Brooklyn Street Art | …loves you more every day.

“MARTHA: A Picture Story” Premieres at Tribeca. A Film By Selina Miles.

March 13, 2019 Artists, Interview, Interview, Interviews

BSA Exclusive Announcement
and interview with the director and the star of

MARTHA

A Picture Story

A Documentary by Selina Miles

BSA is proud to announce the world premiere of Selina Miles’ new full-length documentary on the life and career of New York photographer Martha Cooper at the Tribeca Film Festival next month. Separated by four decades and an ocean or two, the Australian film director and the American photographer – each of whom has garnered serious respect in the myriad subcultures of art-in-the-streets with phenomenal storytelling abilities and an innate sense of timing – together land a remarkable film capturing life as a street-shooter, making the multi-chaptered story sing.

It is a fascinating visual sweep that illustrates the unusually gratifying paths that this ever-curious ethnologist charts on the streets (and below them) worldwide since receiving her first camera from her father at age three. The film is a well illustrated collage of a remarkable 70 plus year span showcasing Coopers’ 6^th sense for people, urban culture, and burgeoning subculture. Viewers get to see the huge variety of interests she has investigated with amiable warmth and academic rigor – from the Peace Corps in Thailand to tattoos in Japan to graffiti train writing in New York to the daily lives of people in her native Baltimore.

With ample interviews and vintage video footage never seen before, “MARTHA: A Picture Story” follows Ms. Cooper across continents into the streets, through tunnels and over rooftops to provide illustrative background contexts for her decisions, her driving motivations, and her pure determination to succeed as a professional photographer – despite man-made and societal adversity.

We’ve been very fortunate to see this diamond of a documentary up close, and we can say that MARTHA is legitimate crowd-pleaser.

BSA spoke with Ms. Cooper and Ms. Miles for this auspicious announcement day about the new movie:

BSA: Your personal and professional history has often been about overcoming challenges and pushing aside barriers. Is there one new challenge you have gone beyond to participate fully in a documentary about you?
Martha Cooper: Well like most photographers, I’m more comfortable behind the camera than in front of it especially when speaking. I can’t say I’ve gotten good about overcoming being filmed, but I tried hard to give good footage.

BSA: One of the challenges of being a doc filmmaker is the number of hats you have to wear – sometimes perhaps feeling like you have to do everything yourself. What did you discover about your preferred role/s on a film?
Selina Miles: Making a documentary is certainly a dynamic job and requires a mix of technical, social and creative skills. Learning from a photojournalist with 50 years experience such as Martha has been a wonderful experience. I started my career in video making by mucking around with friends making graffiti videos and shooting street art festivals, and the DIY spirit of both of these art forms really gave me an advantage on this project.

Not all directors know how to shoot or how to edit, but thanks to these early experiences I do know a little about all of these disciplines. Being able to just grab a camera and shoot, or to edit my own little concept videos was very handy in getting the project off the ground. That being said, being able to employ an amazing editor like Simon Njoo and having the mentorship of producers like Jennifer Peedom has also been a dream come true and really helped take this film to the next level.

BSA: With the new documentary many people will learn about a more dimensional photographer than the one they most frequently associate with the name Martha Cooper. Why is this important?
Martha Cooper: I’m often called a graffiti, street art, or hip hop photographer but I don’t put myself into those categories. I would like people to understand that the common denominator in my choice of subjects is art in everyday life. I’m always looking for examples of how people are creative in their everyday lives. Graffiti is just one of many different examples.

BSA: Is there a special approach or formula that one tries to follow when making a story like this for a more general audience.
Selina Miles: I think that the interesting thing about this story, in particular, is that it explores a subculture that is so misunderstood by so many people. Everybody has seen graffiti and has an idea of what it is, but I still think that few people really understand why it exists and where it came from. There’s so many tropes and ideas about graffiti and those who practice it that are just plain wrong or oversimplify a very complex idea. It’s been an enjoyable and interesting challenge for me to unpack the facts and rules of this subculture as I see them, and step them out in a way that somebody completely new to the culture can understand and appreciate Martha’s story.

