November 2019

Various & Gould and a Collaged Human Future:  “Permanently Improvised”

Various & Gould and a Collaged Human Future: “Permanently Improvised”

“Our early conceptions about a future robot world were made from what we knew about automation and mechanics. Thankfully the surrealists and Dadaists were there to help us with flying ships made of tea pots and mystic, amiable metal helpers soldered and screwed together with spare train pistons and kitchen implements. Our helpers were all carefully oiled and pumping, marching in a mathematical concert through dry-ice fog, propelling herky-jerky humanoids up the path to the thoroughly modern world.

Do Rabotniki exist? They are already here. It just took Various & Gould to remind us.”


~ Steven P. Harrington in his essay “A Mixed and Matched Future-Past: Robotiniki” for “Permanently Improvised: 15 years of Urban Print Collage” by Various & Gould


Various & Gould. Permanently Improvised. Editors Various & Gould. Published by seltmann+sohne. Berlin 2019.

The Berlin based Street Art/fine art duo have released a colorful patchwork overview of 8 major campaigns they formulated for the street in the last decade and a half and present their practice in a series of analytical essays ranging by urban/art intellectuals, activists, and experts including Jan Kage, Steven P. Harrington, Toby Ashraf, Alison Young, Luis Muller Phillip-Shohn, Ilaria Hoppe, Anne Wizorek, Mohamed Amjahid, and an illuminating interview with the artists and Polina Soloveichik. The two open their kooky-cryptic inner fantasy world to the reader and to fans who have wondered how their idiosyncratic method works, and what a world of hybrid thought will produce in our future.

Various & Gould. RABOTNIKI. Essay by Steven P. Harrington. Permanently Improvised. Editors Various & Gould. Published by seltmann+sohne. Berlin 2019.

The medium sized hardcover book features instructive and illustrative images of their collaged works placed illegally in the streets, created in studio, presented in the gallery, and in one case, Papier-mâchéd upon public sculptures of Marx and Engels. Intelligent, inquisitive, infused with riddles, the work is delivered with sincere scholarship and humor – even during the process of creation, public interaction, and mid degradation due to the natural elements.

Various & Gould. CITY SKINS. Essay by Jan Kage. Permanently Improvised. Editors Various & Gould. Published by seltmann+sohne. Berlin 2019.

Professor Young discusses V&G’s broken glass abstracts in the context of law reforms that have used the “broken glass theory” as excuse to demean and exploit targeted populations, and Phillip-Sohn looks at their recent bus-stop installation campaign called “Broken Screens” and he observes a fragile technology that, when shattered and inert, “makes us all too tragically aware of how dependent we’ve become on these devices.”

Various & Gould. FACE TIME. Essay by Toby Ashraf. Permanently Improvised. Editors Various & Gould. Published by seltmann+sohne. Berlin 2019.

Viewers get a greater appreciation of the tribe-like mentality humans possess just beneath the veneer of civility – the dry timber only waiting to be sparked into flame.  The “Wanted Witches” campaign placed 13 portraits of people who are framed as modern pioneers in respect to social issues. Painting them with phosphorus and encouraging you to light a match on them takes public interaction beyond the realms we’re familiar with. The carefully planned and executed installation on city streets powerfully presents the saint-like sacrifice of people who push ahead of us, sometimes burned at the stake as witches – whether literally or perhaps via a hostile media and politicized rhetoric.

Various & Gould. BROKEN WINDOWS. Essay by Alison Young. Permanently Improvised. Editors Various & Gould. Published by seltmann+sohne. Berlin 2019.

Up to their elbows in paste, ink, paper, and possibility, at the root of much of V&G’s work is an examination of identity; its malleability, its fluidity, even its perceived relevance in societal strata. The through-line in many projects is apparent in its meditation of our flexible selves: Identikit interchanges personalities and keywords to present tensions and examine associations. St. Nimmerlein mocks the arbitrary power of declaring sainthood with fictional personas who surely don’t deserve it. Face Time is a Dadaist study that combines the likenesses and features of many into implausible yet familiar glitch-humans. The aforementioned and early Rabotniki mixes and matches bodies, parts, genders, classes, and identities in a handmade heart-conscious way.

Spread over a decade and a half many of these projects overlap and recombine, creating and reflecting a global evolution we are undergoing- a convulsive re-examination of nearly everything and everyone. The question they may be asking is, “What is the sorting method we will use to recategorize our social and political groupings?”

