March 2017

BSA Film Friday: 03.31.17

BSA Film Friday: 03.31.17

bsa-film-friday-JAN-2015

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

Now screening :
1. Vegan Flava – Trapped Peace
2. Rime “UP ON THROUGH”
3. Street Art City
4. 12 + 1 Roc Blackblock. Barcelona

bsa-film-friday-special-feature

BSA Special Feature: Vegan Flava – “Trapped Peace”

The urban artist Vegan Flava typically is seen in abandoned buildings and ex-factories. Here’s a quick look at his studio practice, giving you an insight into the transition that many artist make from one venue to another, one set of materials exchange for a different set.

Rime “UP ON THROUGH”

“If I’m gonna play, I’m gonna play with some new math,” says graffiti/street/fine artist RIME on the attitude of risk-taking and experimentation that artists must continue to embrace to grow. In his case, his inspirations come from many sources and he shows you how he is digging deep in this promo for his current show at Wall Works gallery through May.

Street Art City

A Street Art outdoor museum called “Street Art City”, with an admission fee and selected artists re-facing buildings in a compound. For how many years have you said that the Street Artists are creating a museum? Here in LURCY-LÉVIS, France, one actually is opening on April 28th.

An additional project includes a 128 room former hotel with each room a separate installation by an artist. The idea has been successful elsewhere, including The Haus in Berlin that opens April 1, so it appears that the model of haunted house/ theme park is gaining interest – perhaps it will merge with art/music/performance festivals in cities around the world. Actually, bet on it.

 

12 + 1 Roc Blackblock. Barcelona

Roc Blackblock does his stencil mural for the 12+1 project in Barcelona and the video gives you a better idea how detailed and careful the work must be, particularly to create the birdcage that the protagonist finds themself withing.

 

 

 

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HONG KONG Re-cap, HKwalls 2017 Makes New Paths for Urban Art

HONG KONG Re-cap, HKwalls 2017 Makes New Paths for Urban Art

Go East Young Woman!

That’s where you’ll discover dynamic graffiti and Street Art and murals these days thanks in part to last weeks’ HKwalls festival, now in it’s fourth year. You’ll definitely see more women involved in this outdoor exhibition than most festivals that we’ve become familiar with, not that the organizers are making a point of it.

Zoer. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

And in an incredibly diverse display it is gratifying to see a wide range of countries represented in the artist pool from Asian cities like Jakarta, Manila, Taipei, Penang, Chiang Mai and Hong Kong – along with the European and American contingent you’ve been seeing in other proper Street Art so-called ‘festivals” elsewhere.

In some ways this feels like a new frontier in an old land.

Making the path by walking, this relatively tiny group of passionate urban art fans has convened here in the blooming bohemia/ industrial neighborhood Wan Chuk Hang on Hong Kong’s South Side, with the art-generated traffic getting heavier by weeks end to see live painting, painting competitions, DJs, gallery shows, a short film program, night time projections, and panel discussions.

Jecks. Detail. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

All week we saw intense interest and scrutiny from the new generation of fans who could easily fit into major cities globally with their fashion and omnipresent phones. With one eye on the rising international interest in Street Art and the other on the lettering traditions of graffiti, the calligraphic traditions of Chinese history, modern and traditional tattoo culture, these young fans are hungry for something that seems alive and contemporary.

Despite the much discussed high rents and small apartments here, you can also see that a relatively stable economy has provided many young people a disposable income to create or purchase art and art products.

Jecks. Detail. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

HKwalls co-founders Jason Dembski and Stan Wu and managing director Maria Wong say they’re supplying a much-needed public art element to the annual Hong Kong “Art Month”, which tends to be focused on galleries and the somewhat insular spectacle of high-end international art fairs like Art Basel and Art Central. But clearly after four years of bringing graffiti and Street Art together on walls in different neighborhoods across the city it’s much more than that.

With an inclusive welcoming vibe they’re harmonizing contradictory dynamics with diplomatic aplomb; honored traditions are melding with the hip digital tribe, mildly subversive free expression is getting elbowroom in a culture that doesn’t necessarily value it, wild-style graffiti burners are created in tandem with large multi-hued murals of many disciplines.

Jecks. Detail. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jecks. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

But then, this is Hong Kong, an Eastern/Western city of 7.4 million that speaks English and Cantonese and has been acutely aware of the movements in Mainland China since HK’s transfer of sovereignty from the UK two decades ago. So, “balance” is an appropriate term to use with HKwalls, with an unusually balanced roster of talents from graffiti kings like Tuts from Jakarta and Dilk from Nottingham, stencil wizards like SNIK from UK, design/graffiti collective letterists like Alphabet Monsters, illustration/comic book artists like Hong Kong’s Messy Desk and Seoul’s SeeNaeMe, abstract geometrists like Kris Abrigo from Manila, and magic realists like Spain’s Spok, France’s Zoer, and Italy’s Pixel Pancho.

To present such a wide swath of influences and talents can run the danger of being unwieldy and fractured, but somehow there is a common thread of quality that runs through the offerings.

Kris Abrigo. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

In a way it is an irony that a subculture with roots in disadvantaged economic circumstances like graffiti appears to be garnering a certain cachet among educated artistic and professional people in their teens and twenties. Here is a marginalized, sometimes anti-establishment subculture that now welcomes many to participate either as artists or fans, and along with skater culture, hip-hop, and modern existential feelings of disconnectedness despite a hyper-connected digital world, you have an instant community to plug into.

