes it all seem sort of breezy.

POW! WOW! HAWAII 2014…

Yes, we know they are sneaking those Red Bull ads into this video – it’s called sponsored content and marketing industry reports say that ya’ll don’t mind. And why would you mind when the walls and scenery in Hawaii are so gorgeous?

Also, dang but what about all these wide hovering camera shots courtesy of ……wait for it………drones. (See first video up top).

So Pow! Wow! Hawaii! is wrapped for this year — Now prepare ourselves for Pow! Pow! TAIWAN!, just announced.

BTW, this jingle will make you tingle – like black pepper ice cream.

Mural Festival 2014. Teaser

Meanwhile, north of the US border, Montreal is preparing for another go at MURAL, with mostly French and Canadian street artists and an attached series of cultural activities. See the lineup near the end of the video.

Herakut: Colors of Resilience

In solidarity with the March 15, 2011 Syrian uprising, the resulting deaths and refugees, Street Artists Herakut created this video and this project. Well done.

“Street art by Herakut as part of a an AptART project with children in the Syrian Refugee Camp Zaatari and children in North Jordan, in partnership with ACTED, supported by ECHO and UNICEF. March 2014.

Videography by MESSRS., Film Concept and Edit by HERAKUT, Music by Marbert Rocel.

Poesia and Kwest Pay Tribute to Persue In San Francisco

May 15, 2014 Artists

“It is an amazing hybrid piece,” says Brock Brake as he describes the letter structure and color combinations of this new piece in San Francisco.

With Poesia bringing the wildstyle flames that evoke the firestorms that race across the western region of the US every summer, the graffuturist continues to tighten the angles here with Toronto’s accomplished and hi-definition Kwest in this new wall in San Francisco.

Poesia, Kwest, and “Persue”. (photo © Brock Brake)

The wall is a tribute to their friend, the San Diego graffiti writer/graphic designer/ entrepreneur Persue, who is very much alive, says photographer Brock Brake, so don’t mistake it for a memorial wall but rather a “you’re rad, dude, we like your style” wall. Nice.

Poesia, Kwest, and “Persue”. (photo © Brock Brake)

Special thanks to photographer Brock Brake for sharing these photos with BSA readers. For more about Brock please click HERE.

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“Coachella Walls”: Date Farmers Raise Profile of “Anonymous Worker”

May 14, 2014 Artists

Seriously, like Coachella is NOT even like in Coachella. It’s like in Indio. True story.

The annual concert festival that brings legions of middle class to somewhat affluent feathered fringed bikini babes and awesome face-painted dudes dropping acid while texting and buying merch? – and which apparently features big-name indie music at some point over two weekends in April? That’s not here. That town is called Indio.

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Coachella Walls Poster at a local farm. (photo © Medvin Sobio)

Here in Coachella, the “City of Eternal Sunshine,” no one shoots YouTube videos about “How to Survive Coachella” with hints about SPF 55 sunscreen sticks and personal sized hand sanitizer. Here you will find a mostly rural, agricultural, family oriented community which struggles with poverty regularly. They also pick a lot of your food.

That’s why Armando Lerma and Carlos Ramirez, artistically joined as The Date Farmers, began an “arts-driven community revitalization project” on March 31st, recognized in California as Cesar Chavez Day.

Armando Lerma of The Date Farmers keeps and eye on the rambunctious fans. (photo © Medvin Sobio)

Inviting solidly remarkable street art and mural-painting talents to show some camaraderie with the working men and women in this community, the first annual Coachella Walls has now made its mark in the Historic Pueblo Viejo District of downtown. Here also is the recently opened Date Farmers Art Studios, which they hope will serve as the city’s first art gallery and artist residency.

Thematically joined to honor Chavez and the Anonymous Farm Worker, the festival invited a group of muralists and contemporary artists with Latin American cultural influences in their work, including artists like El Mac (Arizona), Nunca (Brazil), Saner (Mexico), Andrew Hem (Cambodia), Liqen (Spain), Albert Reyes (Los Angeles), Vyal Reyes (Los Angeles), Sego (Mexico), The Phantom (Los Angeles), Jim Darling (Texas), and more.

According to the organizers, “Despite supplying the region with close to half a million dollars a year in vegetable crops, many of the farm workers in the Eastern Coachella Valley continue to live in unsafe and unhealthy conditions.” With murals, luck and a whole burlap sack of talent like this, Coachella Walls aims to bring awareness to these issues and others related to the life of the worker here.