Using techniques that are reassuringly un-digital, the stunning power of V&G’s mission, even if subliminal, is its intuitive ability to explain our current state. With subtle nods to robotics, androids, AI, identity politics and our innate human creativity, the duo cannily constructs the present and predicts the future, with a sense of humor that we are going to need.

Various & Gould. BROKEN SCREENS. Essay by Luis Muller Philipp-Shon. Permanently Improvised. Editors Various & Gould. Published by seltmann+sohne. Berlin 2019.
Various & Gould. SAINT NIMMERLEIN. Essay by Ilaria Hoppe. Permanently Improvised. Editors Various & Gould. Published by seltmann+sohne. Berlin 2019.
Various & Gould. WANTED WITCHES / WITCHES WANTED. Essay by Anne Wizorek. Permanently Improvised. Editors Various & Gould. Published by seltmann+sohne. Berlin 2019.
Various & Gould. IDENTIKIT. Essay by Mohamed Amjahid. Permanently Improvised. Editors Various & Gould. Published by seltmann+sohne. Berlin 2019.
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BSA Film Friday: 11.29.19

BSA Film Friday: 11.29.19

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

Now screening :
1. INTI / “PRIMAVERA INSURRECTA”, Spring Insurrection
2. Sofles VS Rasko / Graffiti Kings 2019
3. Adry del Rocio at Berlin Mural Art Festival 2019
4. Between Street And Art: A Documentary About Meeting Of Styles / Germany 2019

BSA Special Feature: INTI / “PRIMAVERA INSURRECTA”, Spring Insurrection

From vandalizing public sculptures to handmade signs to waving banners, banging oil drums and pots and pans, lighting fires, chanting, and dancing in the streets – these are the insistent voices and perspectives coursing through streets in cities around the world, including these scenes from Chile last month. In one of the tales of people’s victory, these marches and mobilizations of citizens pushing for their rights and fighting state overreach actually worked this month and Chile’s protesters have won a path to a new constitution.

During the demonstrations Chilean Street Artist INTI was at work outside in Santiago as well, adding to the public discourse, with his new work entitled “Dignity!” It was a spring insurrection, now culminating in an autumn victory.

“Both the title and the elements that dress the female figure changed according to the pulse of chaos and civil disobedience that we experienced during the first days of mobilization, which was followed by a carnival of social demands that awaited the moment of becoming all one,” he says. You see the belted figure wearing symbols of resistance, destruction, construction; bullets, frying pan, boxing gloves, a hammer, a Chilean doll. The turtleneck holds the galaxy, an acoustic guitar at the back.

“Dignity!” is what people shouted. “A shout that, had it not been accompanied by insurrection, would never have been heard,” INTI says. “A shout represented in fighting tools, and our demands in a utopian vision of the new Chile.”

"PRIMAVERA INSURRECTA"

Santiago de Chile, Octubre 2019@galerialira

Posted by INTI on Wednesday, November 20, 2019

Sofles VS Rasko / Graffiti Kings 2019

Jake Anderson offers this compilation of two current Kings – Sofles and Rasko. “Two of the best graffiti artists i’ve witnessed. Not meant to be a competition, more of a comparison of two artist doing their thing.”

Adry del Rocio at Berlin Mural Art Festival 2019

Mexican muralist Adry del Rocio came to the Berlin Mural Festival this year. Known for her 3-D perspective painting (along with some Magic Realism from her home culture) del Rocio talks to the camera as she paints, relating stories about her childhood and her mother.

“I started very young. From four years old I won my first art contest. My mother always loved art. I admire her because she always has had this vision to push us.”

Even when del Rocio was discouraged by people who advised her to pursue another line of career, her mother’s advice what quite different. “Don’t listen to those people. You want to paint? You paint.”

Between Street And Art: A Documentary About Meeting Of Styles / Germany 2019

“Meeting of Styles is an international graffiti and street art festival that takes place in different parts of the globe. In its core it is a celebration of art, creativity and the spirit of community found in the street art scene. This year we went to the Meeting of Styles in Wiesbaden, Germany and had the opportunity to speak with some great creative minds and artists.” – from Eight Pixel Productions.

