2019

BSA Film Friday: 08.09.19

August 9, 2019 Artists, BSA Film Friday

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

Now screening :
1. Bordalo II “A Life of Waste” A short film by Trevor Whelan & Rua Meegan
2. One Day With Lady K in Paris
3. The London Police Dogumentary, by Wayne Horse

BSA Special Feature: Bordalo II “A Life of Waste”

Bordalo II “A Life of Waste” A short film by Trevor Whelan & Rua Meegan

Spending a lot of time and effort clawing your way to the top of the pile, braying loudly about your achievements and kicking the people behind you back down the hill? Look where you are standing. It’s a mountain of garbage. And you don’t really care for the others up here.

Bordallo II has been examining our culture of waste. And making sculpture from it. “The artwork is really a reflection of what we are,” he says. “I always had my conscience.”

One Day With Lady K in Paris

Two decades into the game on her own and with Parisian graffiti crews 156 and CKW, Lady K tours the streets in a beret and a silk scarf with can of dark magenta aerosol in her purse, tagging concrete, marble, and ceramic tile on the streets as she goes. The interview shows one reason for her staying power – she’s an omnivore of style and technique, unwilling to limit herself to color or chrome, roller or extinguisher, vandal or Street Artist. Such distinctions are of little interest to her as she openly challenges your comfort zone, and presumably those of the police as well.

The London Police Dogumentary, by Wayne Horse

You may think of the Beastie Boys in wigs parodying the exaggerated male characters of 1970s detective shows, but you won’t see it done with such saucy panache as Chaz and Bob of the London Police – and Chinny Bond, the Darryl Jones of the crew.

“I got this vision from God that said, ‘Go out and help the dogs of the world,’ ”says Chaz with a misty gaze at the camera. Clearly, dog songs have really brought their practice up a level, vastly expanding their artistic practice in three-part harmony, causing their core Street Art fans to howl with delight.

Lapiz Compares Religious Devotion to Addiction in Munich

August 8, 2019 Artists

Lapiz quotes Karl Marx; “Die Religion … ist das Opium des Volkes” when he talks about the new ‘Opium Den’ stencil he has completed on a street in Munich, Germany.

“Religion is the opium of the people” is a close translation, and here he refers to the recently burned Notre Dame cathedral in Paris. With it he questions the priorities of people and what they do with their money.

“Notre Dame caught fire and within a few weeks 800 million euros were donated to rebuild it,” he says. “It was more than a church – it was a symbol for Western Society. But just imagine what social projects you could have supported with this kind of money.”

Asbestos Behind a Mask in Cork, Ireland

August 7, 2019 Artists

The symbolism of the “L” repeated many times, the expression in the eyes peering nervously through them, the appearance of this piece in Cork – it’s all a coded secret for the typical passerby here in Ireland. This is not unusual for Street Art or graffiti because much of it can be so woven into the personal history of the artist that it may require and extensive conversation with them to understand it- or a look at their diary.

Asbestos. *Left Hand*. Cork, Ireland. July 2019. (photo © Asbestos)

Asbestos is from Dublin but he make this new mural as part of a graffiti jam organized by Crack. He says it is a critique of his own hand skills when he is surrounded by Masters of the aerosol can. In fact he feels like he is all left hands – thus the “L” symbol creating a mask for him to hide behind.

“I like to explore an innocent and naive version of my own character called ‘Left Hand’ that sees the world in a different way to me,” he tells us. “Here he’s giving me learner ‘L’ signs because I’m a street artist painting with a bunch of graff artists. His honesty exposes my own frailties and insecurities and my fear that I’d mess the mural up in front of artists I respect.”

When we get to know an artist better it is not a surprise to find how much of their personal history and psychology enters into their practice. The Dublin-based Asbestos is quite literal in explorations of self on the street; splitting himself into a ‘live’ version and a ‘dead’ version.

He said he’s been working on “a series of mask portraits that explore my identity. Each mask portrays two versions of myself, one alive and one dead. The dead version is a fictional character that represents me, if I’d been killed in a car bomb,” he reveals. The ‘bomb’ he refers to was a real one, he sayd. “It went off in Dublin 46 days before I was born, 5 minutes after my mother walked past it,” he says.

“I’ve always been fascinated about the fact that I may never have existed.”

Giulio Vesprini on the B-Ball Court in Fermo, Italy

August 6, 2019 Artists

A basketball court in summertime is a proving ground for skill, a place to kill time with friends, and sometimes a launchpad for dreams of going “professional”. Here in Fermo City in Northern Italy, it’s a place for Street Artist Giulio Vesprini to expand his abstract practice to the field of sport.

Giulio Vesprini. *Struttura G041*. FUM Festival. Fermo, Italy. 2019. (photo © Luca Antonelli-Andrea Amurri)

“The shapes, colors and unique elements of botany characterize my work,” he says, and you can see that his palette is carefully chosen, and sophisticated. His new work is in concert with the Fermo Urban Museum (FUM) and took an organic route to completion, with the help of a handful of assistance. It’s many steps away from the inner city work you might normally associate with innercity graffiti; the sound and fury transmuted. Primitive, graphic, and crisply illustrative, this freshly painted court provides a new field of art and nature for players he’ll never meet.

