All posts tagged: Jaime Rojo

BSA Film Friday 01.06.17

January 6, 2017 Artists

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

Now screening :
1. New York: Art of Beeing with Louis Masai by Where’s Kong
2. Detroit: Art of Beeing with Louis Masai by Where’s Kong
3. California : Art of Beeing with Louis Masai by Where’s Kong
4. Arizona . Texas . Tennessee : Art of Beeing with Louis Masai by Where’s Kong
5. Miami: Art of Beeing with Louis Masai by Where’s Kong

BSA Special Feature: 5 in a row by Where’s Kong : USA Art of Beeing

A visual diary of 9 weeks traveling across the US in search of kindred folk to learn from and exchange with and teach about the 6th Age of Extinction that we are entering where literally thousands of species are dying while we watch television, phones, Facebook.

Individually these tight and tantalizing videos give you a distinct taste for the regions and the cities that Masai and his team of 2 videographers travelled through. Experts and street people and community are narrators throughout, laying out the contours. Collectively the short films are a pulse-taking of a country that could be a world leader in these matters but is somehow in a trance, unable to move in a unified constructive hopeful way to reverse the destructive trends.

Masai is too polite to say it that way, but the truths of our collective folly comes through nonetheless.

See our wrap of the tour here: One Artists’ Mission to Save Endangered Species: Louis Masai Completes “The Art Of Beeing” Tour

The Art of Beeing – New York City #1

Louis Masai / The Art of Beeing Detroit

Louis Masai / The Art of Beeing California

Louis Masai / The Art of Beeing Arizona . Texas . Tennessee

Louis Masai / The Art of Beeing Miami

Click HERE to learn more about Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing

One Artists’ Mission to Save Endangered Species: Louis Masai Completes “The Art Of Beeing” Tour

January 5, 2017 Artists, Interview

9 weeks, 8,000 miles, 20 murals, 13 cities.

Dozens of species going extinct every day.

Those are some telling statistics for Street Artist Louis Masai as he completes criss-crossing the United States during this moment when it looks like the country is on the precipice of a social and political revolution.

Louis Masai painting in Oakland © @lmnotree

At a time when industries and media are consolidating under ever larger private umbrellas that seem unassailable it is all the more striking to witness the audacity of the single crusader, like this one with a spray can, that may prove to be very inspirational. It’s difficult to imagine the willpower of one person to devise an educational campaign like this and then to raise funds to pay for it and use his artistic talents to raise awareness in this manner.

It may strike you that endangered species are an appropriate constituency to speak for since they have no voice of their own, and Masai says the bee is the queen that lead him on with two friends in October, November and part of December. With his thoughtful, studied and “chill” stance on many topics, it sounds charming when the London-based artist tells you his campaign is called “The Art of Beeing.”

With a metaphorical protective patchwork quilt being stitched by the bee around a different animal in each mural, Masai carefully researched and chose endangered animals that are specific to the region he painted in from New York to Detroit to Nevada to California to Texas to Tennessee to Miami. We had the honor to meet him at the start of the journey and at the termination, and to publish as many of his travels as his schedule would allow.

Today we compile a quote and a couple of images from each one of those on-the-road reports below with links to each posting.

We finish our complete coverage of “The Art of Beeing” with a 15 question interview with Louis, who tells us about his personal attachment to the animal world, the startling and gorgeous geography of the US, and which populations seemed most receptive to his message of the Earth’s sixth era of extinction that we are currently engendering.

Thanks for taking this trip with us.

NEW YORK
Louis Masai: “The Art Of Beeing” Tour Kicks Off in NYC to Save Endangered Species

“I’m painting toys because if we don’t act now to stop extinction, only toys will remain in place of animals”
– LM

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. The Bushwick Collective, Brooklyn. NYC. October 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Bog Turtle. Endangered. The Bushwick Collective, Brooklyn. NYC. October 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. New England Cottontail Rabbit. Vulnerable. The Bushwick Collective, Brooklyn. NYC. October 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

DETROIT
The Gray Wolf and “The Art Of Beeing” in Detroit

“The media talks about Detroit as if it is a derelict forgotten city, but we discovered a whole community that has been here for a long time and they definitely wouldn’t agree with their city is a dead or abandoned space,”
– LM

Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing. Gray Wolf. Endangered. Detroit. Michigan. October 2016. (photo © @teebyford)

Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing. Gray Wolf. Endangered. Detroit. Michigan. October 2016. (photo © Louis Masai)

RENO
Cutthroat Trout & “The Art Of Beeing” in Reno, Nevada

“After 4 days of driving from Detroit to Reno we felt empowered by the incredible landscapes we had driven through, from salt lakes to deserts and the Rockies, not one part of the trip was unexciting,” says Louis Masai of the journey. “Well perhaps the 7 hours of corn fields.”
-LM

Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing. Lahontan Cutthroat Trout. Endangered. Reno. Nevada. October 2016. (photo © Mia Hanak)

Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing. Lahontan Cutthroat Trout. Endangered. Reno. Nevada. October 2016. (photo © Louis Masai)

SACREMENTO
Jumping Salmon! Louis Masai is in Sacramento. “The Art Of Beeing” Tour

“We drove through snowy mountains from Reno to Lake Tahoe, and then descended a continuous downwards road for 6000 feet – which took about an hour to get into Sacramento,” he says. “What an incredibly diverse landscape! It’s just mind-blowing.”
-LM

Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing. Coho Salmon. Endangered. Sacramento, California. October 2016. (photo © Louis Masai)

SAN FRANCISCO
Louis Masai: Onward Ho! To San Francisco with “The Art Of Beeing”

“We met some amazing beekeepers in San Francisco that really opened up this idea that nature and the engagement with nature can definitely start to generate a sense of love for oneself and the environment”
– LM

Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing. Island Fox. Near Threatened / California Channel Islands. San Francisco, CA. October 2016. (photo © @lmnotree)

Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing. Honey Bee. Jetty extracts Oakland. San Francisco, CA. October 2016. (photo © @lmnotree)

LOS ANGELES
Louis Masai, Leaping Frogs and Crawling Crayfish in LA : “The Art Of Beeing”

“I painted the Shasta crayfish (or as Americans call it; crawfish) in Venice, an endangered species native to northeast California There are only seven remaining populations of the Shasta crayfish left and are found only in Shasta County, California, in the Pit River drainage and two tributary systems, Fall River and Hat Creek drainages,”
-LM

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Yellow Legged Frog. 90% have disappeared in the last 100 years. Downtown, LA. November 2016. (photo © Lmnotree)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Yellow Legged Frog. 90% have disappeared in the last 100 years. Downtown, LA. November 2016. (photo © Louis Masai)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Shasta Crayfish. Critically Endangered. Venice, LA. November 2016. (photo © Lmnotree)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Shasta Crayfish. Critically Endangered. Venice, LA. November 2016. (photo © Tee Byford)

PHOENIX
A Jaguar in Phoenix: Louis Masai and “The Art Of Beeing”

“It’s always hard to formulate too much of an understanding of a city when you are only there for a very short time…and I guess a lot of this trip has been that way, but even more so in Phoenix, with only two nights and one day.”
-LM

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Jaguar. Only 15K remain in the wild. Phoenix, AZ. November 2016. (photo © Emil Walker)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Jaguar. Only 15K remain in the wild. Phoenix, AZ. November 2016. (photo © Louis Masai)

TEXAS & TENNESSEE
Flying Squirrels and Houston Toads : Louis Masai

“I guess the attraction is the abundance of frats and bar culture in the area. I got to know a handful of these homeless folks over the five days this mural took to complete and I can definitely see that the new mural in their neighborhood gave them some new color and appreciation in their lives. Several vowed to protect its longevity, bless them.”
-LM

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Houston Toad. Endangered. Austin, TX. November 2016. (photo © Emil Walker)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Northern Flying Squirrel. Endangered. Nashville, TN. November 2016. (photo © Emil Walker)

“The wall that I painted shadows a section of the city that I am sure will get pushed out. Men hang out on the street not doing much; we met a cowboy inspired gentleman that was proud to admit to eating gopher tortoise – a federally protected species. He said he had three in his freezer…he grew up eating what they hunted, from squirrels to rabbits and tortoise. Hopefully my line of work can help to steer people away from eating these species.”

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Northern Flying Squirrel. Endangered. Nashville, TN. November 2016. (photo © Emil Walker)

ATLANTA
The Box Turtle in Atlanta: Louis Masai and “The Art Of Beeing”

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Box Turtle. Critically Vulnerable. Atlanta, GA. December 2016. (photo © Tee Byford)

MIAMI
A Manatee, A Crocodile and a Heart of Coral in Miami: Louis Masai and “The Art Of Beeing”

“Well its not my first time to Miami for Basel, so I know what I’m heading into…and actually I think that because I was there doing my own thing and for my own reasons, i.e. the tour, things were a lot easier for me. I also had linked up two good people, the Raw Project and Bushwick Collective so the ride was smooth.”
-LM

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Manatee. Vulnerable. Miami, FL. December 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Manatee. Vulnerable. Miami, FL. December 2016. (photo © Tee Byford)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. American Crocodile. Vulnerable. Miami, FL. December 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. American Crocodile. Vulnerable. Miami, FL. December 2016. (photo © Emil Walker)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Coral. Threatened. Miami, FL. December 2016. (photo © Louis Masai)

An interview with Louis Masai about “The Art of Beeing”

Brooklyn Street Art: Can you share with us a memory or a story from your childhood relating to a pet or an animal or animals that made an impact on you and stayed with you for the rest of your life?

Louis Masai: Ever since I can remember I have felt strong emotions towards animals, we had family pets and all of them became very good friends of mine…however my love for the animal kingdom was far deeper than that. For me spirit animals are very real and I have always felt a huge connection towards lions. I admire their strength, charisma, loyalty, stubbornness, and of course leadership. Those that know me well will know that, I myself share a lot of those traits. Now that I grow older I realize that a spirit animal can’t be chosen and in fact it chooses you, some might say that the bee has chosen me.

Brooklyn Street Art: How did that story inform your growth into adulthood?

Louis Masai: Well I guess the idea of spirit animals has stayed with me into adulthood and become something that I understand in a different kind of way than when I was younger. For me the relevant difference in mindset, is that I realize that life finds you. When you look for something too hard or try and orchestrate a result, the journey might not be as fulfilling as if life is allowed to lead the way. I see one chapter lead to the next in a very organic manner. I evolve as an artist in the same way allowing for one idea to develop into the next.