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Happy Thanksgiving From BSA

Happy Thanksgiving From BSA

Best wishes to all the BSA Readers today as we celebrate Thanksgiving – filling our hearts with gratitude for your support and our stomachs full of turkey. Except for the vegetarian in the family, who is having veggie field roast! Happy T-Day everyone!

A turkey on a wall in the urban jungle at Urban Spree Berlin by an unidentified artist. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
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Thankful For Immigrants: Manolo Mesa paints Unity, Equality, and Inclusion in  Pennsylvania

Thankful For Immigrants: Manolo Mesa paints Unity, Equality, and Inclusion in Pennsylvania

Tomorrow the US marks the Thanksgiving holiday, our great non-religious gathering of families and friends that most people enjoy precisely because of its non-sectarian foundation. We break bread together and celebrate in a spirit of gratitude our brotherhood, sisterhood, goodwill, and the harvest.

Manolo Masa. “About The Community”. For SSJ Neighborhood Network. Erie, Pensylvania. November 2019. (photo © Iryna Kanishkeva)

For us at BSA, we’ll probably be thinking about this new wall in Pennsylvania that openly celebrates the many nationalities who live together here in relative harmony day after day, somehow building a sense of community despite our cultural differences.

Manolo Masa. “About The Community”. For SSJ Neighborhood Network. Erie, Pensylvania. November 2019. (photo © Iryna Kanishkeva)

Says the mural organizer Iryna Kanishcheva, “We managed to bring together a wonderful group of neighborhood residents, portraying a huge hug made up of all their ethnicities and ages.”

Initially drawn to the Rust Belt for jobs in industry and to escape famine, war, and economic disaster, the immigrants who first established the neighborhoods in this town of Erie were German, Polish and Irish. Later, some Greek and Russian. Today the new residents have been arriving from Bhutan, Syria, Iraq, the Congo, Somalia, Bosnia, Ukraine, Eritrea, and Liberia. Each immigrant story is uniquely theirs, and each uniquely American as it weaves with the stories of neighbors.

Manolo Masa. “About The Community”. For SSJ Neighborhood Network. Erie, Pensylvania. November 2019. (photo © Iryna Kanishkeva)

The question you may ask is “How do you say ‘Thanksgiving’ in all these new dialects in this town; The most common now are Nepali, Arabic, Swahili, French, Somali, Bosnian, Ukrainian, Russian, Tigrinya, and French- along with the existing vestiges of  German and Polish from earlier waves of immigrants.

Spanish Street Artist Manolo Mesa took his new photographic mural project quite seriously under the guidance of the folks at The Sisters of St. Joseph Neighborhood Network and asked for the most inclusive group of locals to gather to represent the current character of the city.”We gathered a group of neighbors, he took some pictures, and within a few days, the mural emerged.”   

Manolo Masa. “About The Community”. For SSJ Neighborhood Network. Erie, Pensylvania. November 2019. (photo © Iryna Kanishkeva)

“Each of these people feel proud of where they come from, live together and belong to their neighborhood,” the artist says on his Instagram page. “This Mural would not have been possible without you. A big hug.”

Manolo Masa. “About The Community”. For SSJ Neighborhood Network. Erie, Pensylvania. November 2019. (photo © Iryna Kanishkeva)
Manolo Masa. “About The Community”. For SSJ Neighborhood Network. Erie, Pensylvania. November 2019. (photo © Iryna Kanishkeva)
Manolo Masa. “About The Community”. For SSJ Neighborhood Network. Erie, Pensylvania. November 2019. (photo © Iryna Kanishkeva)
Manolo Masa. “About The Community”. For SSJ Neighborhood Network. Erie, Pensylvania. November 2019. (photo © Manolo Masa)
Manolo Masa. “About The Community”. For SSJ Neighborhood Network. Erie, Pensylvania. November 2019. (photo © Iryna Kanishkeva)

Artist: Manolo Mesa @manolo_mesaMural title:  About the Community  
Curator: Iryna Kanishcheva
Photographs: Iryna Kanishcheva 
Commissioned by SSJ Neighborhood Network

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“New Orleans: Murals, Street Art and Graffiti” by Kady Yellow

“New Orleans: Murals, Street Art and Graffiti” by Kady Yellow

With extensive biographies, careful detailed analysis and research, and generous page real estate dedicated to art, artist, and process, “New Orleans: Murals, Street Art, and Graffiti Volume 1” by Kady Yellow is a thorough look at a street scene in one of the US’s most storied cities.

