August 2016

BSA Images Of The Week: 08.07.16

August 7, 2016 Artists, BSA Images Of The Week

Here’s our weekly interview with the street, this week featuring ABOVE, City Kitty, Corn79, Crisp, D7606, Damien Mitchell, Dee Dee, EC13, Gregos, Hiss, Homo Riot, Imamaker, Invader, Mark Jenkins, MOMO, Olek, OneArt, Savior El Mundo, Stik, Wing, and Zimad.

Our top image: Stik for The L.I.S.A. Project. July 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Olek new installation in Avesta, Sweden. August 2016. (photo © OLEK)

We first called her the Christo of Street Art a number of years ago, and this latest project seems to finally confirm it. Olek created a two part installation for the Verket Museum in Avesta – in short it is about destruction and rebuilding. Above is the latest picture of the house she mounted the installation within – wrapped in meters and meters of pink crochet.

“Our pink house is about the journey, not just about the artwork itself. It’s about us coming together as a community. It’s about helping each other. In the small Swedish community of Avesta we proved that we are stronger together, that we can make anything happen together. People from all walks of life came together to make this project possible. Someone donated the house, another one fixed the electricity and Red Heart Yarns donated the materials. The of course, most importantly, many women joined us in the effort to make my dream a reality.

After I exploded the house I wanted to create a positive ending for them as a symbol of a brighter future for all people, especially the ones who have been displaced against their own wills. Women have the ability to recreate themselves. No matter how low life might bring us, we can get back on our feet and start anew.

We can show everybody that women can build houses, women can make homes. “

Gregos (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mark Jenkins in Montreal. July 2016. (photo © Andre Pace)

MOMO (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Tavar Zawacki AKA ABOVE (Invader on top) for The L.I.S.A. Project in Manhattan. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Corn79 in Mantova, Italy for Without Frontiers. July 2016. (photo © Corny79)

OneArt (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist (photo © Jaime Rojo)

HISS (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Zimad in collaboration with Damien Mitchell. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Dee Dee (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Wing (photo © Jaime Rojo)

City Kitty (photo © Jaime Rojo)

City Kitty in collaboration with D7606. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Homo Riot (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Savior El Mundo (photo © Jaime Rojo)

EC13 in Granda, Spain. August 2016. (photo © EC13)

Unidentified Artist (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Imamaker (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Crisp (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Untitled. Speaking of the Constitution. Wall Street. NYC. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

David Walker Contemplates the Role of His Mural in a French City

August 6, 2016 Artists

“I was conflicted about making the mural in France,” says Street Artist and muralist David Walker about the new sky-gazing countenance of a woman he painted there during the recent terrorist attacks. “I felt it I wasn’t commenting on the current situation there.”

It’s often a point of contention with public art and one that is discussed by city elders, academics, passersby: what role does art in the public have? Is it to advocate, reflect, comment upon, distract, reassure?

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David Walker in Boulogne-sur-Mer, France for Galerie Mathgoth. July 2016. (photo © Galerie Mathgoth)

Commissioned public and private murals and illegal Street Art are all judged by many and assumptions about the artists intent or role are called into question, – even by the artist. “What’s the point of taking up more wall space?,” asks Walker. “Due to the nature of my work, I can have internal conflictions wherever I go,” he says.

Even though Boulogne-sur-Mer is three hours north of Paris, people in the town felt very affected by the attacks, and many conversations touched upon the events – which seemed to be unfolding even as he painted. “During my stay the TV looped with news of another attack in a northern city just a few hours away,” he says.

David Walker in Boulogne-sur-Mer, France for Galerie Mathgoth. July 2016. (photo © Galerie Mathgoth)

It was a 7-day long installation and he says he enjoyed the conversations that he had with people on the street. Some paid him compliments and he says he even appreciated those who didn’t particularly like his work.

“A few commented that the image was not exactly to their taste, but they appreciated that I worked hard everyday and the gesture.” Not exactly work for the thin-skinned, that’s for sure.