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The Date Farmers (photo © Medvin Sobio)

Medvin Sobio was contacted by the Date Farmers to help produce and curate the public art project, and he shows us some of the images that came out of this very first annual event. Coachella Walls is funded by the city of Coachella’s public arts fund and is curated by Sobio, the director of The Academy of Street Art in Los Angeles. Our thanks to Medvin and the Date Farmers for sharing these images with us.

The Date Farmers at work on “Casa de Trabajador”(photo © Medvin Sobio)

The Date Farmers (photo © Medvin Sobio)

Armando and Carlos assessing the progress. The Date Farmers (photo © Medvin Sobio)

The Date Farmers (photo © Medvin Sobio)

Albert Reyes (photo © Medvin Sobio)

Andrew Hem (photo © Medvin Sobio)

Andrew Hem with Carlos Ramirez of The Date Farmers (photo © Medvin Sobio)

Andrew Hem (photo © Medvin Sobio)

El Mac (photo © Medvin Sobio)

El Mac chats with Andrew Hem. (photo © Medvin Sobio)

El Mac. Carlos Ramirez of The Date Farmers snaps a shot. (photo © Medvin Sobio)

Says El Mac about this painting on his blog, “It’s not intended to represent any one specific person, but rather many people, especially the “anonymous farm worker”. Farm workers in this country have been marginalized despite producing the very food we all need for survival. The Coachella valley is an important region for farming, and has been the setting for many of the struggles by the UFW to to improve workers’ rights since the 60s..and you can feel this history there.”

El Mac (photo © Medvin Sobio)

Nunca (photo © Medvin Sobio)

Nunca “The Band” (photo © Medvin Sobio)

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“Done!” Murals from Rubin, Aakash, & Hellbent : Domino Walls Part II

May 13, 2014 Artists, Interview

“Done!” comes the text from Rubin, who is floating on his scissor lift six feet above the line of people down Kent Avenue that is cued along Aakash Nihalani’s new wall for the public opening of Kara Walker’s exhibit in the Domino factory warehouse.

Swear to the Sugar Gods: Not 10 minutes later “Done” arrives again on our phone screens, this time from Hellbent, signaling that his ginormous 476 foot mural is complete as well – three weeks, several rainstorms, and a five borough bike tour elapsing since he and his team started.

Hellbent. Process shot taken during the Five-Borough Bike tour. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Our Domino Walls project hit this finish line this weekend, and although there is at least one more wall to be revealed a little later in this phase, we thought we’d get these shots out to BSA readers so you’d have closure on our progress post last week.

It’s been a dope project and each one of the artists has told us some good information about the thinking and inspiration behind their pieces, their links to geometric forms and futurism – so we’ll share some of that for you too. Also we want to give a shout out to the Walentas family, who funded this project and who we’ve known since we worked as artists, volunteers, fundraisers, exhibitors in DUMBO during the 90s and 00s. They have always provided platforms for creative types to get their stuff out there into the community. Here’s another.

Hellbent. Process shot. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“I like how you can trick the eye using geometric shapes, shadows, and patterns and color in my newer paintings. I think what Poesia has been talking about and organizing around with Graffuturism is something that I feel aligned with in street work and mural work and in the urban contemporary setting. It is a kind of return to abstract art. Graff has gone through lettering, to characters, to pictoral, and now we are coming into abstraction and that’s the stuff that I’m into right now,” says Hellbent.

“So I’m seeing a lot of work that is coming out of eastern Europe, in Poland, and a scattering of these guys in America and central Europe and it is work that I’m drawn to and influenced by. I think Graffuturism is a kind of good term for what is going on right now – it’s a subset of all these other different things that are going on in the streets.”

Hellbent. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Brooklyn Street Art: Can you tell us anything about the neighbors taking great interest in the paintings. We’ve heard you have some new fans.

Hellbent: Yes, I’m really happy to say that the Hasidic community has been really behind what’s going on here. I’ve had some really great conversations with them while we’ve been painting. It’s been really nice to hear that and I like to see my audience broadening a bit like that. I think a lot of people are just happy to see something besides this green wall, actually.

Hellbent. Tools of the trade. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Hellbent. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Hellbent. North View. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Hellbent. North view. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Hellbent. South view. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Aakash Nihalani. Shot taken during the Five-Borough Bike tour. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Aakash Nihalani. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Brooklyn Street Art: You’ve always been interested in sort of pulling geometry out of spaces and revealing it. Is that right?
Aakash Nihalani: Kind of. I mean I think more often than not it is highlighting the space that is already there. So it’s not necessarily creating a new space its more about highlighting the space that already exists, I guess.