Growing in tandem with the scene is an expanding middle class and a certain amount of free time among Hong Kong young – both rather feeding what may be described as the growth of an urban contemporary culture. “Sub” handily is removed from the descriptor and lifestyle brands swoop in for the “like”.

Dilk. Detail. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Ultimately, HKwalls is blazing new urban paths in a densely chaotic city and involving local unknown artists in their official selections along with bigger international Street Art names like Swoon, who did a Hong Kong city tram project that brought her work to city streets for about 6 weeks, as it did for Vhils a year ago. With a good sense of balance like this, we expect to see HKwalls on the streets for their 5th anniversary next year.

Not all the walls were completed before we left so here is a selection of the finished ones.

Dilk. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Snik. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Pixel Pancho. Detail. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Pixel Pancho. Detail. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Pixel Pancho. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Debe. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Tuts. Detail. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Tuts. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anyway. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mauy. Detail. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mauy. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Aspire. Detail. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Aspire. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Merlot . Amuse126 AKA Alphabet Monsters. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Amuse126 . Merlot AKA Alphabet Monsters. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Merlot . Amuse126 AKA Alphabet Monsters. Detail. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Merlot . Amuse126 AKA Alphabet Monsters. Detail. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Merlot . Amuse126 AKA Alphabet Monsters. Detail. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Merlot . Amuse126 AKA Alphabet Monsters. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Spok. Detail. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Spok. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © courtesy of HKwalls)

Rodney Stratton. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

3 x 3 x 3. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

3 x 3 x 3. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

3 x 3 x 3. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Candy Bird. Detail. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Candy Bird. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Snub. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Untitled. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

 


HKWalls and Hong Kong stories come to you courtesy BSA in Partnership with Urban Nation (UN)

#urbannationberlin #allnationsunderoneroof #unblog @urbannationberlin @bkstreetart


Artists for HKwalls 2017 include: Abudulrashade, Alphabet Monster aka Amuse126 & Merlot, Anyway, Brain Rental, Buff Diss, Candy Bird, Damt, Debe, Dilk, Jecks, Kris Abrigo, Mauy Cola, Megic, Messy Desk, Pixel Pancho, Ralph Macchio, Seename, Snik, Snub, Spok, Taka, Tuts, Wong Ting Fung, Zinan, and Zoer.

Exhibit artists include Snik, Abdulrashade, Dilk, Mauy Cola, Spok, Seenaeme, Wong Ting Fung, Jecks, Messy Deck, Mooncasket, Brain Rental, Kris Abrigo, Rodney Stratton, Cath Love, Barlo, 3x3x3, Debe, Taka, Xeme, Ralph Macchio, Candy Bird


This article is also published on Urban Nation and The Huffington Post

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Spider Tag Uses Electricity to Trace a New Direction In The Dark

Spider Tag Uses Electricity to Trace a New Direction In The Dark

It’s good to see artists stretch themselves creatively, going outside of their comfort zone, hopefully, and discovering new techniques and approaches to their art.

“You cannot stay at the same level as when you first practiced your truth, life won’t let you.”

~ Kamal Ravikant, Live Your Truth

Spanish Street Artist Spider Tag has appeared here on BSA for many years constructing his outside constellations in abandoned buildings and community gardens and elsewhere with nails and yarn. If you didn’t see the geometric shapes there on intersecting planes before, he was willing to demarcate their dimensions with bright red lines for your benefit.

Spider Tag. Malmo, Sweden. March 2017. (photo © Spider Tag)

Recently in a new modern neighborhood of Malmö, Sweden called Västra Hamnen, Spidertag decided to use a curiously amenable neon cable material to try out a new public installation. He says the total exhibition lasted about 30 minutes, until the battery died, but it was a successful experiment he is eager to expand upon. “I used nails, a hammer and 50 metres of neon cable,” he says, “I thought it was a perfect spot with the buildings in the horizon.”

Spider Tag. Malmo, Sweden. March 2017. (photo © Spider Tag)

We asked Spider Tag about this new direction and about his practice as an artist working in public space and he reveals that it is not always easy to make a change with your art:

BSA: What inspired you to take this new direction into the darkness?
Spidertag: From 2008 to 2015 I was using yarn and exploring different directions, from geometric, abstract or minimalism in the urban environment and in countryside, taking video documentation and short film. I felt that I had to change the yarn. Even though many people told me that it was a mistake for me to change my art practice because people recognize me for a certain style or practice, I didn´t care. For more than a year I jumped into a bad period in which I didn´t find a solution. It was a scary moment, because I thought that I was losing my sense of direction.

I tried with metal and other materials, but didn’t like the result. And as in a superhero´s classic comic book, by luck or by mistake, I discovered the neon cable. Eureka! Since that moment, I’ve been exploring the use of the light with other materials -hammer, nails and paint- that I´ve used since the beginning of my career. The cool thing for me is that this new material has the same flexible use, but it’s more unique. It is also new and modern in the Street Arts movement.

I had experimented with black lights and yarn back in 2012 in the Alps and in Madrid. So, this is a continuation but with a new power.