David Walker in Boulogne-sur-Mer, France for Galerie Mathgoth. July 2016. (photo © Galerie Mathgoth)

Ultimately, Walker says that he decided the new mural plays an important part in the dialogue of the city.

“After painting and seeing and hearing the buzz happening around the wall, in the newspapers and cafes and restaurants we visited, the people made me feel that actually sometimes something simple, hopeful and human can be enough – or even what’s needed from art. I was, at times, taken aback by the positivity I felt towards the work and I was relieved that somehow it did have a place there.”

David Walker in Boulogne-sur-Mer, France for Galerie Mathgoth. July 2016. (photo © Galerie Mathgoth)

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BSA Film Friday: 08.05.16

August 5, 2016 Artists

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

Now screening :

1. “Watching My Name Go By”
2. Nicolas Romero AKA Ever: “Logo II”
3. Gilf! …and counting

BSA Special Feature: “Watching My Name Go By”

Directed by Julia Cave and originally shown on the BBC documentary series OMNIBUS in December of 1976, this was actually the second half of a program that followed a tour through the art gallery scene of Soho.

A hidden gem that surveys the variety of opinions held by citizens, historians, police and front stoop sociologists about the graffiti scene on trains and the streets, the story is measured and inquisitive. It’s without glamour, although there may be guile.

This documentary predates Style Wars by about seven years and you get a surprising understanding about the priorities of the day at a time when New York was financially in a tailspin and socially ready to boil over. You see this resignation in the body language and descriptors about the state of the city, and while there is a stated desire by many to rid the city of graffiti, there are fervent fans of it as art and impassioned allies of the practice as political speech.

Notably, one commenter who is familiar with law enforcement practices says that police were actively encouraged to focus more on violent offenders like muggers and rapists than graffiti writers. The hand style is pretty basic, certainly not wild, and check out the difficulty of painting with those cans; but that doesn’t detract from the ubiquity of the social-art phenomena and the fact that many consider these early writers as pioneers of what became so much more.

“Watching My Name Go By” © Karen Goldman, Philip Bonham-Carter, BBC. 1976

Nicolas Romero AKA Ever: “Logo II”

Nicolas Romero, the Street Artist variously known as EVER or EVERSIEMPRE brings you a conceptual performance from his recent stay in Cordoba, Argentina for the exhibition “Pioneros de un viaje a ningún lado”.

A would-be heroic/holy/handsome businessman/pop star/savior marches through the street buckling under the weight of his brand.

“ Logo II is a public test”, EVER tells us. “It is a study that I have been conducting on the relationship between the ‘individual’ and the ‘logo’. The logo by definition usually includes some symbol that is associated with almost immediate way what it represents. This means that the individual summarizes his being as a symbol. In this case I wanted to use two logos, one with a political charge and one with a purely economic burden. Both carried in a theoretical context are antagonistic, but in your reality are quite similar.

Based on this, we decided to take this intervention in the most literal way.”

Gilf! …and counting

Street Artist and political activist GILF! recently created an installation called “And Counting” in Cleveland during the Democratic National Convention there. Focusing purely on the surface data of the persons killed during a police encounter this year, she says that the installation will continue to enlarge as it will eventually cover the entire year.

“It presents the facts around each police involved death in America during 2016,” she says. “By presenting only the facts this project gives the viewer an objective and all encompassing opportunity to face our nation’s heartbreaking and ubiquitous problem of death at the hands of police, which will aid in developing solutions.”

THIS JUST IN: LOVE MAKES WORLD GO AROUND (Millo in Kiev)

August 4, 2016 Artists

Dateline: Kiev, August 2016

Mural Social Club Festival continues apace in Kiev (also spelled as Kyiv) with a huge wall by Italian Street Artist Millo (Francesco Camillo Giorgino).