Brooklyn Street Art: What do you think drives humans to destroy what sustains them? It is as if we are killing ourselves slowly by killing what gives us life and keeps us alive in the first place.

Louis Masai: Mmmmmmm…I’m not so sure that I think it’s a drive, perhaps there are agendas that drive humans towards destruction, for example money, but I don’t believe that its actual destruction itself that motivates this unsustainable lifestyle we live. Ultimately its the average person who populates the majority of this planet. I would be inclined to believe that the majority of this demographic have little understanding of what words like finite, extinction, deforestation etc result in. It’s only when I talk to scientists, environmentalists, or activists that I manage to find a true understanding of what we face ahead of us.

Here I am sat at a laptop with my, iPhone in company and a disposable bottle of water on a train, speeding towards Birmingham for Christmas. The minerals in my laptop and phone are finite and the plastic in that bottle is extremely likely to end up in the ocean, or at the very least spending the next 450 – 1000 years biodegrading on a landfill. Ultimately we are uneducated and in denial. If everyone used water filter bottles instead of bought disposable plastic bottles in the developed world alone, the ocean and what survives from its wealth would be hugely affected and in a positive way.

Equally we should be looking at how to extend the lifespan of our smart phones and laptops, its not very smart to run out of the rare earth minerals that makes them work. And even less smart to not know what impact that lack of mineral will have on the planet itself. I have so much to talk about with regard this question…where I will conclude is that I have a personal belief. I believe nature doesn’t make mistakes and that the destruction of the current stage in the earth’s life cycle is what nature has intended for us.

I feel that perhaps given that humans are one of the youngest additions to the planets kingdom and we have become the most destructive, that we are only doing what is required of us. Geographically, we are thousands of years overdue a shift in the planets alignments and I have this idea that nature allowed humans to be so dominant, only to help her speed up this change… so who else is looking forward to the new iPhone then?

Brooklyn Street Art: Did you have any expectations or anxieties as you started your tour in NYC?

Louis Masai: Eeeeeeesh, well it was a huge expectation from the three of us, and I knew that from the beginning. So with that in mind, based purely on my acceptance for organic flow I definitely had my concerns, but I didn’t have anxieties. I think that any artist who is painting in the public domain, within communities, will always have a slight element of reservation. I know that if I didn’t, then it would be a case of not caring enough about where I was leaving my work. The last thing I want is for my work to be undesired, especially given that it comes with an environmental point of urgency. But as for the nine weeks of intense work within confined spaces, filming and editing 5 films, driving across 8000 miles, to paint 20 murals in 13 cities…piece of cake!

Brooklyn Street Art: Yours was an art tour but it also was a round road trip, across the USA from the East to the West and in reverse in the company of your team, which included your videographers, Emil Walker and Tee Byford. What was the hardest part of the road trip?

Louis Masai: Yeah it certainly was never intended to be just a painting tour, there is only so far that a painting can direct influence and it’s our belief as a team that film can create a new chapter for the project. 5 mini docs were filmed and edited as we traveled across the states, each discussing new issues with the people and scientists that we met along the way.

I think that purely based on the fact that I’m used to not really knowing where I’m always going to paint and being able to foresee that element, creating the murals wasn’t really the hardest part. I would definitely say that the editing and creating five engaging films proved the most complicated. All the interviews were found whilst we were traveling with exception of only a few, so that in itself was a task.

Brooklyn Street Art: Did you have a preconceived idea of what you were going to paint in each city and if so did you change your plans/animals as you drove across the country?

Louis Masai: So…as we traveled I also was editing the website to keep the public up-to-date with our progress. Within the website is information about each species and what the general public can also do to help the endangered species out, a call to action. Before I left London I had already selected species for each city that we would travel through, within that list I had double what I needed for completion, that was purely so that I could negotiate with building owners and also switch species in accordance to the composition. There are still a good number of species on that list in the website to be created, I’m sure I will be back to the states in the coming years to complete that list.

Brooklyn Street Art: How was it driving from state to state and city to city in regard to experiencing the variations in culture, attitudes and accents from the people whom you met as you drove across?

Louis Masai: Its mesmerizing, no in fact there is no word that I know of, that justly describes the intense, awe-inspiring beauty of the landscape. That alone is a reason to preserve and encourage the masses to realize what they have before it’s too late. Within each of these ever changing landscapes or screen-savers as we called them, are some of the kindest, and humble of spirits I have met in a long time. However there is always shadow to the light and of course there are also some of the most narrow-minded bigots.

We did indeed meet the many faces of the states from native Indians to illegal aliens; freeway fireworks shop owners to Detroit poets. If I was to generalize purely based on our nine week experiences, the east is very unaware of the environment, the west coast is very awake and starting to take action, the south is in total denial and the middle Americas we drove through seem very detached. Given that we spent so much time on the road – inside a car, I would have to say; that the cars you share the roads with in America definably act as indicators as to how that state thinks about its carbon footprints.

Brooklyn Street Art: In Detroit you discovered a vibrant city with deep rooted and kind citizens but you also witnessed nature taking over the abandoned parts of the city and in fact that’s a good thing for the bees. Can you talk a bit more about that?

Louis Masai: Well the movie world has certainly created many times over, a very good image of what an abandoned city could look like. That city is not Detroit. Of course it has many fallen and crumbled factories, but there aren’t trees growing through the structures or bears and wolves occupying the city. Instead, the people who have remained in the city and the many that have moved to Detroit have returned to backyard horticulture and that alone has changed the dynamics of the people who inhabit this city.

