BROOKLYN STREET ART LOVES YOU MORE EVERY DAY
Welcome to BSA Images of the Week.
Across thousands of U.S. cities and streets yesterday, speakers at the ‘No Kings’ marches framed the protests as a mass rejection of executive overreach—calling for protection of civil rights, enforcement of limits on presidential power, and an end to aggressive anonymous immigration crackdowns. The dangerously growing war—and concerns about its escalation and its potential cost in blood and money—surfaced but appeared as one thread among several.
According to what’s often called the ‘3.5% rule,’ drawn from the research of Erica Chenoweth and Maria J. Stephan, nonviolent movements that mobilize roughly 3.5% of a population at their peak have historically been difficult to ignore—and often capable of forcing major political change, although that is not a guaranteed tipping point. Current estimates put the recent ‘No Kings’ marches at about 7 million people nationwide, or roughly 2.1% of the U.S. population, organized through a decentralized web of grassroots groups including Indivisible. Impressive—and it’s being read as a signal in many quarters, but it’s hard to see how it is moving the needle. For now, it’s clearly a swelling, emotionally charged expression of public will; whether it hardens into something with leverage will depend on its ability to sharpen its focus, its demands, and its impact on policy.
Meanwhile, in some street art-related news, Trump has large banners of himself on the Department of Justice and Department of Labor buildings. History is full of examples of leaders blowing up large images of themselves and filling public space with them. Not usually in the US, though.
The president also wants his signature on US paper dollars—while their value is under increasing pressure.
Insisting he has leverage in negotiations that Iran says aren’t planned or happening, nevertheless the bombs keep falling, and thousands of soldiers are mobilized and the 82nd Airborne is on alert—if not yet airborne.
On the streets, we are seeing some of these themes pop up, if tangentially. You’ll see many doves of peace, figures twisted with anxiety, expressions of anger and suspicion, and bewilderment among the more pleasant and palatable prettiness that much of the current generation gravitates toward. Local pride, tribute walls, romance, pop culture affiliations, and conciliatory sentiments still rule the scene, but amongst the bursting crocuses and daffodils, you definitely discern descent dancing with diffidence.
You have read it here for a decade, but finally larger media outlets are confirming that New York is measurably inhospitable to its artists, chasing them from one neighborhood to the next at a rapacious clip. Gentrification feels like a formula now traced with exactitude by developers and private equity, not an organic pot-smoking beast with stylistic panache that evolves over time. Now, the artists population in this creative capital is verifiably going backwards for the first time in anyone’s memory; it is as if living without health insurance in an overcrowded apartment with 5 of your best friends well into your 30s or 40s is somehow, not exactly the New York dream you had imagined.
For street artists, most galleries have discovered that it’s hard to sell much of it, and with these high rents, they have closed or “diversified” their offerings to include Mickey Mouse with paint drips in eye-popping color. Even the venerable and much-loved publication Juxtapoz, at a moment of transition as The Unibrow opens on Substack, has experimented with different formulas—blending street with contemporary, eye-catching scintillation or a measure of self-aware irony—to keep things viable over the last decades. Striking the right balance for a fickle art audience and a K-shaped economy is nearly unicornary.
Street artists thought they could cut out the middleman by taking their art to Instagram, but many have discovered that it is a lot more work to market themselves than they thought, or that they lack the business acumen or Social savvy needed to make it a profitable model. Also, followers do not pay the rent. Despite promising developments in street art’s growing recognition by some institutions a decade ago, it looks like major museums and auction houses steadfastly omit all but a handful of recurring big names in graffiti and street art – a position of safety, if you will. While outlets like The New York Times and The Guardian have only begun to touch on it, the patterns are already well established, if you know where to look.
Here’s our weekly interview with the street, this time featuring CAMI, CRKSHNK, Goldloxe, Hi Bye, LISA, RATCHI, Skulz, Abe Lincoln Jr, Mr. Moustachio, El Toro, and Stikman.