BSA: Your photos capture a time and a moment and a technique of creation, but also often the more atmospheric and cultural energy of the street. What has drawn you time and again to capture this to share? Your own curiosity?
Martha Cooper: Not exactly. As you know, I like looking for things and collecting them. Photography is a challenging quest and taking a good photo is the reward. The nature of what I’m questing for can change according to time and place but in general, the world is more interesting to me if I have a camera. The possibility of photographing something makes me look at my surroundings with a keener eye than I would without a camera.

BSA: Martha stood on the shoulders of feminists before her, yet blazed some paths that were very much her own – frequently without support. What is one lesson a younger person may take from Martha Cooper when they watch this movie?
Selina Miles: Marty often says that people today don’t understand what it took to survive as a freelancer in earlier decades, especially as a woman and I completely agree. It’s a common thing that you hear but it’s very true, we are lucky these days to live in a world so connected and relatively accepting of all kinds of races, ages and sexes. That being said, there’s always going to be a frontier, and I hope that young people watching Martha’s story will be inspired to push beyond that frontier in their own way, and not be held back by anybody’s expectations of who or what they should be. And do it all the time with a smile and a sense of humor!

MARTHA: A Picture Story.

Premiering at the 2019 Tribeca Film Festival, which takes place from April 24 – May 5th. Public tickets will go on sale on Tuesday March 26 at 11am ET. Tickets are extremely limited and we recommend purchasing tickets early.

https://www.tribecafilm.com/filmguide/

https://www.tribecafilm.com/festival/tickets

Hashtags: #marthathemovie

Film Instagram: @marthathemovie

Martha Cooper Instagram: @marthacoopergram

Director’s Instagram: @selinamiles

For screening dates and locations and to purchase tickets click HERE

Various & Gould: Broken Screens, Shattered Social Scenes

March 12, 2019 Artists

“Catastrophe or salvation?” asks Various and Gould. “Being offline is scary and disastrous to most of us, however for some of us it might evoke the feeling of freedom through digital detox.”

Various & Gould. Broken Screens Project. Berlin. (photo © Various & Gould)

A departure from their typical work and on-the-street installations, the Berlin duo are taking over advertising spaces and bus shelters with images of broken, smashed crystals of digital phones. The smart phone displays are transferred using the venerable intaglio print technique at a large scale, transforming the shattered smart phone displays into works of art.

“We love the beauty and the random and unique structure of the damaged displays,” they tell us of the new works that are illuminated from behind and contain none of the typical insignia or clever ad copy that evoke desire in consumers.

Perhaps more subtle than the activist messages of other hi-jackers of private ad space in public space, these images of brokenness are meant to draw our attention to the fragility of our devices as well as our tenuous connection to the ephemeral information we so greedily consume from them daily.

Not only are these broken screens, they indirectly could be interpreted as a critique of our broken social scenes that have been shattered and fragmented by our slavish reliance on these small glowing rectangles.

Part of a campaign they entitle simply, “Broken Screens” the two say we could stand to consider the power we have given to our smart phones – a charge which may seem obvious but we may actually overlook.

“It also discloses the flaws of these devices, which we use every day almost 24/7 and which we carry around on every occasion,” they say. “The project really attracts us, having raw destruction and dysfunction as a starting point.”

Masaaki Hasegawa: Expansive Gestural Paint Installation on Roofs in Madrid

March 11, 2019 Artists

Not quite calligraphy, this gestural art is calligraffitic for sure; it’s deconstruction of the letter style so complete that the language is no longer there.

As communications are becoming further refracted and dependent upon image and impression, this non-language that requires a full body swing and slap with brush and paint is non-the-less communicative.

Masaaki Hasegawa. (photo still from the video).