Kady Yellow – New Orleans: Murals, Street Art & Graffiti. Volume One. Self-published. 2019

The author tirelessly documents with a sense of the history while drawing out stories that illustrate the present in a scholarly way. A blend of left and right brained appreciation and analysis, this first project by the young author gives a sense of environment and community as it contributes to the practices of graffiti and art in the streets.

“It became clear that New Orleans has a remarkable new story to tell, a story of its street art scene,” says the author. “In telling that story, I sought to respectfully and delicately collect the history of the art in two neighborhoods of New Orleans by way of research and interviews with the artists themselves.”

With anthropologically framed storytelling applied to a very eclectic selection of art practices and styles, Perry includes personal accounts of aspiration, pragmatic descriptions of craft, and a frank examination technique – all presented within the context of a local story informed by the international one.

Interspersed in the book are school primer features like an urban art terminology glossary, a New Orleans timeline tracing benchmarks in its graffiti/Street Art history, a street mural map, and a number of small essays and media article quotations – each providing one more perspective for examining the nature of this organic people’s art movement. If a city’s graffiti/Street Art scene can be fairly captured in a moment, this book has clearly made it a priority and has more than succeeded.

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Paradox & CPT.OLF @ Urban Spree Gallery Berlin

Paradox & CPT.OLF @ Urban Spree Gallery Berlin

Hidden in plain sight. Fucking one system and embracing another. Seeking the limelight as he hides in the darkness of Berlin’s night. This is paradox. This is Paradox.

Detail shot of the blown-up photograph greeting the exhibition. PARADOX x CPT.OLF Urban Spree Gallery, Berlin.

A Berlin Kidz alumni who has been catching tags and surfing trains with photographer CPT.OLF for a handful of years, these two have created a simple exhibition to Urban Spree gallery this month. Bringing masks, video, a new photography book, prints, and a hooded figure cuffed an on his stomach, the gallery effect is spare, crisp, ill-boding, and entertaining. One may say that this presentation looks like a graffiti star is born.

PARADOX x CPT.OLF Urban Spree Gallery, Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Blending parkour with graffiti, he lowers himself south on a rope, spraying vertically cryptic symbols in primary colors down the side of a building, or steeple of a church, his aerosol style inspired by writers in places like São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. In many ways, this man is now claiming a mantle while in his physical prime, modeling one of his multiple horror batik masks atop a speeding yellow U-Bahn – tempting fate, testing limits, testing the viewers’ tolerance.

PARADOX x CPT.OLF Urban Spree Gallery, Berlin. (photo ©Steven P. Harrington)

This is more than urban exploring: This is punching it down and signing its praise simultaneously, the pulsing testosterone deafening, relentless, defiant. This is anti-hero heroicism as performance without a net below – and quite possibly it is the adrenaline rush that claims your life. Looking at these images, following the video, for one thrilling moment, you want to be there as well.

Paradoxes abound.

PARADOX x CPT.OLF Urban Spree Gallery, Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
PARADOX x CPT.OLF Urban Spree Gallery, Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
PARADOX x CPT.OLF Urban Spree Gallery, Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
PARADOX x CPT.OLF Urban Spree Gallery, Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
PARADOX x CPT.OLF Urban Spree Gallery, Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
PARADOX x CPT.OLF Urban Spree Gallery, Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
PARADOX x CPT.OLF Urban Spree Gallery, Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
PARADOX x CPT.OLF Urban Spree Gallery, Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
PARADOX x CPT.OLF Urban Spree Gallery, Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
PARADOX x CPT.OLF Urban Spree Gallery, Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
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BSA Images Of The Week: 11.24.19

BSA Images Of The Week: 11.24.19

What is more consequential to you today as we head into Thanksgiving week?  Social justice? Economic justice? Environmental justice? If we’re looking at Street Artists who are making new stuff for the passerby these days, it looks like themes nature and animals and endangered humans pop up a lot.

Humanity has wiped out 60% of animal populations since 1970, according to a report cited in The Gaurdian this week. Great job, people! If the steady build-up of environmental themes in Street Art is an indicator, we know that killing off the worlds’ animal species will kill us off too.