We met many people within Detroit who gave us first-hand accounts of how they are a part of this DIY culture. That was never more evident than when we met Joan from City Bees. She pointed out that the best habitat for bees is one where lots of native wild fauna is left to grow and humans are not interested in disturbing it. Detroit is exactly that to the many bees and their keepers that live there.

Brooklyn Street Art: In San Francisco, besides painting you also attended the Bioneer Conference. At the end of the conference did you walk out of it feeling more hopeful or less hopeful for the environment? What new radical thing did you learn that people talked about during the conference?

Louis Masai: Ah man…where do I start, I’ll be honest with you, it’s not looking so great. Devastation is happening on a worldwide scale, climate change is in effect. The ice caps are melting, sea levels are rising, ocean temperatures are increasing, coral reefs are dying, plastic is destroying the ocean, species are disappearing – consistently, climate change refugees still don’t have any rights and way too many leading corporations are running the planet for their own benefits… but, hey… we have known that was the cards on the table since before the 70s.

The difference is that now it’s really actually happening, and faster than anticipated. What I learnt at Bioneers is that humans are resilient and that there are many people out there who do care enough and we can turn things around, but only if we all start today. I urge everyone to pick one environmental issue to tackle a month. Before you know it, being conscious could become a part of your daily routine…three good issues to try and tackle are;

Palm oil – just don’t buy it.
Consumption of all cow products (everything with secret ingredients too) – if you can’t eradicate it, half it.
Plastic – recycling ain’t cutting it, stop buying it, and if you can’t eradicate it from your weekly shopping at least lose some of it – veggies come without plastic cellophane too you know!

To understand more about the current situation, check out these films…Racing Extinction, Cowspiracy, and Before The Floods. Don’t take them for gospel, do some research around the topics but if everyone picks something and activates their life in conjunction with that, we could fix this mess we are in…of course fixing politicians and politricks is another story…

Brooklyn Street Art: In Phoenix you talked with a Native American named Breeze and the conversation touched on the topic of “the lack of respect” for our planet. Do you think that this “lack of respect” is a result of our public education systems being decimated by budget cuts and capitalism running amok in our societies?

Louis Masai: Well I think that there are strong possibilities that this is one reason, but I’m not one for believing that school is the only place we learn. I have learnt more about respecting the environmental long after my time at school than I ever did whilst in school. I also had pretty cool parents who didn’t do the NORM, so my widened perspective of life and what goes on around me was in part their doing.

I also think that lack of respect is something that has been amidst the American settler way before any kind of budget cuts existed, you have only to look at the culling of the buffalo to see that. It’s the responsibility of my generation to make sure that the youth are learning about respect with or without cuts in the education system.

In my opinion, the system that is being really abused is our eco-system, I’m not sure we need to make any excuses as to why we are showing it a lack of respect; we just need to fix up.

Brooklyn Street Art: Did you ever experience hostility from some of the residents of the cities or a city where you painted?

Louis Masai: Yeah in New York, it was the second wall, the bog turtle. A disheveled looking guy who I think lived inside a warehouse in Bushwick, took a dislike to us. He shouted some abuse on the eve of the first night to which we ignored but on the second day he picked up from where he left off, so I confronted him.

By the time I had reasoned him, amidst his highly abusive claims and insults he returned an hour later for a hug and cuppa coffee…all is well that ends well. Other than that we were blessed from one city to the next with awesomeness. Oh…except in San Francisco, we fell victim to the everyday car smash and grab…

Brooklyn Street Art: You were in the middle of the tour when the presidential election took place. Was there a before and after in regards of energy and on enthusiasm from the residents? Did you notice a change of the mood?

Louis Masai: I knew when I was planning the tour that the elections would be happening and I knew that there was little if any evidence to show any regard for the environment from either candidate. I also had a strong saddened gut instinct that the result would be as has become. I’m very sorry for what is still to come. And it’s not America alone that is falling victim to this domino effect of politicians.

We definitely were in company of many anti-Trump supporters throughout the tour, but we did spot the supporters; from shops, to car bumper stickers. Did it change the mood, sometimes yes, but for the most part as we were in company of such awe-inspiring people and non-supporters of Trump I can’t say it affected us too much. But of course we discussed it solidly for two months.

Brooklyn Street Art: In Nashville a resident confided to you that he actually hunts and eats and endangered and federally protected tortoise. Did that make you angry? What were your reaction and your approach?

Louis Masai: Furious…and I reached out to my contacts as to what to do about it; there was a mixed response. I’m still to reach my decision as to what to do but I’ll probably send his information directly to the species protection society. He didn’t seem like an evil man, just one that grew up surviving eating what his family could salvage from the woods and that’s what he has grown up to continue doing. I suppose in many ways its no different form eating cows and chickens…

Brooklyn Street Art: In Miami you bartered your art in exchange for accommodations. The Aztecs didn’t have minted currency, yet they were an empire. They bartered goods and services in an enormous open market in their capital city. Do you think bartering could make a popular come back in our civilizations to the point that it could make social impact in the markets?

Louis Masai: Not a chance unfortunately. And the biggest reason for that is everyone perceives something’s value differently. Even with the painting I did for the Miami accommodation it wasn’t a simple task of, I do a painting you provide a room. I emailed about 50 air BNB establishments before I got lucky and the logistics of what that lucky find perceived the value of what I was painting, was very different to what he valued his own accommodation to be.