Spider Tag. Malmo, Sweden. March 2017. (photo © Spider Tag)

BSA: Do you discover shapes and geometric relationships as you are creating the piece, or do you have the composition diagrammed out in your head before you begin?
Spider Tag: I work with the space. That´s the key in street art, especially when you do illegal work or without permission, because you choose the place. In my case I choose it because the surface, the material, inspire me. I work with sketches and also improvise, but it’s the personal background, the ideas that you look forward to realize and the open eyes to found the perfect place that I follow as a patron…”

Spider Tag. Malmo, Sweden. March 2017. (photo © Spider Tag)

BSA: Sometimes when we see your work, we realize that you are outlining shapes that already exist but we couldn’t see them before.
Spidertag: I walk the streets scanning the surfaces with my mind. There are straight lines everywhere, abandoned spots that are perfect for what I want to do. And when you find these, half of your work is done…

BSA: Have you an interest in creating text or perhaps figures or recognizable icons?
Spider Tag:
Yes, but it’s not my field…

BSA: What do you like the most about creating your art in public space?
Spidertag: I enjoy the exploring the moment, walking or being on the bike or skating. And now, also the magical moment when I press the button and the darkness changes with the lights…

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Swoon On the Streets, In the Fairs, and Beyond in Hong Kong

Swoon On the Streets, In the Fairs, and Beyond in Hong Kong

Brooklyn Street Artist Swoon has traveled to hot, hopping Hong Kong recently to create the façade for the tramline with HKwalls, a program of customization for the historic public transportation cars in the city center that has included also Portuguese Street Artist Vhils with HOCA, and during Art Basel this year a site specific tram from Hong Kong artist Kingsley Ng.

Swoon. Hong Kong. March 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Not surprisingly, as is the custom of Street Artists everywhere, the wheat-pasting romantic portraitist introduced a number of her friends to the streets of the Incense Harbor city among its myriad winding cobblestones, wending staircases, and wiley alleyways.

The experience of a local is perhaps to discover this new entity on a wall suddenly, a figure so full of presence and personality as if it may speak to you. As an international traveler the experience may be to be greeted in a foreign land by a friendly familiar face.

Swoon. Detail. Hong Kong. March 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

In our case, that same face greeted us again in the entirely scrubbed austerity of the white cube of a Parisian art dealer, nested as it was among a honeycomb of other white boxed and illuminated beneath a vast white canvas on a pier by the Ferris Wheel.

We meditated lightly on this topic of the gallery on the street – commercial gallery – museum gallery continuum during our Images of the Week wrap up this week. It is an unusual position that Street Artists’ occupy and one that introduces topics around speech, advertising, commercialism, and traditional graffiti practices of getting up and marking one’s name.

Swoon. Hong Kong. March 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

And now we muddy those waters once again, by telling you of a BSA-curated show of new prints that will benefit the Heliotrope Foundation when it debuts next week in New York. Swoon’s Heliotrope non-profit is literally building community, homes, shelter, and helping people become teachers in Haiti. (more at end of posting)

Swoon. Hong Kong. March 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Swoon. Hong Kong. March 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Swoon. This piece titled “Sonia” was destroyed in the process of bringing down a structure from the wall. Hong Kong. March 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Swoon. But we found one intact and for sale at the Art Central Art Fair in Hong Kong. March 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Swoon. Adeline the owner of Parisian Galerie L J at Art Central Art Fair is shown talking to a potential buyer not in the photo. Hong Kong. March 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)


By donating our efforts along with the donated talents of 6 world-renowned Street Artists; Miss Van, Tavar Zawacki (Above), Li-Hill, Case Maclaim, Faith XLVII, and Icy & Sot, we encourage others to contribute to Heliotrope and to buy a custom new print from these artists. We’re proud to curate for this project, to be associated with these great artists, and to provide a platform for everyone to make these connections.

Additionally, Swoon herself will release new drawings from Haiti.


SWOON X Heliotrope X BSA : A Benefit for Heliotrope Foundation
curated by Steven P. Harrington and Jaime Rojo, co-founders of BSA

Opening Event: Thursday, April 6 from 6-9pm.
Beats and refreshments provided.

Location: 88 ½ Seventh Avenue (between 15th & 16th St.)
in Chelsea, New York
Pop-Up Exhibit runs April 7-9 from 11am – 6pm daily

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Sav45 explores Lloret De Mar in Catalonia

Sav45 explores Lloret De Mar in Catalonia

SAV45 is a Russian graffiti artist freely experimenting with a variety of styles and techniques when hitting the abandoned spots in his current home of Catalonia, Spain. Today we have some recent shots of his experimentation in the wilds from photographer Fernando Alcala Losa, who says he has enjoyed witnessing the development of an artist who paints at his own pace without hurrying.

 

SAV45. Abandoned factory. Lloret De Mar, Spain. March 2017. (photo © Fer Alcalá FujifilmXT10)

Mostly figurative in substance, you can see that the lines are in movement, sometimes tight and rendered in degrees and modeled textures, other times loose and sketch-like, full of kinetic energy.

“His work is a mixture between classic references and urban ones, using different techniques, from spray paint to rollers. Less than one year ago he was doing kind of small walls with astonishing results most of the times,” says Alcala Losa, with a sense of admiration at the evolution. “Look at what kind of ‘monsters’ he is creating now.”