Here’s our weekly interview with the street, this week from Berlin, and this time featuring AJ LaVilla, Bisco Smith, Blek le Rat, Damon, Tito Ferrara, Key Detail, Lee Quinones, Surface of Beauty, Jeremy Novy, 7DC and LMNOPI.

Tito Ferrara for East Village Walls. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Key Detail (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Unidentified artist (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Lee Quinones. Lion’s Den Mural, 2018 (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Blek le Rat (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Bisco Smith (photo © Jaime Rojo)
We can’t read this piece on a Berlin train…can you? (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Damon for 212 Arts. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Jeremy NOVY (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Surface of Beauty (photo © Jaime Rojo)
AJ Lavilla (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Unidentified artist(s) in Berlin (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Magnet wall in Berlin (photo © Jaime Rojo)
7DC (photo © Jaime Rojo)
LMNOPI (photo © Jaime Rojo)
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Selina Miles Captures Bordallo II, FinDac, Millo and Case Maclaim at ONO’U 2019

Selina Miles Captures Bordallo II, FinDac, Millo and Case Maclaim at ONO’U 2019

There are times when an artist needs to be completely obvious to get their message out into the world, and Bordalo II is setting the tone for this year’s unofficial ONO’U festival in the gorgeous natural wonder called Tahiti. Using refuse he gathered around the islands of French Polynesia the Lisboan trash artist created a colorful replica of the oceans greatest predator, a shark, using the ocean’s greatest predator, trash.

Vandals at ONO’U 2019 (photo © Selina Miles)

Thanks to filmmaker Selina Miles’ eagle eye we have a brilliant array of scenes today with your from Selina’s trip last month to this uncommon Street Art rendevous in paradise that is organized every year by ONO’U creator Sarah Roopinia.

You may recognize a few of these artists as alumni of previous editions and note the familiar tone that these images relate – like this one with Bordalo II and his co-conspirator modeling fluorescent plastic netting over their heads. It’s funny when you do it to entertain your friends, but not when it gets stuck on your head in the ocean for days or weeks or months and prevents you from eating, like when you are duck, for example.

Bordalo II. ONO’U 2019 (photo © Selina Miles)
Case Maclaim. ONO’U 2019 (photo © Selina Miles)
Case Maclaim. ONO’U 2019 (photo © Selina Miles)
Case Maclaim. ONO’U 2019 (photo © Selina Miles)
Case Maclaim. ONO’U 2019 (photo © Selina Miles)
Bordallo II. ONO’U 2019 (photo © Selina Miles)
Bordallo II. ONO’U 2019 (photo © Selina Miles)
Bordallo II. ONO’U 2019 (photo © Selina Miles)
Bordalo II. ONO’U 2019 (photo © Selina Miles)
Bordalo II. ONO’U 2019 (photo © Selina Miles)
Millo. ONO’U 2019 (photo © Selina Miles)
Millo. ONO’U 2019 (photo © Selina Miles)
Millo. ONO’U 2019 (photo © Selina Miles)
Millo. ONO’U 2019 (photo © Selina Miles)
FinDac. ONO’U 2019 (photo © Selina Miles)
FinDac. ONO’U 2019 (photo © Selina Miles)
FinDac. ONO’U 2019 (photo © Selina Miles)
FinDac. ONO’U 2019 (photo © Selina Miles)
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BSA Film Friday: 11.22.19

BSA Film Friday: 11.22.19

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

Now screening :
1. “Graffiti Rock” Hip Hop TV
2. JR and the “Tehachapi Project”
3. PICHIAVO – Esplugues de Llobregat
4. Walala Pump & Go in Arkansas

BSA Special Feature: “Graffiti Rock” Hip Hop TV

The year was 1984. “Subway Art” was fresh on the bookshelves and “Style Wars” had just been aired on PBS and won the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance, and “Wild Style” had shown in sticky Times Square. With ascendant music stars like Grandmaster Flash and The Cold Crush Brothers rocking mics at the clubs, Blondie bringing Basquiat and Fab Five Freddy to MTV and Rock Steady Crew commanding all the competition, MCing, turntablism, graffiti and b-boying were making serious inroads into popular culture across the US and into Europe.

Enter showman and empresario Michael Hollman with a fresh idea for Hip-Hop TV that would inherit the mantle from teen dance shows of previous decades. Highly produced and rehearsed, the spontaneous looking show featured all the elements you could dream of; fly fashion, phat laces, Adidas, Kangol, a scratching lesson, Jam Master J and Run DMC battling with Special K and Cool Moe D, New York City Breakers, graffiti artist “Brim” Fuentes with the smooth disco song stylings of Shannon.