Tokyo-born artist Masaaki Hasegawa shares with us today his interpretive work with broomstick and bucket paint on the roof of multiple Madrid buildings comprising the Museo Zapadores.

Each retains its own shaped pool of language and Mr. Hasegawa says that his “Calligraphy 4.0” is meant to completely release language from its moorings. It is an expression, he says, “whose understanding of the order of sensation and creative interpretation transcends the usual concepts of identity: nationality, language, culture, religion, generation, gender.”

He calls the installation “Connect People Thru Art Beyond Borders”.

BSA Images Of The Week: 03.10.19

March 10, 2019 Artists, BSA Images Of The Week, Images of the Week

A paper published last autumn by HEC Paris and Columbia Business School finds that artists are more likely to be professionally successful if they network widely – and that their innate talent as an artist may have less to do with commercial success than many thought.

Unearthed by Artsy this week, the paper is ricocheting across social media with shock and dismay uttered by some artists who lament the hollowness of the modern graffiti/ Street Art/ Urban Art world, purporting to be distinct and above it all, yet posing in countless photos on their social pages with myriad peers and professionals and potential clients cheek-to-cheek.

It may be time that some hardcore Graffiti and Street Artists can shed some of the charades about how the globe turns, even if you are a graduate of the “School of Hard Knocks”. This movement we are witnessing toward self-promotion and marketing has always been true: This research paper doesn’t even use modern artists as a model for study – the subjects were part of the 20^th Century abstract art movement and most died years ago.

You’ll recall that a central tenant of graffiti is that writers spread their names on every wall in different neighborhoods and cities to get “Fame”. As the authors of the paper Banerjee Mitali and Paul L. Ingram say, “CEOs, activists, scientists and innovators all benefit from fame. Meanwhile, the struggle for fame is becoming ever more intense and complex in a digital economy.” Download the paper here.

Yes, networking helps your career. In other breaking news, puppies are cute, the Pope is Catholic, and boys like short skirts.

This week our Images of the Week are coming to you directly from our latest visits to Madrid, Bilbao, and Bayonne. We’re excited to share what we found with BSA readers.

So here’s our weekly interview with the street, this time featuring Anna Taratiel, Artez, Aryz, C215, Dan Witz, Eltono, Invader, Monkeybird, MSW, Stinkfish, and Suso33.

Anna Taratiel. Bilbao Arts District. Bilbao, Spain. March 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Invader. Bilbao, Spain. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Aryz. Bilbao Arts District. Bilbao, Spain. March 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Dan Witz. Madrid, Spain. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

C215 for Points de Vue Festival. Bayonne, France. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Artez for Urvanity Arts. Madrid, Spain. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

SUSO33. Bilbao Arts District. Bilbao, Spain. March 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Eltono. Bilbao Arts District. Bilbao, Spain. March 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Stinkfish. Bilbao Arts District. Bilbao, Spain. March 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

MSW. Beyonne, France. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Monkeybird. Bilbao Arts District. Bilbao, Spain. March 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Untitled. Sunset. Madrid, Spain. March 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Guggenheim Bilbao Impresses Outside and In

March 9, 2019 Artists

Bilbao Spain is known for its Basque nationalism, its Basque football club, its pintxos and beer outside pubs in small streets, its Casco Viejo. It is also today closely identified with the Frank Gehry designed Guggenheim Museum, now opened just over two decades.

For mysterious geopolitical, personal, and financial reasons, we have not seen this city since 1994 when the new museum was just being constructed, so amidst the organic graffiti/Street Art hunting and the Bilbao Arts District mural mapping, we knew that we had to get inside the undulating metal building that has become an audacious architectural landmark.

Not that there weren’t other intellectually stimulating exhibititions and programming on offer in this historic yet cosmopolitan northern Spanish city of a million just 10 miles south of the Bay of Biscay. At Azkuna Zentroa there currently are workshops and classes that introduce you to experimental music and sound art and there is a well-regarded ‘Culture Lab’ digital laboratory.