Bartering is very complicated and in many ways money is much simpler because we all need the same object, we just swap different items or services for that object. With bartering most of the time the object in question is not desired by one of the bartering members. That being said, I love swapping and would happily welcome anyone to strike a swap with me…

Brooklyn Street Art: Is there something more personal you might want to share with us about your experience driving and painting across the United States?

Louis Masai: Well I would like to give massive props to Emil and Tee for maintaining a vegan diet for 9 weeks. For me that’s my diet anyway, but for the tour the boys accepted the challenge to be vegan. It wasn’t easy at times, and humus/salsa/salad/avocado wraps definitely don’t need to be on the menu for a bit.

For me it was important to do this as it sets an example of how an environmental idea played out can have impacts. Of course just two extra vegans for two months has a low impact but imagine 200, one week out of every month over a year, that makes impacts and the challenge opened that up as a discussion with the people we met along the way. We actually converted the concept to a handful of people, so it’s worked out.

America as it happens is incredibly good at catering for vegans, I guess that’s mainly because people don’t cook at home in the states. Thumbs up America!

Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing on The Huffington Post

For for more information regarding The Art Of Beeing click HERE

New Ethereal Works From Rubin 415

January 4, 2017 Artists

Many people say that Street Art by its nature is necessarily ethereal because it is often damaged by the elements or destroyed by others. Your expectation for it’s brief lifetime is tempered with the realities on the street. On some occasions, indoor artwork has a similar fate.

A few new pieces here for you from Street Artist/muralist/fine artist Rubin 415 today that you probably haven’t seen – mostly because they are behind lock and key and will remain so until they are torn down. In a common New York real estate story; artists communities make a neighborhood vibrant and then they are kicked out of it when there is a profit to be made from the cultural capital they created.

Rubin 415 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The old Williamsburg factory building where Rubin 415 had his art studio was just sold for 25 million dollars, according to the artist, and is soon to be gutted. Artists tried to mount a legal battle to stay, but eventually lost.

Rubin 415 moved there about three years ago when his long-term art studio in Greenpoint raised rents exorbitantly suddenly to force out the artists who had brought life to that industrial sector when no one else wanted to be there.

Rubin 415 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

This is the fourth time he’s been uprooted while working as an artist in New York.

An optimistic fellow, he’s left a parting gift before the buildings’ destruction on the ill-fated walls and we caught them here for you and for posterity. Following those images is a recent mural outside he’s done that we haven’t published previously.

Rubin 415 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

A recent outside mural by Rubin 415 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

New “Uninhibited” Art Scene in Allapattah, Miami

January 3, 2017 Artists

Clara Vanessa Avalo and her Uninhibited Urban Art Magazine mounted their own celebratory event full of artists and fans this year in Allapattah, a gritty neighborhood adjacent to the glaring spotlights of Wynwood during Art Basel Miami.

Bordalo II . Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Celebrating the magazine’s first anniversary Ms. Vanessa Avalo’s project brought a number of artists to paint live at “The Collective” during Basel week and to meet new folks and art fans at their big party out back at the compound and gallery. A self-described Luxury Real Estate Broker, Ms. Vanessa Avalo has managed to parlay international travel and art-world relationships with her affection for urban artists and is growing a scene of her own with some well-known and newer names on the scene. Ms. Avalo is the curator, organizer and creator of Uninhibited Urban Art Magazine and Uninhibited Mural Festival Allaphatta.

Bordalo II (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Loosely referred to by some as “The Collective Art Miami” this noisy front/quiet back block encompasses all the organic bohemian stuff that fuels a grassroots artists community and draws interest – a radio station (Jolt Radio), record store, live performances, small gallery shows, in-gallery yoga, design startups, production teams, dance, fashion.

With the exception of The London Police pieces all the murals featured here were created this year from November 21st. through December 2nd. These photos can give you a taste of the new grassroots scene growing out of, or perhaps in response to, the madness that is Wynwood.

Miles Toland (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Miles Toland . Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The London Police (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mr. June (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Fio Silva . Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Galo (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Aquarella (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Tracking Phlegm in Wynwood, Miami.

January 2, 2017 Artists

Phlegm. Wynwood, Miami. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

It’s over a year old, but this mural by UK’s Phlegm along rail tracks in Miami has a certain timeless quality.

Maybe it is the illustrator’s monochromatic fanta-realism or the placement of this industrial-age freight running on the side of an old factory building , but these characters and potentially nested stories give Phlegms work a longevity that exceeds many. Extra points awarded for context.

As we begin a new year we are reminded that a goal of many artists as they mature is to craft something that has a timeless quality, remaining evergreen. In the case of a muralist or street artist, that goal may also extend to creating work that ages well in the punishing sun and rain and snow over time. It will be good to see this one in ten years, right?

Phlegm. Wynwood, Miami. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Happy New Year 2017 from BSA !

January 1, 2017 Artists

Times Square. New York City. December 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Pop the cork, throw the confetti!

Happy New Year to all the BSA Readers and fans and family!

As ever we begin this new year with gratitude to you for the old one. We learned a lot from you and from wise guides who helped us steer this path, leaning on the counsel of fans, artists, cultural observers, museum directors, curators, gallerists, photographers, writers, collectors, documentarians, academics, scholars, hoodlums, naysayers, critics, weirdos, and modern icons; all manner of cultural workers.