He calls it “Struttura G041”.

Giulio Vesprini. Struttura G041. FUM Festival. Fermo, Italy. 2019. (Video Andrea Amurri-New Media Solution )

Steve ESPO Powers in Syracuse

August 5, 2019 Artists

Graffiti writer, Street Artist, and muralist Steve Powers (aka ESPO) has created cryptic poetry in bold, nostalgia formed fonts on city walls including Brooklyn, Dublin, and his hometown Philadelphia.

Steve ESPO Powers. Syracuse, NY. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

In Syracuse, a city in mid-New York State, he has left his inside-joke humor outside on many bridges. We just happened to driving through this weekend and caught a few of his pieces from the last few years that suddenly cross your path – often as you are descending through an underpass.

BSA Images Of The Week: 07.08.19

August 4, 2019 Artists, BSA Images Of The Week

Here’s our weekly interview with the street, this time featuring BRCEDU, Captain Eyeliner, Damon, Dark Clouds,Fhake, Ghake, Jerk Face, Mad Villian, Mattew Hyte, MurOne, Praxis, R Burns Wilder, Shepard Fairey, Sinned, Stikman, Tatyana Fazlalizadeh, Thomas Allen, and Vy.

Thomas Allen in collaboration with Ethan. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Tatyana Fazlalizadeh. This piece has been vandalized. The original artwork included a bouquet of flowers and text that read: “LET BLACK MEN BE SOFT”. They both have been buffed by an unknown person. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Tatyana Fazlalizadeh (photo © Jaime Rojo)

This piece by an unidentified artist has been restored. The tag and posters have been removed. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

R Burns Wilder x Sinned (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Judith Supine Stars in MANLBDRO: The Cowboy Series

August 3, 2019 Artists

A quick shout out to the new collaged gender fuckery Judith Supine uses that openly plays with the man. The Marlboro man that is; the ubiquitous cowboy that appeared in advertisements for thirty-five years, thanks to Philip Morris and Leo Burnett. Enveloped in mythology and archetypes of masculinity, countless men died of cancer emulating this hunky wind-whipped hero of the imaginary west, including at least four of the original actors who portrayed the fictional character, according to the LA Times.

Not to get sidetracked from Supine’s intensely playful machinations with the knife and magazine. The Street Artist has successfully redirected his studio and street practice in recent years, stripping back the fluorescence many of his 2000s-2010’s pieces were known for. Here he is choosing to focus instead on his unexpected recombinants of limbs, features, and proportions to present otherworldly figures who are just human enough to disturb your subconscious, and make you laugh.

By playing with the same magnetic images that drew millions to the messages in glossy magazines of the 60s-90s, Judith winks flirtatiously at you with clever bait and switching. Pulling apart our instincts and letting them lay next to, or sit upon, or lick, or pop out of one another, Supine daily plays with fantasy and fiction, and very possibly fear.

Muddguts in Williamsburg hosts Manlbdro right now, where they say “The Cowboy series is a continuation of the artist’s pursuit of placing art between the worlds of abstraction and representation.”

Shots from the future on Judith’s Instagram

The collages featured on the show are the original images that were used for the posters on his bus shelters ad take over around NYC city streets. We have published the ad take over installations HERE and HERE

BSA Film Friday 07.02.19

August 2, 2019 Artists, BSA Film Friday

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

Now screening :
1. Facing The Giant: Three Decades of Dissent Part Two – Shepard Fairey
2. Stephanie Boyce: If You Know Me Is To Love Me.
3. Dotmasters: Why Is That Shovel There?

BSA Special Feature: Facing The Giant: Three Decades of Dissent Part Two – Shepard Fairey

The sky is on fire! And it’s not just because of the gorgeous sunset.

Shepard Fairey has been respectfully smacking us in the head for 30 years with his earnestly alarmist art in the streets. Challenging a narrative pushed by the corporate state via smiling blond newsreaders fronting a well funded armature of skullduggery, this perpetual dissenter has found ways to deliver the poison pill with ever-more sophisticated graphic design and plain spoken diatribe.

“I was trying to encourage people to just be more analytical and to come to their own conclusions,” he says as he describes his work during the steady hail of disinformation called “The War on Terror”. Bless his heart.

He says he was looking for a more honest manifestation of his work and how he represented the observations and opinions he had based on his own research.

“I felt like I had the courage to become myself what I had emulated in a lot of my heroes.” Faced with a hostile political environment from the corporatized media machine and the dazed inertia response from a significant portion of his intended audience, it is surely maddening at times. Regardless, as an artist, catalyzer and a citizen, Fairey continues to challenge himself, and us.

Stephanie Boyce: If You Know Me Is To Love Me.

Brooklyn Artist Stephanie Boyce has been drawing all her life and takes you on a tour of her neighborhood and the Muddguts Gallery that represents her.