You can also check out Museo de Bellas Artes for a new exhibition that highlights the momentus cultural changes of 1968 and the five decades that followed as seen through the perspective of Basque art. Their permanent collection includes El Greco, Goya, Tapies, Mary Cassatt, Paul Gaugin and Francis Bacon.

Our own experience of the Guggenheim somehow felt more profound because of Gehry’s well respected visual vocabulary in the public expression of architecture as art. Over two days we made sure to take a personal stroll outside and inside to measure the experience.

Background, Arku Gorriak *ARCOS ROJOS*. Foreground, Louise Bourgeois. *MAMA* Guggenheim Bilbao (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The resulting personal observation is that being outside on the street, witnessing the buildings’ dialogue with its surroundings as well as its own powerful image along the Nervion River which runs through the city of Bilbao to the Cantabrian Sea, by far impressed us as visitors.

Perhaps it was because a few of the exhibitions inside were closed or being installed, perhaps because the current exhibition from VanGogh to Picasso felt incongruous with the superstructure, or because the galleries themselves sometimes overpower the art-viewing experience, but inside didn’t stand a chance against the experiencia afuerda.

Set aside the sprawling Richard Serra sculpture gallery with its slinging sloping slabs of rusting iron bending your very perception – and the amazing soaring electronic text installation by Jenny Holzer. Both of those meet the challenge set by the outsized personality and promise of their common home.

Jeff Koons *PUPPY* Guggenheim Bilbao (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Here we present some of our visual impressions of the Guggenheim Bilbao experience, one that surely speaks to many of our readers – with gratitude to the museum and the city for their hospitality and inspiration.

Jeff Koons *TULIPS* Guggenheim Bilbao (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Nakaya Fujiko *Escultura de Niebla No. 08025 (F.O.G.)* Guggenheim Bilbao (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Richard Serra *La Materia del Tiempo* Guggenheim Bilbao (photo © Jaime Rojo)

BSA Film Friday: 03.08.19

March 8, 2019 Artists

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

Now screening :
1. Isaac Cordal’s Installation at Urvanity 2019

2. Penique Productions Site Specific Installation at Urvanity Art 2019

3. Pro176 Mural for Urvanity Art 2019

4. 1010 Pedestrian Installation in Madrid

BSA Special Feature: Homemade videos at Urvanity 2019

Just in case you didn’t catch these verite recordings of some scenes in Madrid last weekend for Urvanity – here are the original captures by Jaime Rojo, seamed together.

Isaac Cordal Site Specific Installation at Urvanity 2019 Art in Madrid

Penique Productions Site Specific Installation at Urvanity Art 2019 in Madrid.

Pro176 Mural for Urvanity Art 2019 in Madrid

1010 Pedestrian Installation in Madrid for Urvanity Art 2019

Bayonne Diary, From Alban Morlot’s Point of View

March 7, 2019 Artists

Here in Basque country you can casually drive between Bilbao (Spain) and Bayonne (France) as if you were just heading out to the shopping mall to buy new kicks. The signs of course are in multiple languages (Spanish, French, Basque) and there is much more political street art in these towns- addressing topics like fracking, racism, women’s rights and amnesty for political prisoners.

With an atmosphere that is more politically charged than other parts of the world, you can quickly forget it when you see so many rolling green hills dotted with puffy round sheep and old white farm houses along the highway.

Arriving in Bayonne we were happy to see many of the medieval small streets still boast Gothic-style cathedrals, a cloister here, the occasional castle there. It’s a walkable city with centuries of history, conservative cultural values, and a cool Street Art festival from the last few years called Points de Vue. Co-Founder Alban Morlot obliged us with a tour of the city and a multitude of murals produced over the past few years (You can read here our article of the recent 2018 edition of the festival with exclusive images from Martha Cooper and Nika Kramer).

