Slowly the world is opening up, one little step at a time. We hope.
Essential services and workers never shutdown, people who were on the frontlines of the Pandemic, making certain we have emergency medical attention, electricity, food on the table, running water, trash collection, and a secured environment in our homes and outside deserve our gratitude for many years to come. Most countries have set up phases for reopening with the goal of returning to a normal life, or at least a semblance of it.
Among the many sectors of our society that are hit by Covid and vulture economics, the art community was among the most affected; many artists the last to return to their practice, or losing their spaces. In fact, in many countries, the arts and entertainment are still in lockdown. It’s especially gratifying for us to see our peers getting up and making art after months of not being able to do what they love the most.
Today we have a familiar glowing face on the pages of BSA. Spider Tag who tells us that after months of not being able to even go to his studio finally he has something new up for the Take Tomorrow Back Festival in Söderhamn, Sweden to celebrate the cities 400th anniversary. His work has evolved from using yarn to cable to neon with his illuminated pieces now being interactive as is the case of his new creation Neon Mural #9 (INM#9).
Sometimes the eyes tell you
a lot. In the case of masked people, its all you can rely on aside from posture
and body language. Here in Cork, Ireland,
the artist who calls himself Asbestos keeps the faces hidden and the eyes alert
– very alert.
“The piece is another in a
series of mask murals I’m doing,” he tells us. “This mask has drawings on it by
my childhood subconscious, an imaginary version of myself called Left Hand. He
exists as an innocent and naive version of myself, who doodles thoughts of the
past and snippets of the life he sees through my eyes.”
The mural was part of this years Cork Graffiti Jam was organized by @mistertrixy. Asbestos would like to thank him for the chance to paint this and the wonderful hospitality.
As summer sun wanes in the
Northern Hemisphere, we are again reminded of our dependence upon nature, the
print it leaves upon us.
Gola Hundun. Habitat. (photo courtesy of the artist)
Gola Hundun is fascinated at
the moment with the marks that nature can make, and presents these new handmade
prints for us to look at. A land artist largely, Gola has experimented and observed
our complicated relationship with the earth for more than a decade with his
work.
“The human world has many examples of neglected buildings whose demolition is always very tricky and may lead to additional damage to nature,” he tells us. “In the meantime, nature immediately starts to reoccupy the land with fern and fauna, naturally and gradually replacing it.”
Gola Hundun. Habitat. (photo courtesy of the artist)
With his new series “Habitat”,
Gola says he is researching degradation and growth with an aesthetic analysis. “I
like mapping it,” he says. “It is a way to witness different cases all over the
world and to show it up as a universal phenomenon.”
Here he shows us his prints
made with his own version of “eco-printing”, a process that begins with the
selection of leaves. Then “I use the leaves to release colors from their
tannins and carothens, instead of using chemical inks.”
To learn more about this series, check out his Instagram
Gola Hundun. Habitat. (photo courtesy of the artist)Gola Hundun. Habitat. (photo courtesy of the artist)Gola Hundun. Habitat. (photo courtesy of the artist)Gola Hundun. Habitat. (photo courtesy of the artist)Gola Hundun. Habitat. (photo courtesy of the artist)
Today we celebrate American worker’s contributions to our society. The workforce is the engine moving our country to the realization of our dreams and goals. The men and women who get up every day to seek a decent living in this country are increasingly under assault by the corporation’s manipulation of people and profits. Our labor unions have been decimated and the workers’ rights chipped away little by little, or a lot by a lot. All of it began with Reagan and it hasn’t stopped since. Congress is beholden to special interests with most of our elected officials’ ears more attuned to the lobbyists’ demands roaming the halls of Congress than to the ordinary people’s plight for help for better wages, better work conditions, better parental leave, better health insurance.
The Pandemic has only exacerbated the already perilous conditions among the middle class and poor Americans. Most working-class individuals were already living paycheck to paycheck with little if any savings to confront personal, family crises. The poor have always counted on the safety net that the government has put in place to help alleviate their financial and health burdens but those services have been either privatized for-profit or totally eradicated. When Covid-19 took hold of the whole world and Trump made the situation in the USA worse, the majority of Americans have found themselves steps removed from the economic precipice, or pushed into it. Strangely, Democrats also are not coming to the rescue.