Brooklyn Street Art: As you have gone bigger, has it been a difficult transition?
Aakash Nihalani: I wouldn’t say difficult, but I work with tape and I don’t work with paint and this is all paint, so in that sense it is out of my medium realm. Having tried spray paint now – I’m really not interested in murals and painting. Yeah, I definitely prefer tape over paint for sure.

Aakash Nihalani. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Brooklyn Street Art: I would think so – when I’ve seen you working with it (tape) it just seems to flow out of your thumb.
Aakash Nihalani: Yeah.

Brooklyn Street Art: So it feels like you are “painting” with tape.
Aakash Nihalani: Yeah exactly. I mean this is too, it’s fun. It’s a good challenge to try to figure out a process that fits and will work for the clean lines that I’m going for.

Brooklyn Street Art: Do you think of this as a mural?
Aakash Nihalani: I don’t think so. I don’t know what I would call it. I would say it is still an installation.

Rubin: I try not to look back but in the mid-nineties I was one of the most active writers in Sweden and I have my photo collection with me here and I’ve been working on it for years, trying to scan the images and I realize that a lot of the stuff I’m doing now, without really thinking and knowing it, started in the mid nineties. So I did a lot of abstract. The geometrics has always been there, the craftsmanship – being able to do straight lines, – a lot of the stuff. So I like to sample myself I guess. I also try to think of it in terms of music a lot.

Brooklyn Street Art: Really? What music is influencing this wall?
Rubin: It may sound weird but two of my influences have been Kraftwerk, which may seem obvious, but also Nina Simone. I’ve been listening to her music a lot. I’ve been listening to her while creating a lot of my sketches.

Brooklyn Street Art: It makes a lot of sense. The composition of the whole wall is like a music diagram.
Rubin: Like the rhythm in a piece, it has to start with the intro, getting into the verse, then in the middle it gets busy with the chorus, then you get a bridge, the song gets to breathe a little bit, and then you have the outtro so its all the same between music and art. It’s different tools to express – some ideas work better as paint and some as audio.

Brooklyn Street Art: I can see Kraftwerk in this epic minimalist cleanly structured classical approach – so that is the overall sweep, and the scale. But in addition there are the more organic forms, the color, warmth, the gentleness and strength – that part comes from Nina Simone?
Rubin: Yeah and the melancholy, her lyrics – she dealt with a lot of hard stuff and yeah, she has affected me a lot.

Brooklyn Street Art: So it is like you’ve been discovering your own past.
Rubin: Yeah, and it also relates to when I started deconstructing my work

Brooklyn Street Art: When you were doing graffiti?
Rubin: Yeah, and then moving to working more large scale I had to adapt my work so that I can still work fast. It suits me so well. It is also is about balance, it can’t be too geometric so it’s always a struggle so that is why I try to keep my work free hand – so I don’t use projectors and stencils. I started using the chalk line more because it’s a time saver, but also I try to keep it analog and organic and physical. It can’t be too sharp – there has to be a more human element.

Brooklyn Street Art: Yes, well you have some more organic forms in this also.
Rubin: Yeah but at the same time there is no right or wrong so you have to be true to yourself, whatever feels right for you.

Brooklyn Street Art: Did you like the Italian Futurists show at the Guggenheim?
Rubin: Yeah! I was very very emotional. It was very overwhelming. There was also another side of it, a political aspect, that was very radical.

Rubin. A southern view as visitors to the Kara Walker exhibit “Subtlety” cut in just before his wall begins . (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Domino Walls is a project supported by Two Trees Management, the firm that is developing the Domino Sugar Factory site, and under the guidance of Lisa Kim, Cultural Affairs Director. BSA is acting as the curatorial advisor on this project.

Read Part I of this posting here:

Hellbent, Rubin, and Aakash Nihalani In Progress on Domino Walls in BK

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Claudio Ethos and Alex Hornest aka Onesto Collaborate in Sao Paulo

May 12, 2014 Artists

A line drawing illustrator and photo-surrealistic fantasist combine their styles to form one long peculiar collaboration under Sao Paulo traffic. Both Claudio Ethos and Alex Hornest (aka Onesto) have done their share of wall work in recent years, each with their own distinctive style. Seeing them co-mingle on this Consolacao wall draws just enough of a contrast to fully appreciate their individual styles. Both will be creating another wall shortyly in the Zona Leste of this Brazilian city as well.