Millo work in progress in Kiev for Mural Social Club Festival/NGO Sky Art Foundation. (photo © Maksim Belousov)

The 9 story high piece illustrates quite literally the axiom that one’s personal emotional intentions produce an energy which affects the local and the global. Using his customary line drawn method to set the scene, Millo places an outsized figure amidst a miniaturized dense cityscape, not unlike Kiev. “It’s a message of peace in a city zone where there are just blocks and blocks and blocks for kilometers,” says the artist.

Millo work in progress in Kiev for Mural Social Club Festival/NGO Sky Art Foundation. (photo © Maksim Belousov)

Highlighted in this monochrome metropolis in saturated color is a rudimentary series of gears and pinions rotating to establish a direct route originating from personal internal machinations which, in turn, act upon the functioning of greater events elsewhere.

It’s a clarifying moment writ large. Without being sentimental we will venture the august opinion that we here at BSA tend to be in agreement with such a viewpoint.

Millo work in progress in Kiev for Mural Social Club Festival/NGO Sky Art Foundation. (photo © Maksim Belousov)

In observation of the traveling record of Millo, who has participated in street art/ public art festivals and exhibitions in Portugal, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Morocco, Belarus, London, Rio de Janeiro, Chicago, Milan, Rome, Florence, Turin, and more, one may surmise that this outward expression of an emotional worldview is rooted significantly in his personal course of research and study as well.

Millo at work on his mural in Kiev for Mural Social Club Festival/NGO Sky Art Foundation. (photo © Maksim Belousov)

Millo in Kiev for Mural Social Club Festival/NGO Sky Art Foundation. (photo © Maksim Belousov)

Our sincere thanks to the team at Mural Social Club, founder Dmytro Palienko and curators Oleg Sosnov and Julia Ostrovska as well as the NGO Sky Art Foundation for sharing these images exclusively with BSA.

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Dan Witz’s “Breathing Room” Installs Meditating Figures in 10 London Phone Booths

August 3, 2016 Artists

“It was an insane install,” says Dan Witz of his London phone booth, “probably one of the most challenging of my career.”

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Dan Witz. “Breathing Room” London, July 2016. (photo © Dan Witz)

The New York Street Artist who began working anonymously putting art on the streets in the late 1970s is sometimes given to hyperbole, but when you see the map of the ground he covered in the city in search of the right homes for his “Breathing Room” guerilla installations, you think he may be hewing to the truth. He’s also got the timing and delivery of a Catskills comedian when describing his efforts to put up these new people deep inside a spiritual practice.

“All 10 of the pieces are up and scattered nicely around greater London,” he says wide-eyed and nearly out of breath as if he had just finished running an interventionist art marathon. “Greater is the word. That place is huge. Vast. Endless. And it seems like I’ve seen every scruffy inch of it now.”

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“Take my wife, please!” He didn’t actually say that one. Besides, Dan’s wife Tiffaney is the linchpin who helped him realize this project, putting together the video and Kickstarter page that raised money to bring him from New York to glue these paintings to the iconic red phone booths.

As it turns out, these quietly meditating illusionistic figures were measured and created for a size of booth that has fallen into disuse – a fact that he may have liked to know before painted these in his Brooklyn studio. There are two sizes of phone booths in London, Dan tells us; the K2 and the K6.

“The one that I measured for, the K2, is the older, rare and widely dispersed one. Apparently there are only a couple of hundred of them in use at remote and largely undisclosed locations. But, through the deep research skills of Mark Clack of Wood Street Walls and my ever intrepid wife Tiffaney, we were able to locate enough K2’s for me to put my paintings on.”

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Witz’s newest work is meant as a response to the terrorist attacks in many cities that have hurt many people psychologically and stirred an atmosphere of fear – now he hopes to encourage a place for people to create “breathing room” for reflection. He has dealt directly with darker issues before, particularly a well-documented street art campaign a couple of years ago in Frankfurt, Germany, of figures caught just behind dark windows and metal grates. It is a guerrilla style he has honed over years to subtly draw attention and unnerve a passerby, perhaps into action.