SAV45. Lloret De Mar, Spain. March 2017. (photo © Fer Alcalá FujifilmXT10)

SAV45. Lloret De Mar, Spain. March 2017. (photo © Fer Alcalá FujifilmXT10)

SAV45. Lloret De Mar, Spain. March 2017. (photo © Fer Alcalá FujifilmXT10)

SAV45. Abandoned hotel. Lloret De Mar, Spain. March 2017. (photo © Fer Alcalá FujifilmXT10)

SAV45. Abandoned hotel. Lloret De Mar, Spain. March 2017. (photo © Fer Alcalá FujifilmXT10)

SAV45. Abandoned hotel. Lloret De Mar, Spain. March 2017. (photo © Fer Alcalá FujifilmXT10)

SAV45. Abandoned hotel. Lloret De Mar, Spain. March 2017. (photo © Fer Alcalá FujifilmXT10)

SAV45. Abandoned hotel. Lloret De Mar, Spain. March 2017. (photo © Fer Alcalá FujifilmXT10)

 

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BSA Images of the Week 03.26.17 : Hong Kong Edition

BSA Images of the Week 03.26.17 : Hong Kong Edition

BSA-Images-Week-Jan2015

This week BSA and Urban Nation (UN) are in Hong Kong for the 4th edition of HKwalls to capture a very international and local mix of artists in this East/West nexus; a world-class city for art and culture, English and Cantonese, hi-tech and traditional methods – all during the enormous Art Basel week. We’ll bring you the new walls, some previous pieces, some graffiti, stickers, and a whole lot of color from this fast moving and dynamic city on the Pearl River Delta of East Asia.



Certainly Hong Kong got a little richer this week – not that it needed it. Of course we mean richer in the sense that more artworks and appreciators have been coursing through the streets, the art fairs, galleries, the back alleys, roof top gardens and even a terrace or two. The most satisfying aspect of being a part of a worldwide grassroots people’s art movement like Street Art/Urban Art/graffiti is that you will always find someone you know along this continuum of practices.

Anyway, a particular thrill this week was seeing it on the street – and on the art-fair wall. Some times the same exact image. We didn’t actually hit any museums but we did see Swoon in the alleyway and represented by a gallery. Same with Cleon Patterson. We saw Vhils work in his studio and in Art Central fair – and you can also catch it on the side of the International Hong Kong School – and once in a while it is on a wall of plastered posters in the city. Os Gemeos at Art Basel is a great find, but we didn’t see any of their yellow fellows on the streets.

Thorny questions arise for some – by way of pointing out that when you catch an un-permissioned tiled Street Art piece by Invader on the wall in public here it is no more than an advertisement for the one at his gallery in the art fair, a sign of the final deleterious stages of a free-spirited untarnished proletariat art practice now corrupted by capitalists, sold out.

Yes, got it. Also, remember that since it’s earliest days, graffiti and Street Art have often been about fame and burning one’s name into the minds of many – why else would you sign your piece? You may even use your name as the art itself.

Additionally you can see a fresh Swoon for no money at all in the street. At the art fairs or museums, not so much.

Here’s our weekly interview with the streets, this week featuring: Barlo, Caratoes, Cleon Paterson, Crafty Cow, Faust, Invader, Jimmy Paint, MSK, Rukkit, Shepard Fairey, and Swoon.

Top image: Swoon. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Cleon Paterson. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Barlo. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

MSK. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Shepard Fairey. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Invader. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Invader. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jimmy Paint. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Faust. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Rukkit. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

KristopherH. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

KristopherH. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Cat Time with Caratoes. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist. Hong Kong. March 2017. HKwalls/Art Basel 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Untitled. Art Central Art Fair. Hong Kong. March 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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A Diverse Mix on All Accounts – HK Walls 2017, Dispatch 4

A Diverse Mix on All Accounts – HK Walls 2017, Dispatch 4

This week BSA and Urban Nation (UN) are in Hong Kong for the 4th edition of HKwalls to capture a very international and local mix of artists in this East/West nexus; a world-class city for art and culture, English and Cantonese, hi-tech and traditional methods – all during the enormous Art Basel week. We’ll bring you the new walls, some previous pieces, some graffiti, stickers, and a whole lot of color from this fast moving and dynamic city on the Pearl River Delta of East Asia.


Last night was a blast with Louisa Haining and “Secret Walls” at the HKwalls HQ here on the southside of Hong Kong. DJs were pumping old school hiphop hits and happy jams from 80s and 90s and the young and extremely attentive HK crowd was happy and savvy, although a BK crowd would have singing/yelling the lyrics and fronting and jumping around more probably.

Debe. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

It’s a sort of franchise, these Secret Walls events, begun In Berlin in the 90s(?) and the competition of multiple artists and art styles up on a stage creating in teams in a semi-competitive environment  with black instruments on a white wall – all while the audience is swilling beer and pumping to jams blasted by a DJ… is just flexible enough to respond to any range of tastes and ultimately does what we love the most; engages people directly with the creative spirit.

Also we appreciated the diverse mix of graff writers and Street Artists from Thailand, Indonesia, Hong Kong, UK, Italy and US – not unlike the representation of people in HKwalls itself out here on the street.