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Images Of The Week: 05.11.14

May 11, 2014 Artists, BSA Images Of The Week

Happy Mothers Day to all the moms, mommies, mama, mas, mutters, madres, and variations on loving female caregivers out there. Thank you sincerely from the bottom of our hearts.

Been a huge week for New York with yet another round of art fairs that no one has ever heard of and a few that you are familiar with, all crammed and crawling with buyers, collectors, fans, surveyors, looky-loos. Also it looks like the action on the street, both commissioned and uncommissioned, is coming on fast and furious. You try to catch it while it happens, and yet somehow in a city like New York, you know that there are hundreds of new pieces that you missed because everything is blooming seemingly overnight and April showers have brought May murals, tags, throwies, wheatpastes, stencils, street art, graffiti, stickers and cellphones hoisted into the air to capture it all!

Here our weekly interview with the street, this week featuring Billi Kid, Billy Mode, Chris Stain, Chris Uphues, Cristian Sonda, COL Wallnuts, Cre8tive YouTH*ink, Dailey Crafton, Faluja, Grosseling, Joseph Bottari, Kazy, Lillewenn, Manuel Huth, Martha Cooper, Mender, Mover, Olek, Pork, Sober, Zola, and Zura.

Top Image >> Chris Stain and Billy Mode new mural in Brooklyn in collaboration with Cre8tive YouTHink. The image is based on Martha Cooper’s photograph from her series Street Play, 1978. To learn more about Cre8tive YouTHink click HERE. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“The greatest gift a father can give his children is to love and respect their mother” ~author unknown. OLEK suggests a similar sentiment here. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Zio Ziegler: Primitive, Bizaare, Theatrically Punchy in San Francisco

May 10, 2014 Artists

Californian artist Zio Ziegler has a number of murals throughout San Francisco and Los Angeles – anthropomorphic figures and animals full of pattern, caught mid-action and almost exclusively in black and white. Primitive, bizaare, and theatrically punchy, the illustrative work by this RISD grad has been translated across all sorts of surfaces like hats, sweatshirts, tee-shirts, sneakers, corporate offices and luxury cars over the last decade, and his fine art work is landing in many collections. Currently enjoying his first European solo exhibit at Antonio Colombo Arte Contemporanea Via Solferino in Milan, he is still doing big murals back home like this new one in the Hayes Valley district of San Francisco.

Thanks to Gareth Gooch, who organized this wall for Ziegler and who shares with BSA readers his photos of the installation.

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BSA Film Friday: 05.09.14

May 9, 2014 Artists

Our weekly focus on the moving image and art in the streets. And other oddities.

Now screening :

1. ECB and ANPU in Delhi, India with Ghandi
2. “If I Live I’ll See you Tuesday” By Gary Gardner
3. René Almanza: Gloves, drawing project
4. Martin Whatson at Memorie Urbane Festival 2014

BSA Special Feature: Hendrick ECB Beikirch x ANPU in Delhi, India

A few years ago in Bushwick, Brooklyn, the German street artist named ECB was painting elongated men’s heads on diminished factory facades with pieces of semi-cryptic text passages accompanying them. This spring he was painting India’s largest mural with ANPU in Delhi for what organizers say is that country’s very first Street Art festival. Check out the angles that you can get with a drone camera that capture the installation of this Ghandi portrait. Dude, the future is drones.

“If I Live I’ll See you Tuesday” By Gary Gardner

Skater culture is gliding through Christie’s storage department here, thanks to smart young director Gary Gardner, who also directed their Basquiat piece last year. Showing off individual pieces that will be auctioned this Tuesday throughout the thrillride, the Richard Prince, Jeff Koons, Jean-Michel Basquiat, and Ed Ruscha pieces rush by you in one of the slickest branded content videos you’ll see this year. Stuff like this makes the competition drool when it comes to marketing to the ADD demographic with collector genes.

There will be more.

René Almanza: Gloves, drawing project.

Often we talk about gestural painting, that is, strokes and movements that are tied to your movements. Dribbled, slashed, smashed, smeared. Action painting. Artist René Almanza allows you to watch him experimenting with a technique whereby each finger has it’s own writing device. That may sound like you can get great specificity, but in fact it looks like he is a bear scratching on the outside of a jar of honey. Please try this at home.

Martin Whatson at Memorie Urbane Festival 2014

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