What we have found is that Street Art, graffiti, and urban art are still open to everyone who has the courage to tap into the creative spirit.

We’re immensely thankful to the stellar group of talents who each contributed to the BSA end-of-year tradition of sharing a significant photograph and their reflections on the turning of the year in our “Wishes and Hopes for 2017” series.

We’re always impressed by the depth of resources, knowledge, and heart that comes to fore in this annual round-up. In case you missed any of them, here’s the full list:

Clément Martin 12/31

Roula David and Jesse Corey 12/30

Selina Miles 12/29

Christian Omodeo 12/28

Maria Enriqueta Arias 12/27

Guillaume Trotin 12/26

Tor Ståle Moen 12/24

Wayne Rada & Rey Rosa 12/23

James Finucane 12/22

Tee Byford 12/21

Emil Walker 12/20

Annie Nocenti 12/19

Marcelo Pimentel & Marina Bortoluzzi 12/18

Ethel Seno 12/17

Pedro H. Alonzo 12/16

Fernando Alcalá Losa 12/15

Also, in the event that you missed any of our end-of-year lists:

BSA “Images Of The Year” for 2016 (VIDEO)

BSA Top Stories 2016 – As Picked by You

Top 15 Videos on BSA Film Friday From 2016

BSA’s 15 Most Popular Murals Of 2016

Let’s all bravely face the new year with our best intentions and talents and we’ll see how far we can go.

Our best to you for 2017.

Merry Christmas 2016 from BSA

December 25, 2016 Artists

Jaime’s Christmas/Navidad-inspired sculpture on the beach in Florida on Christmas Eve. Materials: found pieces of driftwood, coconuts, seashells, and electric lights. December 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

To all of our families, friends, collaborators, co-conspirators, community, tribe around the world: we wish you peace and happy holidays. This year Hannukah starts on Christmas Eve, so it’s sort of mash-up of those two holidays. Kwanzaa starts any minute, and Winter Solstice was a few days ago.

Bottom line is, if you celebrate one of these, or none at all – we’re sending you love and good vibrations and gratitude for taking this ride with us.

BSA “Images Of The Year” for 2016 (VIDEO)

December 14, 2016 Artists

Of the thousands of images he took this year in places like New York, Berlin, Dresden, Moscow, Marrakesh, Detroit and Miami, photographer Jaime Rojo found that the figurative image still stands prominently in the Street Art scene – along with text-based, abstract and animal world themes.

Surprisingly the scene does not appear to be addressing the troubled and contentious matters of the political and social realms in a large way, but the D.I.Y. scene keeps alive and defies the forces of homogeneity with one-of-a-kind small wheat-pastes, stencils, sculptures, and aerosol sprayed pieces alongside the enormous and detailed paintings that take days to complete.

Every Sunday on BrooklynStreetArt.com, we present “Images Of The Week”, our regular interview with the street. Primarily New York based, BSA interviewed, shot, and displayed images from Street Artists from more than 100 cities over the last year, making the site a truly global resource for artists, fans, collectors, gallerists, museums, curators, academics, and others in the creative ecosystem. We are proud of the help we have given and thankful to the community for what you give back to us and we hope you enjoy this collection – some of the best from 2016.

Brooklyn Street Art 2016 Images of the Year by Jaime Rojo includes the following artists;

1Up, Above, Adele Renault, Alaniz, Amy Smalls, George Vidas, GEN2, Apexer, BordaloII, Buff Monster, C215, Collin Van Der Sluijs, Super A, David Choe, D*Face, Duke Riley, El Sol 25, Sean 9 Lugo, EQC, Faile, Faith47, Faust, Shantell Martin, Felipe Pantone, Hueman, Droid907, Icy & Sot, InDecline, Invader, JJ Veronis, Jilly Ballistic, John Ahearn, JR, London Kaye, Louis Masai, MadC, Marshal Arts, Mongolz, MSK, Rime, Myth, Nina Chanel, Optic Ninja, Otto Osch Schade, Panmela Castro, Plastic Jesus, QRST, Reed b More, Remi Rough, REVS, Self Made, Sharon Dela Cruz, Maripussy, Specter, Stikman, Strok, Swoon, Ted Pim, Thievin’ Stephen, Farin Purth, Thomas Allen, Tobo, Uriginal, Vermibus, Vhils, Wing, Yes Two, Zola.

The artist featured on the main graphic is D*Face as shot by Jaime Rojo in New York.

BSA Top Stories 2016 – As Picked by You

December 13, 2016 Artists

Museums, Festivals, and Activism – three of the themes that garnered the most traffic on our published stories on BSA and The Huffington Post this year.

From a scholarly Street Art related exhibition in St. Petersburg to the opening of the Mima Museum in Belgium to the Anti-Banksy exhibition with the Blu controversy in Bologna and the “Magic City” exhibition in Dresden, BSA readers were astutely studying the slow but steady move of Street Art from the street to the museum and the academic canons.

But you also liked the huge multi-player outside exhibitions as well – with stories from Sicily and Northern Spain to Northern Mexico, BSA readers were interested this year in seeing how eclectic locally-organized Street Art festivals and projects are done, and who is doing them.