For that campaign a nearby QR code could be scanned and followed to the Amnesty International campaign in support of political prisoners. Here he hopes to spark individual acts of hope, with these serene images radiating an optimism and focus on more peaceful matters.

Mr. Witz says that the whole experience tracking down and installing in London phonebooths was challenging, and fun and rewarding as well. “Fortunately I had the foresight to rent a motorcycle and I figured out how to mount my phone with Google maps on the handlebars,” he says.

“I’m not sure how I would have done any of this without that. But don’t even get me started on how crazy it was to drive on the left side of the road for the first time in my life,” then adds somewhat conspiratorially, “Don’t tell Tiffaney but there were some close calls.”

INO “Instability” in Kiev

August 2, 2016 Artists

The frank pop symbolism and dark sarcasm of artists like Banksy and the early punk graphics of albums and ‘zines has reached into the monumental public murals of today and this new one of a ballerina balancing on a lit bomb is an apt example. Idealized beauty teetering upon disaster is an image that you’ll understand quickly. Certainly everyone has experienced this feeling at one point in life, if not many points.

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Greek artist INO may have familiarity with “Instability”, the name of the piece, which could easily apply to economic matters in that country. The symbolism of paintings will of course be interpreted by the viewer, as ever, and instability often applies to our politics, our trade relations, our warring countries and cities, immigration of refugees, access to clean food and water, our shifting environment, even our our banking systems. Ukraine itself has suffered the crisis of war and division in recent years as well, so this mural may evoke emotions which people in Kiev can relate to.

The monochrome figure, split across the middle and slightly shifted to one side, is a common treatment of the subject by INO, as is the accented splash of a bright hue that rides across the composition as different layer. This blue divination of the sky appears to be melting the celestial sphere and dripping downward into the main piece.

Sponsored by the arts organization called ArtUnitedUS, the new mural is 48 meters above the ground and the group says it is the largest that INO has ever created.

Our sincere thank you to co-founders/curators of Art United Us; Geo Leros, Iryna Kanishcheva, and Waone Interesni Kazki for sharing the project with BSA readers.

Dot Dot Dot Creates ‘Analogram’ as a Concrete Status Update in Norway

August 1, 2016 Artists

Some walls just lend themselves perfectly to a piece, don’t they?

This arching-forward piece reminded Oslo-based DOT DOT DOT of the bending of a filmstrip and called to mind the continuous updating of images that people feel compelled to do right now in the “always on” social media world.

The single image is DOT DOT DOT’s strength: Not overly cluttered or a complex composition, and rarely a direct in-your-face confrontation. But the intention is there, and the layers of implication are as well. Here the analogy is the status of a person (or the social image of the person) is dependent upon a constant self-report. This new piece in Kristiansand, Norway is telling you that his current status is sunnily “Okay”.

On the topic of social media “sharing” DOT DOT DOT tells us his critique of this evolutionary moment; His actual phsyical art and the expectations he feels from a connected digital life lead him here with a piece called ‘Analogram’

“So this is what is expected as social behavior from us : always be out there and feed the people with content and information all the time. Social media keeps putting the pressure up and often creative work is now measured by how fast the progress or by the way you reveal your activity,” he says.

“The social media scene and the activities that come with it has escalated almost like a stock market or marketing view, the focus has shifted and often it is no longer about just making art for art.”

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Our top image: Stik for The L.I.S.A. Project. July 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Gregos (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mark Jenkins in Montreal. July 2016. (photo © Andre Pace)

Mark Jenkins in Montreal. July 2016. (photo © Andre Pace)

MOMO (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Tavar Zawacki AKA ABOVE (Invader on top) for The L.I.S.A. Project in Manhattan. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Corn79 in Mantova, Italy for Without Frontiers. July 2016. (photo © Corny79)

OneArt (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist (photo © Jaime Rojo)

HISS (photo © Jaime Rojo)

HISS (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Zimad in collaboration with Damien Mitchell. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Dee Dee (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Wing (photo © Jaime Rojo)

City Kitty (photo © Jaime Rojo)

