Good to see Mint and Surf on the streets again here in NYC. We wondered where they had gone.
Wishing all of you a Happy Thanksgiving this week, whether you are alone or with family, cooking a turkey or baking a pie, spraying a tag or slapping a sticker, collecting art or collecting bills. We hope that we can all count some blessings this week. Please stay safe from the Covid-19.
Here is our weekly interview with the streets, this week featuring Butterfly Mush, Dragon 99, Eye Sticker, Fours Crew, Graff Art Kings, HOACS, Invader, Michael Conroy, Mint & Serf, Mr. Can Do, No Sleep, Only Jesus NYC, Rawraffe, Roachi, Shniz, Shorty, Smells, and Surface of Beauty.
A quick heads up for a new video with Brazilian street artist and muralist Alex Senna and contemporary Brazilian poet Marcelo Ariel that will debut on November 25th. Any time street art collaborates with another form of expression, we have the opportunity to gain a new appreciation for it.
Alex Senna. Fronteiras. (photo courtesy of the artist)
While international capital flows freely, we discover that boundaries for people are still in place – often to confine and conform. These Fronteiras may be personal, political, or matters of the state.
We’re looking forward to seeing and hearing these two artists’ collaboration in the wake of Senna’s dual walls for the Nalata International Street Art Festival, which took place in São Paulo a couple of months ago. It is an idea germinated from poetry, translated in paint.
Our weekly focus on the moving image and art in the streets. And other oddities.
Now screening : 1. “Strength” from Pejac 2. Chant – Faith XVII 3. Spells, The Salton Sea – Faith XLVII 4. EDOARDO TRESOLDI, An Interview
BSA Special Feature: “Strength” from Pejac
Santander, Spain has suffered from COVID, of course, as has most of the country. Local street artist PEJAC says he wanted to contribute to his local hospital, the University Hospital Marqués de Valdecilla, by painting in public areas for people to enjoy. He says the common theme that unites the three distinctly different styles he used, is Strength.
“It’s a gesture of gratitude to the heath workers of Valdecilla, for their work in general and during this Covid crisis in particular,” says PEJAC
PEJAC / STRENGTH
FAITH XLVII / CHANT
Reliably enigmatic, street artist Faith XVII is using the medium of video to add impressions and associations to her works here on a text series called “Chant”. The irony of using the letter C that may call to mind Chase bank is drawn tighter as you see neighborhoods and walls probably redlined by corporate banks, or targeted for annihilation through neglect. In the context of our older societies, one may see in her work the power of chanting to focus a larger group to act in union with purpose, and power.
SPELLS / SALTON SEA / FAITH XLVII
60 miles south of Palm Springs, California, the Saltan Sea is disappearing, it’s shore moving miles in only a couple of decades, along with its population. Faith XVII is a Californian these days and she is here pondering the “beach” that remains, full of mercury, arsenic, selenium. California’s largest inland body of water now turns into dust, and Faith pours herself into the soil and the air that carries it; and the drought, well… How this translates to her art on the street or in the studio, it is in alignment with her ongoing concerns about climate change – and you can be sure this project will appear again in her work.
Painting on the street for only eleven years, artist Tamara Djurovic made a sterling impression wherever she created her cerebral diagrams, empathic figures, dream-like compositions, frank diary entries, societal critiques and sly metaphors – most often in a monochrome palette.
For such a short career, how is it possible that she enabled her work to speak volumes to us and about us from so many walls? And how can we not feel shaken by her passing today?
Born in Argentina and living for many years in Spain, she created her nom de plume Hyuro from her given family name. After first working with street artist Escif she was warmly adopted by an ever-growing street art family, her subtle humor and elegant self-effacing demeanor rather effortlessly opening doors over time to paint murals on the streets of the Americas, Europe, Africa… Her practice was studied, her process intentional, her dialogue with the passerby sincere.
Now she has passed in Valencia after struggling with a long illness for years, leaving behind a family, close friends, and many fans. You can also safely say she leaves a legacy as an artist, a colleague, and a person. We raise a toast to Hyuro, with many thanks, and if you can hug somebody, tell them they are loved.
Juan Yksuhc is more oil-on-canvas than aerosol-on-steel, but he’s done the latter with the same fantastical figurative free-wheeling quotidian panache as the former. Rich tones and stretched torsos give way to static snapshots of real life, always rendered in a fevered fervor.
Here in Madrid his paintings are episodic and serially thematic, you may say. Photographer Ricardo Hernandez seeks them, warmed with curiosity at their formal classicism, their nonplussed aplomb and sometimes obvious symbolism. It’s a different kind of lengua de la calle.
Yksuhc in fact is not eager to be unpacked, preferring the graphic manifestation of a historical present to catch you in your moment, ready to walk into the world he’s just painted for you.
For example he tells us that this series “Centropelia” is an allusion to the conflicted realities bound within gentrification; as modern as it is historic with its themes of speculation, expulsion, and the spiraling economic violence of rent.