Finally activism played a big role in what you were re-Tweeting and “liking” and sending to your friends – From Icy & Sot installing anti-radiation work in the Native American desert and then talking about oceans polluted with plastic, to a United Nations food program with kids and artists in El Salvador, to highlighting Indigenous peoples rights with Jetsonorama, to a US cross-country tour to save endangered species by one artist and a Greenpeace show in Barcelona addressing the same issue with 35 artists, it looks like BSA readers are engaged and concerned about socio-politico-environmental issues left and right.

On a side note, we were honored that our El Salvador article was picked up and published in spanish on the UN World Food program website – HERE.

Of course it was good to see that you liked the feature on the notorious graffiti crew 1UP and seeing Nychos slay New York as well. Tasty!

These are the TOP 15 articles on BSA for 2016 from the more than 365 postings we did this year – meaning they all beat at least 350 articles to get here. Congratulations to us all.

No. 15
Borders and Boundaries : A Multi-Disciplinary Exhibit at St. Petersburg’s Street Art Museum

SpY. Street Art Museum (SAM). St. Petersburg, Russia. May 2016. (photo © Evgeniy Belikov)

Rafael Schacter Takes a More Nuanced Approach to the Migration Crisis

Commerce and technology have been eroding traditional constructs of the borders and boundaries, especially in the age of the Internet, satellites, transnational banking and trade agreements that create governing bodies that openly dismiss national sovereignty, integrity, identity, aspirations. Borders and boundaries are contested, guarded, or disregarded at will; open to international capital, porous to immigration, hardened by armies.

Daily they are in the headlines: Trump’s plans to build a wall along the US-Mexican border, Syrian war refugees immigrating across European borders, Israel and Palestine’s ongoing land and settlement disputes, even maritime territorial claims of China and the Phillipines in the South China Sea that were ruled upon yesterday – all reveal clues to our historically complicated relationships and geo-political perspectives.

Art to the rescue! continue reading here

No. 14
Icy & Sot Stencil An Enormous Blue Whale in LA

Icy & Sot. Endangered Species Mural Project. Los Angeles, CA. January 2016 (photo © Jess X. Chen)

“The brothers spent two solid days hand cutting the multi-layer stencil here on Melrose Avenue. How many pieces? “19 pieces,” says Icy. “Its not that big but it has a lot of details” The composite image features an enormous whale emerging from the sea in full view of a coastline packed with industrial forms which presumably are dumping contaminants directly into the waters.

As ever, the brothers crash into each others sentences while talking to us. “Whatever happens in the ocean… it comes back to us,” says Sot. “Whether is trash or plastics or oil..”

Icy jumps in, “The fish eat them and then we eat the animals and we have the plastics inside of us.”

“Yeah, It’s a cycle. We are all making a lot of trash – we are affecting the world. Then it all comes back to us,” says Sot… Continue reading here

No. 13
MIMA Museum: City Lights with Swoon, MOMO, Hayuk, Faile

Maya Hayuk. MIMA Museum. Brussels, Belgium. April 2016. (photo © The Pickles – MIMA Museum)

What is it about Brooklyn Street Art that is so appealing that one would curate the opening exhibition of a museum with it?

Four pillars of the New York Street Art scene are welcoming the first guests of the new Millennium Iconoclast Museum of Art (MIMA), which opened days ago in Brussels. Attacking the cherished institutions that relegate grassroots people’s art movements into the margins, MIMA intends to elevate them all and let them play together. Graphic design, illustration, comic design, tattoo design, graffiti, street art, plastic arts, wheat pasting, sculpture, text, advertising, pop, story-telling, aerosol, brushwork, and naturally, dripping paint.

Obviously street culture has been mixing these influences together in a never-ending lust for experimentation; punk with hip-hop, skateboarding with tattoo, performance art with graffiti – for the past four decades at least. The folk tradition of cutting and pasting predates all our modern shape-shifting by centuries, but institutional/organizational curating often often has a preference for sorting street culture disciplines into separate piles.

With the inaugural exhibition “City Lights” MOMO, Swoon, Faile, and Maya Hayuk each bring what made their street practice unique, but with an added dimension of maturity and development. Without exception each of these artists have benefitted from the Internet and its ability to find audiences who respond strongly to the work with physical location a secondary consideration. Now as world travelers these four have evolved and refined their practice and MIMA gives them room to expand comfortably…Continue reading here

No. 12
San Salvador, Street Artists, Food Insecurity and “Conect-Arte”

Vexta.Workshop. Conect-Arte. San Salvador. April 2016. (photo © Yvette Vexta)

“Six street artists took their social engagement a step further in El Salvador last month and taught youth some serious skillz from the street.

Coming from Brazil, Australia, Ecuador, Mexico, New York, and New Jersey, this international crew took the time to share and teach about painting, art, and how community can be built. The program Conect-Arte is a newly launched initiative by the United Nations World Food Programme, which as the name suggests, also is in the city to address a more core need to battle food insecurity. With Conect-Arte the goal is to also meet youth in some communities and help with positive role models an options with an eye on transforming lives through developing art and related creative skills that can provide income and channel energy in ways productive to community.

Together the artists worked on projects with 45 teens and younger kids over the course of the a week-long workshop in San Salvador, teaching street art techniques like stencil, lettering, mural painting, sculpture, even hot air balloon making. The goals are huge, like reducing violence, food insecurity, increasing access to economic opportunity. The tools here are art, the creative spirit, and strengthening relationships.