City Kitty in collaboration with D7606. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Homo Riot (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Savior El Mundo (photo © Jaime Rojo)

EC13 in Granda, Spain. August 2016. (photo © EC13)

Unidentified Artist (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Imamaker (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Crisp (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Untitled. Speaking of the Constitution. Wall Street. NYC. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

David Walker in Boulogne-sur-Mer, France for Galerie Mathgoth. July 2016. (photo © Galerie Mathgoth)

David Walker in Boulogne-sur-Mer, France for Galerie Mathgoth. July 2016. (photo © Galerie Mathgoth)

David Walker in Boulogne-sur-Mer, France for Galerie Mathgoth. July 2016. (photo © Galerie Mathgoth)

David Walker in Boulogne-sur-Mer, France for Galerie Mathgoth. July 2016. (photo © Galerie Mathgoth)

David Walker in Boulogne-sur-Mer, France for Galerie Mathgoth. July 2016. (photo © Galerie Mathgoth)

BSA Special Feature: “Watching My Name Go By”

Nicolas Romero AKA Ever: “Logo II”

Gilf! …and counting

Dateline: Kiev, August 2016

Millo work in progress in Kiev for Mural Social Club Festival/NGO Sky Art Foundation. (photo © Maksim Belousov)

Millo work in progress in Kiev for Mural Social Club Festival/NGO Sky Art Foundation. (photo © Maksim Belousov)

Millo work in progress in Kiev for Mural Social Club Festival/NGO Sky Art Foundation. (photo © Maksim Belousov)

Millo at work on his mural in Kiev for Mural Social Club Festival/NGO Sky Art Foundation. (photo © Maksim Belousov)

Millo in Kiev for Mural Social Club Festival/NGO Sky Art Foundation. (photo © Maksim Belousov)

Dan Witz. “Breathing Room” London, July 2016. (photo © Dan Witz)

Dan Witz. “Breathing Room” London, July 2016. (photo © Dan Witz)

Dan Witz. “Breathing Room” London, July 2016. (photo © Dan Witz)

Dan Witz. “Breathing Room” London, July 2016. (photo © Dan Witz)

Dan Witz. “Breathing Room” London, July 2016. (photo © Dan Witz)

Dan Witz. “Breathing Room” London, July 2016. (photo © Dan Witz)

Dan Witz. “Breathing Room” London, July 2016. (photo © Dan Witz)

Dan Witz. “Breathing Room” London, July 2016. (photo © Dan Witz)

Dan Witz. “Breathing Room” London, July 2016. (photo © Dan Witz)

Dan Witz. “Breathing Room” London, July 2016. (photo © Dan Witz)

INO. Work in progress for ArtUnitedUs in Kiev, Ukraine. (photo © INO)

INO. Detail. For ArtUnitedUs in Kiev, Ukraine. (photo © INO)

INO. Detail. For ArtUnitedUs in Kiev, Ukraine. (photo © INO)

INO. Detail. For ArtUnitedUs in Kiev, Ukraine. (photo © INO)

INO for ArtUnitedUs in Kiev, Ukraine. (photo © INO)

INO for ArtUnitedUs in Kiev, Ukraine. (photo © INO)

DOT DOT DOT in Kristiansand, Norway for KRS Gadekunstlaug. July 2016. (photo © @Ardcon)

DOT DOT DOT in Kristiansand, Norway for KRS Gadekunstlaug. July 2016. (photo © @Ardcon)

DOT DOT DOT in Kristiansand, Norway for KRS Gadekunstlaug. July 2016. (photo © @Ardcon)

DOT DOT DOT in Kristiansand, Norway for KRS Gadekunstlaug. July 2016. (photo © @Ardcon)

DOT DOT DOT in Kristiansand, Norway for KRS Gadekunstlaug. July 2016. (photo © @Ardcon)

DOT DOT DOT in Kristiansand, Norway for KRS Gadekunstlaug. July 2016. (photo © @Ardcon)

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