Headquartered in the public/privately run community center/gallery called SpaceJunk since the early 2000’s Alban and director Jérome Catz have been organizing shows here and in Lyons and Grenoble as their interests and network of artists has expanded. The two met when Catz was better known as a celebrity snowboarder organizing an art show for a sponsoring brand, and Marlot attended the show as a self-described “groupie”.

Shows and exhibitions over the last decade and a half have included artists such as Lucy McLauchlan, Adam Neate, Will Barras, Jeff Soto, Laurence Vallières, Robert Williams, Robert Crumb, Isaac Cordal, Vhils, C215, Slinkachu, Ron English, Zevs, Shepard Fairey, JR, Lister, Augustine Kofie, Beast, NeverCrew, Monkey Bird, Daleast, and Seth.

A topic close to our heart for a decade, they also began a new film festival for there 2017 edition of the Grenoble Street Art Fest.

Headquartered in the public/privately run community center/gallery called SpaceJunk since the early 2000’s Alban and director Jérome Catz have been organizing shows here, Lyons, and Grenoble as their interests and network of artists has expanded. The two met when Catz was better known as a celebrity snowboarder organizing an art show for a sponsoring brand, and Marlot attended the show as a self-described “groupie”.

With a common interest is providing artists a platform and complementary abilities with funding and collecting, the two have gone on to mount shows and festivals in their organic path through the lenses of “board culture”, graffiti, Street Art, Lowbrow and Pop Surrealism. Shows and exhibitions over the last decade and a half have included artists such as Lucy McLauchlan, Adam Neate, Will Barras, Jeff Soto, Laurence Vallières, Robert Williams, Robert Crumb, Isaac Cordal, Vhils, C215, Slinkachu, Ron English, Zevs, Shepard Fairey, JR, Lister, Augustine Kofie, Beast, NeverCrew, Monkey Bird, Daleast, and Seth. A topic close to our heart for a decade, they have also began a film festival for there 2017 edition of the Grenoble Street Art Fest.

As we walk through a very windy afternoon that kicks up the new construction dust that coats this neighborhood by the river, Alban talks to us about the suspicious embrace of locals and politicians of his work, the various working personalities of artists for the festival, the creation of a new currency by the Basque community, the tradition of socialist bars and political activists in the neighborhood, and his own connection to graffiti that began when he was hanging out in his hometown of Pau as a teenager with other skaters.

“We would listen to music, smoke a blunt, and skate all day. At some point graffiti became my culture,” he says of those times that formed his character and informed his aesthetic eye. “I don’t think I realized it at the time when I was a teenager but by the time I was 25 I said to myself ‘this is my culture’. I know I’m not the only one to feel this way but I knew that I wanted to share this experience and make it visible for other people in my generation.”

Walking and riding in a car to see murals, small installations, illegal graffiti, and formally approved artworks, you may wonder how this organizer and curator looks at his position in an evolving urban art scene that has witnessed the arrival and departure of many over the last 15 years. He says that his work has always centered on the artists, and that despite the chaos and change, this may be why he perseveres.

“My job is to know the artist and learn where they want to go and what their context is,” says Alban. “Afterwards I let them express their hearts without any conditions because I want them to have the maximum pleasure to produce their art. This way you receive the best from them.”

You may wonder where this philosophy comes from, and ask if he always felt this way.

“I think I just love artists so much,” he says. “People at Space Junk often ask me if I am an artist and I am not. I just consider artists to be very important in our lives and in society and I think we have to put artists in the middle of the system and not like they are just observers. I think artists belong in the center of society and I think people have to learn again how to listen to what they have to say. The way they present society is a very different point of view that helps us to understand who we are, who our neighbors are and help us to drive together.”

Our sincere thanks to Alban and Jérome for their work and hospitality and we hope you enjoy some of these pics from Bayonne.

Xabier Anunsibai & Sebas Velasco (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Bilbao Diary: A Quick Survey

March 6, 2019 Artists

“The Basque Government is about to start the procedure for awarding the 104 homes in the subsidised housing project that will be located on Zorrotzaurre plot SI-2,”says the website for the biggest development area in Bilbao- the new Zorrotzaurre Island.