Debe. Process shot. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

And that spirit has been alive on the streets for HKwalls these last few warm and sticky days, now at full volume with artists around many corners (and up a few elevators) making new murals in this industrial and auto neighborhood now in the early-throes of gentrification. On the one hand, walking on some streets is so loud and near-death-defying with boldly defiant drivers who don’t appear to register your existence as you scurry across the street in front of them.

On the other hand there are some of those trendy shops with pressed panninis and olives in a tub and pretty mommies and business suit daddies ferrying their progeny up the elevator of new glass buildings to private day care activities – and of course the sparkling green soccer fields full of teams playing every night.

Debe. Process shot. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

It helps matters that there is a brand new extension of the MTR train system, all shiny and smooth and hi-tech and friendly, running right though the neighborhood out to the furthest island of Apleichu – now five minutes away.

Enter the HKwalls festival. Run by three partners – founders Jason Dembski and Stan Wu and managing director Maria Wong. This is the fourth time out for the festival, which has been held in different neighborhoods and had various configurations in terms of art and artists. Determined to break the mold in whatever ways are possible, the three have backgrounds in graffiti, architecture, marketing, entrepreneurship, and curating/producing events.

Tuts. Process shot. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The mix of artists is about a third from Pacific Rim, a third Euro-US, and a third locals and expats. Respected by the graff kids and old schoolers, they are smart to be inclusive of HK’s professional artistic folks too, including inroads from the illustration side, tape artistry, brushwork of all manner, aerosol freehand, stencil, projection mapping. More on this later but just wanted to give you a little background on the solid knowledge that is in effect, yo. Suffice to say more attention needs to given to this hard-working big hearted team.

Tuts completed his wall. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Today’s update gives you a sense of some of the flavor on the festival tip, along with some shots of pieces inside the Art Central show on the other side of mountain on this island.

While it was good see the offerings in the deliriously corporate environment under giant tents near a Ferris Wheel – and a number of the full ceiling to floor sculptural installations were of good quality – there is a definite reigned-in quality, with a slight tendency toward cute. As artists in certain parts of the Western world and even the Middle East have become more activist and challenging in certain aspects, the art fairs in general are sort of playing it safe.

Spok. Process shot. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mauy. Process shot. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mauy. Process shot. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jecks. Process shot. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jecks. Process shot. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Messy Desk . SeeNaeMe. Process shot. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Messy Desk . SeeNaeMe. Process shot. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Messy Desk . SeeNaeMe. Process shot. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Dilk. Process shot. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Dilk. Process shot. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Aspire. Process shot. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Aspire. Process shot. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Wong Ting Fung. Process shot. HKwalls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Cleon Patterson at Art Central Art Fair. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Shepard Fairey at Art Central Art Fair. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Desire Obtain Cherish at Art Central Art Fair. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anida Yeou Ali at Art Central Art Fair. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Invader at Art Central Art Fair. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Craneo at Art Central Art Fair. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

 

 


HKWalls and Hong Kong stories come to you courtesy BSA in Partnership with Urban Nation (UN)

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BSA Film Friday: 03.24.17 – Hong Kong Edition

BSA Film Friday: 03.24.17 – Hong Kong Edition

bsa-film-friday-JAN-2015

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

This week BSA and Urban Nation (UN) are in Hong Kong checking out flavors and practices on a true international scene. Street Art and graffitti too Euro-centric for you? No worries, Asia has a growing, shape-shifting series of scenes of their own, not easy to categorize and very alive.

Now screening :
1. Graffiti Asia
2. BSA Right now at HKwalls2017
3. UTAH & ETHER – Hong Kong
4. M.I.A. – Rewear It

bsa-film-friday-special-feature

BSA Special Feature: Graffiti Asia

Hong Kong, Shenzen, Shanghai represent!

Let’s make some noise for Indonesia, Thailand, Malayasia, South Korea, Singapore, Taiwan! Phillipines in da house! Jakarta where you at?

Here is your inside trip around some of the most popular graffiti locations, words of some of the emerging and established artists, a good selection of the attitudes and incidental atmospheric sounds and details that are evocative of life and the street scene in each.

The mini-documentary dates back a handful of years yet remains completely relevant and accessible – possibly because it does not rely heavily on spoken word, allowing you to gain a sense of the practice through other means. Clearly the international style is evolving, local flavor is always king, and you can see how Graffiti Asia changes the game.

HKwalls has a nice selection of videos looping on a wall inside their main event space that highlights a variety of aspects of current street culture. We feature this one because it keeps the focus on the people who are organically preparing the creative soil for what comes next.

BSA Right Now at HKwalls2017

No need to wait for the fancy video team here to cut together all the best shots – Jaime’s got his phone, yo. 60 seconds of right now at HKwalls.

Featuring still-wet and fumey pieces from Alphabet Monsters (Amuse and Merlot), Spok Brillor, Dilk, Mauy, and Tuts.

UTAH & ETHER – Hong Kong

The Grifters invariably take the thrill level ten times higher toward hair raising painting adventure with UTAH & Ether.

UTAH & ETHER – PROBATION VACATION: LOST IN ASIA (Episode 10 – Hong Kong) from The Grifters on Vimeo.