There are many lessons to be learned from this Pandemic, one of them will undoubtedly be the abysmal difference between those with money and those without it to confront this crisis. The rich are getting incredibly richer and the poor are getting poorer. Lockdown has been difficult for all of us but certainly easier for those without financial difficulties.
Almost 30 million Americans have lost their jobs, and their hopes of getting them back are slimmer by the week. If there is to be an economic recovery in this country the divisions of who’ll benefit from said recovery will be sharply divided. While the stock market has hit record levels of wealth, ordinary Americans have seen greater inequality. So you might wonder, what are we celebrating today? Our workforce is in tatters and our service economy has been decimated.
Shepard Fairey made the works shown above in LA almost a decade ago, and his message resonates even stronger today.
Anarchists and lawlessness on the streets of New York? Where are you looking exactly? This is a narrative that charlatans like to slander our fair city with, where we spent 8 hours hanging out on blankets on the grass yesterday in Prospect Park, performing anarchist acts like eating sandwiches, reading books, taking naps, going for walks with thousands of our neighbors. So far this is one of the most beautiful Labor Day Weekends we’ve seen in ages and there was no army present.
Every time the fearmonger’s from outside of NYC try to scare people into voting for something, you have to be amused by their ignorance and obvious disinformation – and wonder if it isn’t a generalized fear of black and brown people that drives their critiques. Maybe they are fearful that New Yorkers are the most ethnically diverse population in the country and we are always getting along just fine with each other, even liking and loving each other on a daily basis and we have been doing so for years. Gorgeous and expansively green Prospect Park in the middle of Brooklyn is a fine example of it this weekend – you’ll see people of many backgrounds hanging out happily and civilly, barbecuing meats and vegetables, playing volleyball with the youth group, tossing the frisbee with their girlfriend, sitting on blankets and playing board games with their kids and neighbors, helping babies take their first steps, helping grandpa into a folding chair.
We didn’t see one fight or argument Saturday, and the park was completely teeming with people, and we saw maybe one or two police officers throughout all day – because apparently tens of thousands of us co-New Yorkers know how to enjoy a sunny day in the park with each other and without invoking chaos. On blankets, in lawn chairs, on picnic tables – there we all were; Indians, Africans, Mexicans, Germans, Italians, Jews, Conservatives, Liberals, Koreans, Chinese, Europeans, Buddists, LGBTQI, singles, couples, families, church groups – too many to list here. You could see all kinds of different foods if you walked around and heard music being played – some of it live and spontaneous, like the Dixieland jazz band, the violin quartet, the guy on the flute. We love New York and we love New Yorkers more than ever before.
So, no, Mike Huckleberry or the Foxes or the Divider in Chief, we don’t fall for it because we know the great people of our city. Scare people in the middle of the country with stories about lawlessness in our city, but you don’t fool us for a second. For the record, 93% of the Black Lives Matter marches across the country this year have been peaceful. We’re all capable of having the hard conversations, despite what you and your networks want people to believe – New York has been proving that for years. Sorry, society is moving on – or in many cases already has moved on – from the cultural hegemony phase. It ain’t perfect, but Jesus sometimes it can feel like it.
And now some street art images recently shot – our weekly interview with the street, this week featuring Almost Over Keep Smiling, Antennae, Damon NYC, JKos Art, Little Ricky, Raw, Stikman, and Urban Russian Doll NYC.
A beacon of color, seventy two colors to be exact, is now standing along the Spanish coast, thanks to Cantabria native Okuda San Miguel. The candy wrapped pole is circled by the street artist as he covers it and called it his “Infinite Cantabria” just as the fires of summer begin to cool.
Okuda San Miguel. “Infinite Cantabria”. Cantabria, Spain. (photo Beatriz Carretero & Omar H. Garcia)
He says he wanted this, the first lighthouse on the coast to be painted, to reflect the natural wealth and diversity of the autonomous Cantabrian region on Spain’s north coast. Built between 1833 and 1839, the Cabo Mayor Lighthouse is already a major tourist attraction with a storied past, so it is an unusual commission for a street artist to be invited to paint it and an opportunity to shed new light on these troubled times.
With sweeping vistas in every direction, this new treatment from Okuda is a hit, with 10K visitors in its first weekend a couple of weeks ago.