We wonder how long the street art and graffiti will persist here now that the masterplan of Zaha Hadid is nearing another phase of completion. We’re guessing that you still have time to catch some of the best stuff if you are willing to scout it.

The Future Is Female (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The grassroots handmade art movement has occupied the rundown and neglected sector for years, as well as the concomitant artists performance spaces, quirky small businesses and tech-forward digital art studios.

Yesterday with a local expert named Javi we scaled some of these neglected spaces to get a sense of this particular margin and discovered that old skool aerosol colorful letter styles and the new flat brush & roller tags are flourishing amongst the occasional political screed.

The new island, created by excavating the existing peninsula, may not be on time but the existing neighborhood is still popping with pop-ups and late night excursions into experimental music and scene making.

While vast swaths of smoothly graveled land await the new towers of developers dreams to punctuate the skyline, you are invited to pass through the fence and climb a small mountain of old furnishings, coats, furniture and building rubble.

This Bilbao based site-specific survey reveals a varied selection of traditional graffiti, post-graffiti; abstract, conceptual, figurative, activist, and some that is just plain smart.

Unidentified Artist (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Inopir Brouk – Tep One (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Zero Munoz . Kero Graff . Ukais Dead (photo © Jaime Rojo)

BROUK . RYTE . and friends. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Urvanity 2019: Isaac Cordal’s Dire Courtyard Installation

March 5, 2019 Artists

A large installation in the center of Urvanity by Street Artist Isaac Cordal went up and came down while we were in Madrid this past week, and we were fortunate to see how such a vision is realized in the midst of a modern school of architecture campus. We also witnessed the responses of guests who circled the ex-urban tale of with cocktails in hand, or in the case of sunny afternoons, reclining alongside it on the artificial green turf.

Isaac Cordal. Site Specific installation.Urvanity Art 2019. Madrid, February 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

At a commercial art fair of this caliber it was thrilling, chilling, to see this large scale courtyard installation depicting absurd and psychologically dire scenarios playing out in the wake of crises. This is the kind of discourse that gives a place gravitas, and may provide a route to go forward.

But Cordal doesn’t regale us with color and vividly drawn character studies that some how charm us into a Dantean vision of circles and layers of hell. His dimly illuminated and apocalyptic tale is heavy and grey and in such slow motion you may not realize it is moving.

Here finally are the Business Class, climbing as ever, now also sinking into the toxic soil they created, the world translated as one continuous privatized prison complex.

Living Inside a Big Red Bubble With Penique Productions at “Urvanity” 2019

March 4, 2019 Artists

“And yes, it is that red in the room,” scholar Susan Hansen says to narrate her photos of the BSA Talks. “Like Dexter kill zone plastic red.”

Penquie Productions. Site Specific installation at Urvanity Art 2019. Madrid, March 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

It was an unusual three days living inside the conference that was blowing minds inside an art piece. We often forgot that we were bathing in, drenched in, glowing within a steady crimson glow while listening to astute historians, lawyers, hackers, artists, academics, and urban arts pros who were sitting on a big plastic couch or leaning on cherry plastic lectern.

We were lucky to be there to see the process by Penique from the beginning, a transformational project that looks like a lot of fun, if a lot of work.

The Yap crew from Berlin described it to friends the same way we’re seeing it, BSA Talks was “bringing the most creative heads from all the world to chat in the red living room.”

We simply surmised that we were working with others inside of a beating heart.

Come in! Have a seat!

Artist Jan Kalab at BSA Talks. Penquie Productions. Site Specific installation at Urvanity Art 2019. Madrid, March 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Curator Sabina Chagina at BSA Talks. Penquie Productions. Site Specific installation at Urvanity Art 2019. Madrid, March 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

BSA Images Of The Week: 03.03.19 – Madrid Special

March 3, 2019 Artists, BSA Images Of The Week, Images of the Week

What a blast it has been this week in Madrid – on the street and on the stage with curators, artist, urban planners, professors, researchers, disrupters, and dreamers. We’re happy we managed to hit a number of the new murals as well as the one-off smaller pieces in the unsanctioned margins of the city. Our thanks to Madrid for its hospitality.