M.I.A. – Rewear It

And let’s get up and dance. It’s Friday !


HKWalls and Hong Kong stories come to you courtesy BSA in Partnership with Urban Nation (UN)

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The Tiniest Brutalist Sculptures – HKWalls 2017, Dispatch 3 (as in 3 x 3 x 3)

The Tiniest Brutalist Sculptures – HKWalls 2017, Dispatch 3 (as in 3 x 3 x 3)

This week BSA and Urban Nation (UN) are in Hong Kong for the 4th edition of HKWalls to capture a very international and local mix of artists in this East/West nexus; a world-class city for art and culture, English and Cantonese, hi-tech and traditional methods – all during the enormous Art Basel week. We’ll bring you the new walls, some previous pieces, some graffiti, stickers, and a whole lot of color from this fast moving and dynamic city on the Pearl River Delta of East Asia.


When you spot one of these palm-sized concrete sculptures on the street in Hong Kong they may remind you of Brutalist architecture  or the dense clustering of concrete beehives like so many of this cities’ neighborhoods.

3 x 3 x 3. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The tiny formations by UK Street Artist Steev Saunders aka 3x3x3 may point you toward the man-made environment, but they may also recall organic shapes, sort of like industrial barnacles which attach themselves to the bodies of factory-whales during their free-swimming concrete larval stage.

These could be hi/low tech sensors of the city environment, in much the same way as Hong Kong ocean scientists use selected barnacles as biomonitors to measure concentrations of trace metals like arsenic, cadmium, chromium, cobalt, copper, iron, lead, manganese, nickel, silver, zinc.

3 x 3 x 3. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

3x3x3 has worked as a sculptor and sound designer with complex creations that employ fundamentalist mechanics in rather a Steam-Punkian manner and style. On the street simply as “3” he has used a triad of sprayed repetitions of stenciled symbols and the numeral 3  as well as larger complex tags formed with rebar that is fired and pounded and beaten and bent into outlines.

These smaller pieces are so understated that they may well be overlooked, but once you discover them you are tempted to childhood, playing with your toys, imagining all the tiny people who live within them and realizing what a gargantuan giant you have become.

3 x 3 x 3. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Certainly these expressions of the creative spirit on the street are not easily grouped with the massive murals that have characterized the rise of so-called Street Art festivals, and their humble simplicity and scale makes the impact that much more impressive.

An invited exhibiting artist in the formal inside exhibition at HKWalls this year, 3x3x3 tells us that these pieces on the street art not only recalling his experience of the city, but also the country.

BSA: What inspires these small sculptures? Architecture? Materials? Comic books?
3x3x3: Architecture is the inspiration behind the concrete pieces, as you can see around, HK is packed with the stuff. Yeah they are brutalist style but in a delicate way. I’m not a fan of giant skyscrapers, I like the countryside, mountains and rocks.

3 x 3 x 3. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

BSA: Have you watched someone discover one of these pieces? How do they react?
3x3x3: I haven’t watched anyone discover the pieces. They are so small I think few people notice them and I often put them in positions where they blend into the surroundings, I like that they can be unnoticed but in plain view. Some government workers have even painted around them.

BSA: You have also tagged with a metal cutout of the number “3”. Are you the 3rd child in the family?
3x3x3: Ha ha , I’m not the 3rd but I like the number, it has many graphic possibilities , it’s a nice shape and it’s a lucky number too. In the graffiti scene it’s all about getting your name up so I thought “I’ll be just a number”.

3 x 3 x 3. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

BSA: There is a rebar sculpture in the fine art show for HK Walls. Can you talk about your interest in art that takes a third dimension in public space?
3x3x3: I’ve always been interested in sculpture, making stuff is fun and the processes bring up new ideas. Welding and bending steel is physically demanding so I don’t focus on that exclusively. In 1995 I started carving spirals into wet concrete whenever I came across it, which was fairly often in HK. When street art started to become noticed more I was inspired but wanted to do something unique so in 2003 I put up my first concrete pieces.

3 x 3 x 3. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

3 x 3 x 3. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

3 x 3 x 3. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

3 x 3 x 3. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

3 x 3 x 3. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

3 x 3 x 3. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)


How to Detect a Brutalist Building by Charles Humphries (© Charles Humphries)


HKWalls and Hong Kong stories come to you courtesy BSA in Partnership with Urban Nation (UN)

#urbannationberlin #allnationsunderoneroof #unblog @urbannationberlin @bkstreetart

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SNIK, Flip-Flops, Amuse & Merlot – HKWalls 2017, Dispatch 2

SNIK, Flip-Flops, Amuse & Merlot – HKWalls 2017, Dispatch 2

This week BSA and Urban Nation (UN) are in Hong Kong for the 4th edition of HKWalls to capture a very international and local mix of artists in this East/West nexus; a world-class city for art and culture, English and Cantonese, hi-tech and traditional methods – all during the enormous Art Basel week. We’ll bring you the new walls, some previous pieces, some graffiti, stickers, and a whole lot of color from this fast moving and dynamic city on the Pearl River Delta of East Asia.


“Hong Kong is that tough sweaty dude with a gas blowtorch in his hands, soldiering a metal frame on the sidewalk while wearing a muscle shirt and flip flops with a cigarette tucked over his ear and a lit one in his mouth,” to roughly paraphrase the description of this city from an artist at a discussion panel here last night.