“Graffiti Rock” held everything in its hands in that moment in June when it aired, and even though the show couldn’t continue, it’s a shining beacon of triumph, empowerment and promise for the positive scene that had evolved around youth in cities like New York that gave it agency. A primer on a scene, it was so dense that you could think of this as skool, fool.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXhFHJGTNE4

JR and the “Tehachapi Project” (Trailer)

No mention of the feckless politicians paid on the side by for-profit prisons to trample justice and capture bodies for beds, but here JR ventures inside prisons to talk about humans caught inside a system of prisons that few in the media even bother with anymore.

PICHIAVO – Esplugues de Llobregat / Video by Marta Romero

Great attitudes, European idealized classical images of women, colorful graffiti tags layered and dancing around and above your head; It’s a winning combination for Street Art duo Pichiavo, who have been on a tear around the world painting ever larger commercial walls for the last five years wherever you look. Here are two recent videos created by one of their more recent clients, a real estate investment and development company headquartered in Madrid and Lisbon.

PICHIAVO en Temprano Esplugues – Video by Marta Romero

Walala Pump & Go in Arkansas

The creative agency Justkids produced a new project in Fort Smith, Arkansas this month by rehabilitating a bit of urban blight with “eclectic tribal pop” from French artist Camille Walala. The best part? When you paint this gas station with vibrant geometry you can name it after yourself. Just call it “Walala Pump and Go”.

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Know Hope, Icy & Sot, and Eron Produce “The Distance Between” in Berlin

Know Hope, Icy & Sot, and Eron Produce “The Distance Between” in Berlin

Somber and sorrowful, this distance in between. Distance between people geographically, politically, ideologically. Distance between dreams and reality, between what is possible and what we achieve. Yet, we’ve seen that each of these distances can be bridged.

Addam Yekutieli/Know Hope . Icy & Sot . Eron “The Distance Between” BC Gallery. Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

That allegory is plain and obvious in the new exhibition curated by Sasha Bogojev at Berlin’s BC gallery called “The Distance Between”.

Addam Yekutieli/Know Hope . Icy & Sot . Eron “The Distance Between” BC Gallery. Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Perhaps because of their personal backgrounds, or in spite of it, three Street Art talents of today (one of them a duo) address a series of politically charged and ultimately human crises that play out on an international stage today. Because of their own nationalities, one may surmise their points of view quickly, but in arts’ expression we can find greater complexities, gradations, and subtleties.

Addam Yekutieli/Know Hope . Icy & Sot . Eron “The Distance Between” BC Gallery. Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Iranian brothers Icy & Sot, Israeli Addam Yekutieli (aka Know Hope), and Italian aerosol artist Eron each come to the global migration crisis from distinct perspectives, each willing to explore the human cost of war, dislocation, grief, longing.

Addam Yekutieli/Know Hope . Icy & Sot . Eron “The Distance Between” BC Gallery. Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unconventional pairings perhaps, these makers of metaphor and poetry and gesture, yet in their nexus lies a certain possible common understanding. In the minds of some these collaborations could be unthinkable, so their work product is charged with socio-politics by its mere existence. The understated presentation in the gallery setting is suitably serious and somewhat cramped, with room for the cracked smile of irony, and disgust.

Addam Yekutieli/Know Hope . Icy & Sot . Eron “The Distance Between” BC Gallery. Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Icy & Sot. “The Distance Between” BC Gallery. Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Icy & Sot. “The Distance Between” BC Gallery. Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Eron “The Distance Between” BC Gallery. Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Addam Yekutieli/Know Hope. “The Distance Between” BC Gallery. Berlin. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“The Distance Between” is currently on view at the BC Gallery located at
Libauerstraße 14
10245 Berlin

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NRNY Mural Program with “Street Art For Mankind” in  New Rochelle, NY

NRNY Mural Program with “Street Art For Mankind” in New Rochelle, NY

An hour north of New York City in the wealthiest county of the state, a new mural program extends the reach of organizers Audrey and Thibault Decker of Street Art for Mankind. They say that they have produced murals and exhibitions in Larchmont, Mamaroneck, and Midtown with the support of more than 50 international Street Artists in the last few years – all with the goal of raising awareness and funds to stop child trafficking worldwide.