Okuda San Miguel. “Infinite Cantabria”. Cantabria, Spain. (photo Beatriz Carretero & Omar H. Garcia)Okuda San Miguel. “Infinite Cantabria”. Cantabria, Spain. (photo Beatriz Carretero & Omar H. Garcia)Okuda San Miguel. “Infinite Cantabria”. Cantabria, Spain. (photo Beatriz Carretero & Omar H. Garcia)Okuda San Miguel. “Infinite Cantabria”. Cantabria, Spain. (photo Beatriz Carretero & Omar H. Garcia)Okuda San Miguel. “Infinite Cantabria”. Cantabria, Spain. (photo Beatriz Carretero & Omar H. Garcia)Okuda San Miguel. “Infinite Cantabria”. Cantabria, Spain. (photo Beatriz Carretero & Omar H. Garcia)Okuda San Miguel. “Infinite Cantabria”. Cantabria, Spain. (photo Beatriz Carretero & Omar H. Garcia)
Our weekly focus on the moving image and art in the streets. And other oddities.
Now screening : 1. Back to Skool with Professor Sofles
BSA Special Feature: Back to Skool with Professor Sofles Wielding the Cans
Well its back to school time of the year, kids, and COVID-19 is complicating everybody’s plans this year. But we can still learn something, right? Did you bring an apple to class to give to Mr. Sofles?
Today we are going to have a Sofles Master Class: 7 brief but potent videos with the Australian renaissance man and graffiti master Sofles, who shares insightful tips and on-point techniques for executing a specific piece or how to mix colors, how to do an outline, how to mix graffiti elements in a realistic portrait. We want to see everybody here in the front row, no stragglers in the back. And wear your mask please, because you’re smart.
Street
artist Swoon’s Heliotrope Foundation continues to add artists to its lustrous roster
of prints and projects with a new program of pieces for you and your kids to
color in.
“We worked
with a few artists to make this activity book in response to all the need for
home schooling and anyone else who likes to color,” she tells us.
Book Cover art by Swoon. Compass. Heliotrope Foundation.
The
collection is called Compass: “a unique and beautiful handbook, a collection of
creative activities and an inspirational journal. The aim of the project
is to generate work for artists while sharing the joy and necessity of art to
heal, grow and play.”
COMPASS is a free PDF activity book available for distribution to those at home, those with children, and those looking for something to be motivated by. If you would like to distribute Compass in your local area, please contact us: info@heliotropefoundation.org
Tag @TheHeliotropeFoundation on Instagram with your finished COMPASS pages & we may share your work! #HeliotropeCompass
The international art fair Art
Basel announced today that this year’s flashy Miami event is cancelled, joining
its two other high-profile annual fairs in Hong Kong and Basel, Switzerland, which
had both already met this fate earlier – all due to the complication of
COVID-19.
One of the best parts about graffiti, street art, mural, and hip hop culture events like Urbane Kunst here in the city of Basel is you don’t have to worry about air kissing on both cheeks.
Graffiti jams are more interested in getting up on the wall, drinking beer, and having a barbecue – which 40 local and international artists did here from August 20-30, thanks to the event’s sponsor, Bell on Neudorfstrasse in Basel.
“The top criterion for artists was we have to know them: because we’re going to spend a lot of time together,” explains street artist BustArt, who has been working for about five years to make this wall happen. “You are together every day for about two weeks and so the main important thing is having a good time and for this, we just wanted to have cool people here with whom we’ve worked in the past and who we could trust that we were going to have a great outcome.”
Not that “Change of Colours”, as this event is called, didn’t have a lot of complications from the worldwide virus. The artist list kept changing as certain countries were eventually banned from traveling here – First the US, later Spain.
A final list of names was not available at press time but scheduled were artists like Boogie, Cole, Kesy, Kron, Tizer, Seyo, and Sonic. Photographer and journalist Nika Kramer caught a handful of the artists to ask a few questions, including Mr. Cenz (UK), Chromeo and Bane (CH), and event organizer BustArt (CH).
Street artist Julian Phethean aka Mr. Cenz is internationally known for his unique, expressive portraits of women. He tells us “I created one of my futuristic female portraits that I’ve been doing for a few years now and I paint a lot of black women as well because I think they are under-represented in the street art world. It’s very important to me, coming from a multicultural city like London.