As he delivers this gem, you look to your left at the pink-cheeked bearded half of the artist duo SNIK, who shakes his head in agreement. Yes, this does seem like a good description of HK so far.

The first finished wall for HK Walls 2017 is this multi-layered stencil by the duo Snik. Detail. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Hong Kong also is the top-boss-lip-gloss power babe waiting for a train at the Prince Edward station with sharply drawn persimmon red lips and cinnamon-bun braided hair bobs that look like Mickey Mouse ears on her head – striking a commanding stance with one hand on her waist and her cool eyes laser-focused on her phone screen.

Also, Hong Kong is the pounding staccato noise of 5 double-decker buses hurtling around a concrete road curve at top speed only 5 meters away from you on the sidewalk, propelling hot bluffs of gritty wind that push you closer to base of factories here here on Wong Chuk Hang Road.

Snik. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Merlot and Amuse, an artist duo who know a lot about letter style, hand style, and style in general are painting a massive 30 meter long tag in a opening between industrial buildings knocking out their text based monikers that borrow and snatch from raw graffiti, wildstyle, pop, and advertising design. Lately, drips.

Merlot is originally from Seattle and its outskirts and has been writing/painting for a decade roughly. For the last two years she and Amuse have been hanging together, sometimes calling their two-person crew “The Alphabet Monsters”, possibly alluding to the cosmic comic influences that may evoke fantasies and stories from graphic novels.

Snik. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

I’ve been testing and doing a bunch of different things because I am a graphic designer and so I like exploring a couple of different approaches,” she explains during a break from painting. “Typically the letters will all stay pretty much the same but with this one we wanted to have more fun and do something different,” which includes painting letters in each others names.

We point out the “S” in amuse, which appears to split wide at the top – little molecules spreading apart and spraying upwards. That’s his “S,” but she says he’s coming over later to give the treatment to her “O”.

BSA: Have you two used the fire extinguisher much before?
Merlot: I haven’t but he has before and I would really like to start using it more. He is into this very drippy kind of zone right now and I think that is what he wants his new look to be this year – he actually did a new fire extinguisher piece recently and he incorporated all of these different elements and it was really amazing.

Snik. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

BSA: Where did you learn how to paint with the extinguisher?
Amuse: My buddy Morgan is a big solid influence of mine and he said to me, “We need to try something different.” Now that is all I want to do. A graffiti writer for more than fifteen years, Amuse says he gets his new tricks sometimes from other guys in other crews he is part of. “Morgan is another guy in the crew – we’re all in the same crew and his approach – Also a very good street artist who I grew up with (in Chicago)- Esteban del Valle – he is amazing and he has this same approach with the dripping and then the nice detailed line work over it,” Amuse explains, “and he told me ‘dude you are killing yourself with all the spray paint – why don’t you incorporate some other kind of paint?’ And he’s right, the bucket paint allows you to paint so much bigger and faster and then you can go back and work on it.”

Snik. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Evidently HK Walls is in full effect right now, with the French trio Anyway, Berlin Duo Snik, Hong Kong’s Wong Ting Fung, Philippine’s Kris Abrigo, and Italy’s Pixel Pancho all on the street, on ladders, on bamboo scaffolding, on cherry pickers.  Just saw Spain’s Spok in an elevator, Zoer showed us his purple/moss/tan color pallet on his phone and tape artist Buff Diss has been lurking from every corner.

And this is a taste of what it is like on the street; The electric/eclectic High/Low influences of Hong Kong are knocking everyone about – sounds of traffic and trucks and construction and laughter and the smell of a cigar smoke and petrol and sweaty basketball players on the public court and aerosol paint and flowering trees all blend together in a heady HK romance sort of way.

Thinking of buying some flip-flops.

Pixel Pancho. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Pixel Pancho. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Pixel Pancho. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Wong Ting Fung. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Wong Ting Fung. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anyway. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anyway. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anyway. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anyway. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Kris Abrigo. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Kris Abrigo. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Kris Abrigo. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Amuse . Merlot. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Amuse . Merlot. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Amuse . Merlot. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Amuse . Merlot. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Amuse . Merlot. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Amuse . Merlot. Process shot. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mundano . Martha Cooper. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

We met with Brazilian Street Artist Mundano, who just one first prize at the International Public Art Awards for 2017 for his “Pimp my Carroça” project here in Hong Kong Sunday night. He gave us this hand-made book that he made with photographer Martha Cooper calle “Viva or Catadores”. Congratulations Mundano!

Mundano . Martha Cooper. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

 



HKWalls and Hong Kong stories come to you courtesy BSA in Partnership with Urban Nation (UN)

#urbannationberlin #allnationsunderoneroof #unblog @urbannationberlin @bkstreetart

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Catching Up With Hong Kong – HK Walls 2017, Dispatch 1

Catching Up With Hong Kong – HK Walls 2017, Dispatch 1

This week BSA and Urban Nation (UN) are in Hong Kong for the 4th edition of HKWalls to capture a very international and local mix of artists in this East/West nexus; a world-class city for art and culture, English and Cantonese, hi-tech and traditional methods – all during the enormous Art Basel week. We’ll bring you the new walls, some previous pieces, some graffiti, stickers, and a whole lot of color from this fast moving and dynamic city on the Pearl River Delta of East Asia.