AEC for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The New Rochelle murals that went up this fall and were debuted in November through and organized art walk and other events appear to be more loosely correlated with local pride and history, such as the one by artist Loic Ercolessi featuring local-born musician Don Mclean (“American Pie) and Manhattan-born musician Alicia Keyes (“Empire State of Mind”).

AEC for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

An inspiring walk through the city’s downtown neighborhood on a grey and brisk fall day to discover these new murals was warmed by sharing the experience with photographer Martha Cooper, who took the train up from the city with BSA co-founder Jaime Rojo to catch the new works. The program here is called “NRNY Artsy Murals” and a highlight from this day was taking a cherry lift with Ukrainian Street Artist AEC to get a closer look at him while he worked on his new mural of allegorical surrealism.

Famed photographer Martha Cooper shoots AEC at work on his mural for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The quality is obviously high and the program eclectic, including artists such as DanK (GBR), Elle (USA & AUS), JDL (NLD), Loic Ercolessi (USA & FRA), Lula Goce (SPA), Mr Cenz (GBR) and Victor Ash (DEN, FRAand POR). Ash left the city with a new floating astronaut high above the Earth, which may describe some of the uplifting feelings passersby may experience here in New Rochelle.

AEC for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
AEC for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
AEC for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
AEC for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Dan Kitchener for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Lula Goce for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Lula Goce for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Lula Goce for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Lula Goce for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Lula Goce for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo) The Swan and the falcon depicted on the mural are actual residents of New Rochelle. The came and liked what they saw and decided to stay and raise their families there. A fitting real story as New Rochelle is a town where immigrants are welcomed and are an important part of the community.
Victor Ash for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Victor Ash for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Victor Ash pays tribute to Mae Jemison. Ms. Jemison became the first African American woman to travel in space. She is an engineer, a physician, and was an astronaut while she worked at NASA. It was during her time at NASA that she was part of the team aboard the Space Shuttle Endeavor when she served as a mission specialist in September 1992. for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
ELLE for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Mr. Cenz for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
JDL for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
JDL for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
JDL for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
LOIC pays tribute to New Rochelle born star singer Don McLean and New York State icon Alicia Keys for NRNY Artsy Murals / Street Art For Mankind. New Rochelle, NY. November 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
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DALeast Presents “Rippling Stone” at Hashimoto

DALeast Presents “Rippling Stone” at Hashimoto

A uniquely dark atomized aesthetic and vocabulary that references computer modeling and Rorschach tests, the subjects of DALeast’s focus are energetic skins, or simply skin-like armor that moves to contain the energy within the form as it flies, races, pounds upon the wild gravel planes.

DALeast. Rippling Stone. Hashimoto Contemporary NY. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

A self-driven creator, this Street Artist’s voice has stood confidently within the boisterous murmur of the last decade’s international urban art feast, quietly sticking to his story while the more brash braggarts at the table don new scarves to affect a commercial style or simply contort into something more appealing to merchants and queen-makers who have cunningly appeared at the table.

DALeast. Rippling Stone. Hashimoto Contemporary NY. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

In fact, he’s even taken time off from the so-called festival circuit to examine his painting practice, arguably with solid results. Or liquid.

For Rippling Stone, his solo exhibition with Hashimoto Contemporary on Manhattans’ Lower East Side, the Chinese Berlinian is displaying a strong collection that moves and stands at the same time. According to the press release, he uses “his signature fluid, organic lines to form sinuous creatures that leap and swirl across the plane.”

DALeast. Rippling Stone. Hashimoto Contemporary NY. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“I had a vision of a stream in the mountains that travels through different regions,” says DALeast.

“Sometimes it crashes and merges with rocks, and sometimes it rests in the stillness, moving very slowly. A falling stone causes a rippling pattern, that pattern reflects, then it becomes indistinct whether the stream or the stone is rippling. The show represents a moment, so all the work echoes with this idea.”

DALeast. Rippling Stone. Hashimoto Contemporary NY. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
DALeast. Rippling Stone. Hashimoto Contemporary NY. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
DALeast. Rippling Stone. Hashimoto Contemporary NY. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
DALeast. Rippling Stone. Hashimoto Contemporary NY. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

DALeast Rippling Stone will be on view through Saturday, November 23rd.

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