“It’s difficult to tell my story in a ten minute movie,” she says, but you get a good idea of the ups and downs that she has faced through her art, their symbolisms, and of course her own words.

Special props go out to Director Nicolas Heller for this insightful and well-balanced storytelling.

Dotmasters: Why Is That Shovel There? Nuart Aberdeen. By MZM Projects

Dotmasters also takes you on a tour in his new video, and even instructs you how his technique is done. Mostly, it’s a relaxed conversation about his history and his approach.

“Oh that’s just a silkscreen process with a spraycan,” he said of his initial realization of how certain pieces on the street were done when seeing stencillists like Blek Le Rat in the 80s. “And I thought, ‘Wow, that’s a good way of invading public space’.”

Guerilla Spam and 108 Paint 2 Versions of the “Quarantana”

August 1, 2019 Artists

The Turin-based illustrator Guerrilla Spam has interpreted the “Quarantana” as a stylized toy extended from the arm of an elegant, almost Egyptian figure in a tall fez. Alessandria-born Street Artist 108 depicts the traditional doll as a unique abstraction merged within a form, not specifically figurative, rather primitive perhaps.

Guerrilla Spam x 108. Premio Antonio Giordano Festival. Santa Croce di Magliano, Italy. July 2019. (photo courtesy of the festival)

Both are interpreting a pagan/Christian traditional ritual next to each other here in Santa Croce di Magliano.

“ ‘Quarantana‘ is a doll made of fabric and straw, having the appearance of an old woman; the doll, usually hanged to a rope between the balconies or in front of the windows, stands on a potato with seven feathers attached,” say organizers at the Antonio Giordano Street Art festival. “The ritual, fusing Christian and pagan cultures, expresses the importance of living a life of sobriety and peace.”

An unusual topic to depict and oddly paired artists to create it – you are here able to better appreciate the multiplicity of styles at work on the street today. CLICK HERE to see a number of variations on the Quarantana doll as it is used throughout Santa Croce di Magliano, Southern Italy and the Balkan Region.

Chip Thomas “La Isla Memory Project” in a One-Room Schoolhouse

July 31, 2019 Artists

Street Artists have a natural affinity for abandoned places. Sometimes they wander through them to find the right spot to create a piece. Other times they wonder who used to live here. Who used to work here. Where are they now. You may never learn the truth, but you can rely upon your observation skills – and the stories of others. Sometimes you meet someone who used to inhabit it.

Chip Thomas. Norma Romero. (photo © Chip Thomas)

This one room school house was built in the 1930s, according to artist Chip Thomas, and was used until 1959. More than six decades later, the Street Artist/Installation artist interviewed people here in the community of La Isla in southern Colorado to learn about their heritage. Many are descendants of the Spanish who passed through during the last few centuries, commandeering, trading with, and enslaving Native Americans.

Chip says he installed images of people who attended this one room schoolhouse, some of them wheatpasted, others fluttering in breezes over the dirt floor. A simple structure, it is still full of many memories for some who live in the area.

“It’s a gorgeous spot,” he says of the San Luis Valley. “It’s at about 7,800 feet above sea level and the valley is 122 miles long and 74 miles wide.” In the images are old and new portaits of students who went there. He calls it the “La Isla Memory Project.”

Chip Thomas. Cletus. (photo © Chip Thomas)

Chip Thomas. Walter Perea. (photo © Chip Thomas)

Chip Thomas. La Isla. (photo © Chip Thomas)

Don Rimx “Olor a Azucenas el Perfume del Barrio” in Brooklyn

July 30, 2019 Artists

“Olor a Azucenas el Perfume del Barrio” (The smell of Lilies is the Perfume of the Neighborhood) is the new mural by Don Rimx for this Brooklyn wall on Grand Street.

Don Rimx. *“Olor a Azucenas el Perfume del Barrio*”. In collaboration with OwLey. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

He lived here for a while, an energetic and exciting part of the borough full of sights, sounds, smells, and tastes that may remind many of New York’s deep ties to Puerto Rico.

A figure holding an armful of flowers, the image is inspired by a flower seller in San Juan, says the artist. A fragrant reminder of the sweetness of the island, the Azucena’s in his embrace are an emotional bridge between the NY-PR divide, a symbol of the love that many people have for both.

For Don Rimx, there is an additional element that assures him when he travels. “The feeling that no matter where I paint, I will always feel at home.”

This project was curated by (OwLey) and supported by The Grand Street Business Improvement District.

NesPoon Makes Swiss Lace

July 29, 2019 Artists

There used to be over 600 lace-makers here. Nespoon is remembering them with her new works on the street.

NeSpoon. Le Locle, Switzerland. July 2019. (photo © NeSpoon)

Part of a residency that she is doing with the LuXor Factory in Le Locle, this project has enabled the Polish Street Artist/fine artist/muralist to study the local lace motifs that are identified with this part of Switzerland historically. She has included the heritage in this veritable wrapping of lace, custom made for this town of 10,000 especially.

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