Here’s our weekly interview with the street, this time featuring 1Up Crew, Add Fuel, Alice Pasquini, Ben Eine, Clet, Dan Witz, Dingo, Kill It, La Tabacalera, LaNe Leal, Lelo021, Nano4841, Okuda, Ruben Sanchez, and Wolf.

Bordalo II. Detail. (Photo © Jaime Rojo)

Okuda and Bordsalo II collaboration in Lavapies. (Photo © Jaime Rojo)

Okuda at La Tabacalera. (Photo © Jaime Rojo)

Alice Pasquini at La Tabacalera. (Photo © Jaime Rojo)

Ruben Sanchez at La Tabacalera. (Photo © Jaime Rojo)

Lelo021 at La Tabacalera. (Photo © Jaime Rojo)

Add Fuel at La Tabacalera. (Photo © Jaime Rojo)

Urvanity Madrid Diary 5: Selections From Urvanity Art Fair

March 2, 2019 Artists

This week BSA is in Madrid to capture some highlights on the street, in studio, and at Urvanity 2019, where we are hosting a 3 day “BSA TALKS” conference called “How Deep Is the Street?” Come with us every day to see what the Spanish capital has happening in urban and contemporary.

“Urvanity seeks to explore and thus imagine possible future scenarios for this New Contemporary Art,” they say boldly in the manifesto for this art fair/cultural platform in Madrid. A thrilling nexus is created here in this college campus of architecture where art from the streets is evolving in such ways that it is invited to come in from the street.

Isaac Cordal. SC Gallery. Urvanity Art Fair 2019. Madrid, February 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Whatever your perspective is on this evolution, we encourage the conversation – which usually contains elements of tribalism (various), resistance, acceptance, even euphoria. During breaks from hosting the BSA Talks this weekend we are also skipping and swerving through the crowds to look at the art that galleries have on offer.

Anthony Lister, Marion Jdanoff and Victor Ash. Urban Spree Gallery. Urvanity Art Fair 2019. Madrid, February 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Here we offer a very quick sample of some items that have caught our eye, looked fresh, or were indicative of larger movements in the so-called “scene”. And we use the word “scene” very loosely, because there is really not such thing as a homogeneous scene, only a constellation of them which are intersecting, coalescing, and redefining themselves. Some pieces are remarkable.

Here is the past, existing side by side with the future.

Jan Kalab. MAGMA Gallery. Urvanity Art Fair 2019. Madrid, February 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Miss Van. Fousion Gallery. Urvanity Art Fair 2019. Madrid, February 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Okuda. The Rainbow Mountain Installation. Detail. Urvanity Art Fair 2019. Madrid, February 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Okuda in collaboration with his mother. The Rainbow Mountain Installation. Detail. Urvanity Art Fair 2019. Madrid, February 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Hendrik Czakainski. Urban Spree Gallery. Urvanity Art Fair 2019. Madrid, February 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Dmitri Aske. Ruarts Gallery. Urvanity Art Fair 2019. Madrid, February 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

D*Face. Stolen Space Gallery. Urvanity Art Fair 2019. Madrid, February 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Dan Witz .Wunderkammern Gallery. Urvanity Art Fair 2019. Madrid, February 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Pro176. Swinton Gallery. Urvanity Art Fair 2019. Madrid, February 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Sabek. Swinton Gallery. Urvanity Art Fair 2019. Madrid, February 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Sam3. Doppelganger Gallery. Urvanity Art Fair 2019. Madrid, February 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

2501 .Wunderkammern Gallery. Urvanity Art Fair 2019. Madrid, February 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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