Also for me, hip-hop is a black culture that’s why I paint mainly black power for women,” he says. “If you look at it, it’s quite spiritual as well. My style is kind of something transcendent. It’s for people to look at and to get lost in. That’s just what I do, and it’s amazing to do it on a big scale in such a prominent place and I hope people enjoy it.”
Two Swiss artists Fabian
Florin aka Bane and David Kümin aka Chromeo, have worked together on smaller
walls in the past, but the two masters of photorealism have never truly collaborated
on something new together, and they say that they’re very satisfied with the result.
For Chromeo, Basel holds a special meaning to him in the development of his career as a graffiti writer and an artist.
“Basel is history. Back in the days when I started graffiti it was like a duty: you have to go to Basel!” he says. “Because it was considered state of the art. No disrespect to other places in Switzerland but… The graffiti history is here and it is the most important, I would have to say – even though I’m not from Basel.”
In the opinion of Bane, Basel left a major impression as well, but it is much more personal. “I came here with completely fresh eyes. I was drug addicted during the time that Chromeo’s referring to,” he explains. “I’ve just been painting for about 10 years so Basel for me is a very fresh place, like new. What I enjoy here is the community. There’re so many people. It’s a community I’m stepping inside of – kind of a small family already. It was heartwarming and I felt very welcomed and for me, that is the best thing about Basel.”
For
organizer and hometown boy BustArt, who just completed his largest wall to date
for Urban Nation Museum in Berlin a couple of months ago, this wall has been
beckoning to him and the event is the result of persistence in pursuing it. “I’ve
been wanting to paint this wall for 20 years so we are happy that the company
actually paid for it,” he says. He calls his new piece, “Home Sweet Home”
because it symbolizes the place and the city he loves more than any other.
The Bristol based street artist Banksy is again walking the fine line between activism and self-promotion, uncomfortable bedfellows at best.
Sponsoring a ship “M.V. Louise Michel” to rescue refugees can probably be accomplished without branding the ship with your artwork, and he’s received criticism for what could appear to some as patting himself on the back for his generosity. Conversely one could argue that placing his name and art on the ship raises the profile and plight of those who otherwise get ignored, even creating a protective immunity of sorts around them.
Banksy. “M.V. Louise Michel” (photo courtesy of M.V. Louise Michel)
His new campaign, or stunt, went perilously bad this weekend when the vessel was overloaded and its ability to navigate freely was hindered, according to news reports. What’s more the team sounding increasingly more panicked in successive Tweets appealing for official recognition and rescue.
We tend to overlook human failings when they are backed by goodwill, and this team will get it right, no doubt. At least you can say that this is an artist who walks his talk, which is refreshing as an ocean breeze.
To learn more about the rescue boat and their mission from their website:
Every season brings new artists to the street art scene, while others leave town, or simply fade away. The summer, born in the age of Covid-19 and #BLM when the federal government tries its latest attempt to kill off postal services so it can privatize one more thing the taxpayers used to own, we now see work in New York re-engineering that time-honored graffiti-tag vehicle, the USPS address sticker.
Sticker Maul (photo Jaime Rojo)
Sticker Maul is a mixed-media collagist with a loose style of irony and a textual wit paired with photos, as well as straight-up wordplay. Topics are vaguely social, mainly clever, the demeanor sincere without pomposity. These are good qualities for an artist working within a smaller canvas on the street who wants to “cut through the clutter” – and its working!
The winds of change are gathering force and weaving together – social, political, financial, environmental… and it is all being reflected in street art today. Ironically, because media in the US is addicted to money and misdirection and is completely disinterested in the poor and working class as a whole, thoughtful analysis that pops off city walls seems unadulterated, capable of giving you more truthful assessments of what is missing, what is out of whack, and who’s gotta take action. Your face here.
Here’s our weekly interview with the streets, this week featuring Adam Fu, AJ LaVilla, Antennae, Black Ligma, City Kitty, CRKSHNK, De Groupo, Hearts NY, Novy, Pork, Surface of Beauty, The Greator, Winston Tseng, X Rebellion NYC, and Zuli Miau.
BROOKLYN STREET ART LOVES YOU MORE EVERY DAY