“When I first read Jessi’s zine I cried the kind of tears you cry when you feel seen and known in a loving way,” says New York street artist Swoon, who has made her own recovery from childhood trauma quietly and gently public in the last few years. An internal process of discovery that is central to her art practice, you may also discern related stories in the pieces she makes for the street.
Swoon is speaking of the second zine in a series we began this past Saturday – a zine that you can download for free. This one is about working with trauma that we or others in our lives have experienced. “It’s a beautiful book which speaks so simply and clearly to the condition of trauma, and to the footholds we can get in our everyday lives which will help us on our journey towards wholeness,” says Swoon.
She considers therapist and artist Jessi Rado to be one of those brave visionaries who is not afraid to “go there” and who uses their skills and their art to help people to heal. Using her workshops with The Million Person Project and Philly Mural Arts, Jessi has developed this very accessible booklet that may be helpful to you or somebody you care about. Working with the The Heliotrope Foundation and Swoon, we are proud to share it with you.
“Trauma and the question of how to heal from it has become a central part of my practice as an artist,” says Swoon. “What I have found over the years is that trauma is real, it’s not “just in our heads” and it can be healed from. There are many brave therapists at the frontlines of this field who are finding new ways to work through the nervous system and the mindful self to unravel the debilitating stress which holds people in destructive patterns of coping.”
So eager are we to rid ourselves of this year 2020, some of us are already laying plans for humanity in 2021.
Martha Cooper in a still from video shot by Jaime Rojo for “The New Humanity” 2021.
“I really hope that we can put together the things that we have seen and the lessons that we have learned and work together so that we can achieve justice and equality for all,” says photographer Martha Cooper in this new video for “The New Humanity”, an art project by Lavazza for 2021.
Martha Cooper in a still from video shot by Jaime Rojo for “The New Humanity” 2021.
The video, shot by BSA’s Editor of Photography Jaime Rojo, follows Martha as she shows us the new project that she took on in response to being cooped up in her apartment this year.
Martha Cooper in a still from video shot by Jaime Rojo for “The New Humanity” 2021.
Shooting regularly out of her Upper West Side apartment window Martha captured thousands of people passing by a particular bench that she has officially adopted. The text on the placard is a joint effort by Cooper and Steve Harrington, the Editor in Chief of BSA, who proposed a few options for it at Martha’s request in the summer of 2018.
Martha Cooper in a still from video shot by Jaime Rojo for “The New Humanity” 2021.
Ultimately, she liked Steve’s “writer’s bench” idea, since it is a graffiti term and Martha’s well regarded for her preservation of graffiti culture history with her photography. Together they tailored her selection to its current form on a plaque which many New Yorkers have strolled in front of, sat upon, eaten lunch next to, and spent peaceful summer moments of golden slumber beneath.
“A writer’s bench of my own, a place to plan more adventures as I gaze upward to the windows of this captivating city.”
Martha Cooper in a still from video shot by Jaime Rojo for “The New Humanity” 2021.
In “The New Humanity 2021” calendar 13 photographers present their take on a possible vision the theme, each expressing their personal viewpoints and styles. Included along with Cooper are David LaChapelle, Simone Bramante, Martin Schoeller, Ami Vitale, Christy Lee Rogers, Steve McCurry, Joey L., Carolyn Drake, Denis Rouvre, Eugenio Recuenco, Charlie Davoli, and TOILETPAPER.
Alongside and in addition, there are 6 cultural “ambassadors” in the campaign – our personal favorite is true New York activist, performer, and poet Patti Smith. Don’t miss her performance of “Because the Night” that will send chills down your spine.
To see more about Martha and the whole campaign, check out
An overview of the New Humanity 2021 / Lavazza Calendar.
80 years ago the great actor and philosopher Charlie Chaplin delivered a “Final Speech” in the movie The Great Dictator. The words are so appropriate to our time that the speech could have been written today, as we slip into the Greater Depression and a rise of fascism in many corners of the world. We only hope we will find and retain our humanity again.
Editor note: Lavazza is not an advertiser with BSA, although Jaime did enjoy shooting video of Martha for her contribution to their campaign.
Happy Diwali to all our Hindu neighbors here in Brooklyn and around the world. We hope you find some ways to celebrate safely over the next few days in this year of COVID-19. Diwali is a festival of lights that symbolizes the spiritual “victory of light over darkness, good over evil, and knowledge over ignorance”. We need that for sure.
A week after the US election was called, the current president is trying to foment discord and raise funds for himself, but with war-loving folks like John Bolton and Carl Rove jumping ship, can it be much longer until a stampede of similar careerists and military industrialists follow suit?
And while certain yellow newsreaders on corporate TV were desperate for open warfare in the streets in the days around the election, most people are just waiting until the inevitable capitulation. This has hardly been a bloody revolution, but keep trying Rachel and whatsisname?