A day after heaving rains delayed the first couple of walls and a projection mapping show on  Sunday, a few walls are getting started, like the sprawling text of Amuse and Merlot, a vertically soaring robot of certain pedigree by Pixel Pancho and the trio called Anyway deconstructing a car on a roll-down gate that covers the mechanic shop.

Unidentified Artist. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

As the artists arrive into HKWalls headquarters in the base of the Ovolo Southside hotel in the Wong Chuk Hang neighborhood, we decide to head up north to the more congested and commercial center of Kowloon to say hello to Pixel and Dr. Fjordor as they start to sketch out the new figure of their wall way up above the traffic on a cherry picker.

Pixel radios to a young guy who is about 22 years old in English his next directions for where he would like to move the the basket they are riding in next. The helper then translates into Chinese the directions – move to the left and a few meters upward – to a grey haired gentlemen manning the mechanical controls that are mounted to the back of the crane on the street. We ask the walkie-talkie guy to tell Pancho we say “hello” and he turns in his bucket to wave down 10 stories below.

Peeta. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

We hop back on the super modern and smooth MTR system train to the Sham Shui Po neighborhood and wander through the markets and alleys and congested commercial streets to see the vendors selling fabrics, zippers, buttons, leather goods… and small groups of guys playing poker on card tables.

We also find a huge 3-D text piece by Italian Street Artist Peeta that wraps around corner of the second story façade that may remind you of a department store at a mall. Eventually we found more free-form one-color characters in some thin alleyways and a very talk Okuda multi-colored geometric patterned fox mural sandwiched between residential high-rises with freshly washed clothing and bed linens hanging outside apartment windows.

Paola Delfin. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Riding the high-tech train back to Wong Chuk Hang at rush hour and crammed closely with people who are poking and swiping at their phones playing games or texting friends, you could watch world news on the screen just above your head as you ride. The images and headlines are featuring news about FBI Director Comey talking about an investigation into Russian interference in the US elections – and an image of Donald Trump inveighing at a rally microphone with a few guys wearing red “Make America Great Again” caps smiling behind him.

It strikes you that a fourteen hour flight to literally the other side of the world has just collapsed into one second. It’s true that people around the world watch these political developments and make judgements – which is why someone tells an American at a party at the end of the night that just hearing his US accent makes the guy think he must be a racist. Real talk, bro.

Shida. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Okuda. Detail. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Okuda. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

GR1. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Zids. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Phron & Sars = Seduce. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Suiko. HK Walls. Hong Kong – March 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)


HKWalls and Hong Kong stories come to you courtesy BSA in Partnership with Urban Nation (UN)

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GAIA Paints in Virtual Reality for New Mural in Gainesville, FL

GAIA Paints in Virtual Reality for New Mural in Gainesville, FL

Street Artist and renaissance man Gaia tried his hand at developing his mural for the Grove Street Neighborhood in Gainesville, Florida in Virtual Reality recently and we have few new shots to prove it.

Gaia. Gove Street Neighborhood. Gainesville, FL. February 2017. (photo © Iryna Kanishcheva)

Part of a community mural revitalization project in the historic neighborhood, Gais features a magnolia/azalea framed duo of local prominent educator Wilhelmina Johnson and the beat poet Jack Kerouac. Together they are connected by literary and African American history, says the artist. Now they are connected by virtual reality as well.

Gaia hitting the high notes at the Civic Media center in Gainesfille Florida. Here he is painting in the air and in Virtual Reality as a parallel performance to the wall installation above.

Gaia. Gove Street Neighborhood. Gainesville, FL. February 2017. (photo © Iryna Kanishcheva)

Following those images are new walls painted as part of the community initiative that is volunteer run and relies on community support. Walls here include local artist Nicole Holderbaum and Martin Torres (Jacksonville), Steven Speir and Sanders Soloman (Gainesville), Rachel Sommer (Gainesville), Chaya Av (Orlando), with contemporary graffiti by Ras Justo Luis (Gainesville) and Bhuta Bhavana Das Adhikari (Gainesville).

Ruben Ubiera. Gove Street Neighborhood. Gainesville, FL. February 2017. (photo © Iryna Kanishcheva)

Chaya Av. Gove Street Neighborhood. Gainesville, FL. February 2017. (photo © Iryna Kanishcheva)

Nicole Holderbaum . Martin Torres. Gove Street Neighborhood. Gainesville, FL. February 2017. (photo © Iryna Kanishcheva)

Nicole Holderbaum . Martin Torres. Gove Street Neighborhood. Gainesville, FL. February 2017. (photo © Iryna Kanishcheva)

Nicole Holderbaum . Martin Torres. Gove Street Neighborhood. Gainesville, FL. February 2017. (photo © Iryna Kanishcheva)

Grove Street Neighborhood in Gainesville, Florida is founded and coordinated by Iryna Kanishcheva (Curator and Photographer) and Maria Huff Edwards (Project Coordinator). The project is coordinated by including Iryna Kanishcheva, Maria Huff Edwards, David Edwards, John Wilson, Rachel Sommer, neighborhood supporters Mary Mehn, Tom Salmon, and Greg Stetz.  For more information please click HERE.

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