Street art is reflecting the current mood in broad strokes and pointed ones. New Yorkers can never keep their big yaps shut, so the level of discourse may sometimes be crude and brash – but it can also be insightful, enlightening, and even an invitation for thoughtful exchange. It’s times like these you can be proud of the voices on the streets, which very likely will persevere.
Here is our weekly interview with the streets, this week featuring Baston714, Cake$, City Kitty, Dan Bennett, De Grupo, Faile, I Heart Graffiti, Lunge Box, Pure Genius, Reisha Perlmutter, Rubin 415, and Sac Six.
A free zine today for you
from Jessi Rado, an artist and therapist interested in helping those of us who
have suffered trauma or one kind or another. It’s accepted knowledge among
those who work with those struggling with substance abuse that it often is a direct
result of trauma – a fundamental insight that may help us all re-set our thinking
about addiction.
Everyday Healing Part 1: How To Work With Your Own Pain. (Artwork by Jessi Rado)
Ms. Rado’s new zine is the
product of a program she collaborated in with street artist Swoon with the Mural Arts’ Restorative Justice
Program in Philadelphia
a few years ago. At this time when so many in our communities are already
dealing with the wreckage of addiction and what it does to families, the stress
of COVID-19 and economic insecurity only compound the fears and in many cases,
suffering.
That’s why BSA is so happy
to offer something constructive that can help!
Everyday Healing Part 1: How To Work With Your Own Pain. (Artwork by Jessi Rado)
The new zine is born from the
program that Swoon participated in with Rado and storytellers Heather Box and
Julian Mocine-McQueen; It “hosted a series of trauma-informed art therapy
courses, followed by a month of storytelling workshops, designed to develop an
understanding of the conditions and context of trauma that lead to and
perpetuate lifelong addiction.”
Take a look at some of the simple and simply profound artworks and texts here, and download the PDF at the end of the posting. One day at a time, friends.
Everyday Healing Part 1: How To Work With Your Own Pain. (Artwork by Jessi Rado)Everyday Healing Part 1: How To Work With Your Own Pain. (Artwork by Jessi Rado)
Our weekly focus on the moving image and art in the streets. And other oddities.
Now screening : 1. A Series of TEMPERAMENTS / GONZALO BORONDO
BSA Special Feature: A Series of Temperaments from Gonzalo Borondo
As foul and as fickle and as steady and as sublime as the weather, so are the many temperaments of humankind. Seizing upon religious and scientific relics and our own yet rudimentary understanding of ourselves, Borondo brilliantly blends his ongoing experimentation with light, electricity, and layers of carved glass. Singular in the manner of its gentle pulsating, these new pieces are peculiar and familiar: at once alive, a laboratory specimen. Each temperament is deeply rooted in medicine and literature, all still encased in mystery.
A new secular icon today from Naples, and while this fresco is not quite Vesuvian, its sovereign purple and sunkissed golden tones and draped fabrics make it quite at home here in this historic city of classical antiquity.
INTI. “Polvera Di Stelle”. Naples, Italy. (photo courtesy of the artist)
Chilean street muralist INTI bespoke this vision in the Barra neighborhood, which its Wiki page says “has suffered much the same fate of urban decay as the rest of the eastern periphery of Naples, a fate that includes drugs and entrenched organized crime.”
And yet here rises the Polvera di Stelle (Stardust), a nurturing, protective maternal figure – though perhaps more Greta Thunberg than Sophia Loren – surrounded by mysticism and ancient-future symbolism.
INTI. “Polvera Di Stelle”. Naples, Italy. (photo courtesy of the artist)
“Look with the naked eye,
without placebos or metaphysical aspirins.” INTI tells BSA. “Look without
dogma, without wanting to rest on great truths. Look without easy answers that
calm doubts, prevents us from seeing poetry in the uncertain and in the
minuteness of our place in nature.”
The new mural is in collaboration with the Campania region and Jorit Foundation, says the artist.
INTI. “Polvera Di Stelle”. Naples, Italy. (photo courtesy of the artist)INTI. “Polvera Di Stelle”. Naples, Italy. (photo courtesy of the artist)
Montreal’s ASHOP crew is a complete team of talented writers and painters who can handle the commercial jobs – but when it comes to having fun they just want to hit the wall with their own stuff for a few hours.
While in Sacramento last month, WIDE OPEN WALLS founder David Sobon found the aerosol team some primo possibilities and they didn’t hesitate.
“Meeting their deadline, you would think they would have been exhausted and glad to relax for a day or two,” says photographer and co-author of Spray Can Art, Jim Prigoff. “In the true graffiti spirit, they asked ‘Isn’t there a wall we could go and paint?’” he marvels as he describes these new photos he took of the jubilant day.
Often an activity overlooked by the everyday joe, outside painting is one of the most joyous activities a person can do – especially when COVID has you cooped up and afraid of getting or spreading the virus. Here are a talented group working side by side, leaving new works for the city to enjoy.
BROOKLYN STREET ART LOVES YOU MORE EVERY DAY