We bring you some images of the works that were made by the visiting artists and some of their observations and experiences during the Conect-Arte program…Continue reading here

No. 11
Discovering a “Magic City” in Dresden, Germany

Unidentified Artist (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“A couple of weeks ago BSA was in Dresden, Germany to help lay plans for a new Street Art show opening there this fall called “Magic City” and naturally we hit the streets with bicycles three days in a row to see the city’s graffiti, Street Art, and murals whenever time would permit. The first day we had the honor of getting a tour from Jens Besser, an artist, author, lecturer, and producer of mural festivals in the city who sped ahead of us through a labyrinth of streets to show us a number of the impressive murals he and partners have brought to the city in the last decade or so…Continue reading here

No. 10

Louis Masai: “The Art Of Beeing” Tour Kicks Off in NYC to Save Endangered Species

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Bog Turtle. Endangered. The Bushwick Collective, Brooklyn. NYC. October 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“Activism and Street Art go hand in hand and some artists are skilled at activating public space for hearts and brains to spark and cogitate. During the last 15 years we’ve documented a number of seriously affecting artworks on the street that use text and/or imagery to address political, social, environmental, and economic issues and opinions by artists as varied as Shepard Fairey, Banksy, John Fekner, Ganzeer, LMNOPI, Myth, Gilf!, Gaia, LNY, Jetsonorama, and any number of one-shot authors. In this election year there are too many Trumps to count, and a few Hillary pieces as well.

Undaunted by commercial interests and able to deliver directly to the passerby, Street Artists know that their visual message isn’t guaranteed acceptance but they take a chance anyway. The ones that reflect the sentiments on the street tend to last longer, aesthetics count, and so does spelling, at least that is our inductive observation.

One London artist who seriously raises awareness about the Earths’ endangered species is Louis Masai, a painter, sculptor, illustrator and Street Artist. Starting this week in New York Masai is beginning a 20 mural tour across the United States to talk about the hard working, honey-making, pretty pollinating bee – and a number of our animals that are in danger of dying off completely…Continue reading here

No. 9
1UP in Berlin : “ ‘All City’ Doesn’t Even Begin to Cover It ”

1UP. Berlin 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“An amorphous shape-shifting consortium of Berlin-based aerosol hooligans named 1UP is one of those graffiti crews who eventually make the entry into graffiti street lore because of the scope and daring of their travails.

Primarily Berlin based, you’ll find their almost-commercial sounding name on roofs, walls, abandoned factories, and in tunnels in many cities around the globe. Without a clear idea of the exact number in their association nor precise membership these daredevils are most often described as white men in their twenties and early thirties reveling in the athleticism and sport of graffiti, in addition to style. The tag itself appears to be rather “open source” at times, with only insiders able to keep track of the distinct hand styles forming the ubiquitous name on thousands of surfaces…continue reading here

No. 8
A “Cathedral” of Characters in Northern Spain

RIM. Spain. (photo © Lluis Olive Bulbena)

“It’s a cathedral of characters, this abandoned furniture factory forty kilometers outside of Barcelona. Cartoons, illustrations, portraits are everywhere; a curious collection of aerosol spray pieces that highlights the popularity of the animated and exaggerated personalities among graffiti and Street Artists in this region of the world.

The character may be a salty with a haggard stare, or reference a topic with a bit of satire. The scene may be serious, comical, ridiculous or purely sci-fi and horror. You discover the stories and allegories as you walk through the empty manufacturing rooms now flooded with natural light and dust. Expressions and situations here are full of drama that may trigger your empathy, startle your attention, elicit a shiver, or creepily fondle your funny bone…Continue reading here

No. 7
“Art Silos” Rise in the Harbor of Catania, Sicily

Interesni Kazki. Detail. (photo © VladyArt)

“They’ve been here since the 1950s, these silos for wheat and corn on the harbor of Catania on the east coast of the island of Sicily at the foot of Mount Etna. 28 meters tall and facing the Ionian Sea, they are now some of the largest canvasses in Italy by a small group of international and local Street Artists.

The “Art Silos” project includes works completed during an eight month installation begun in June 2015 as part of Festival “I-ART” organized by “Emergence”, thanks to Angelo Bacchelli, curated by Giuseppe Stagnitta. The artists taking part in the project were Okuda (Spain), ROSH333 (Spain), Microbo (Italy), BO130 (Italy), VladyArt (Italy), Danilo Bucchi (Italy) and the duo Interesni Kaxki (Ukraine), mostly all from the graffiti/Street Art world. A separately organized but related project on the harbor-facing row of eight silos was completed by one artist alone, the Lisbon-based Vhils…continue reading here

No. 6
BLU Allies : A Counter Exhibition to “Banksy & Co.” Launched in Bologna

Tadlock (photo © @around730)

“An anti-Banksy & Co. Street Art show opened in Bologna Italy the same night as its controversial bank-backed cousin with brand new works by 50 or so Italian and international Street Artists and open admission to their outdoor ‘museum’.

“It is free and spontaneous, as Street Art should be,” says an organizer and participant named About Ponny as he describes the exuberant and sometimes saucy toned exhibition on the grounds of the sprawling former headquarters of Zincaturificio Bolognese which is destined for future demolition.

“The message we want to convey is that true street art is found where it was born, in the street and not in the paid exhibits,” says Bibbito, who along with two other out-of-town street artists named Jamesboy and Enter/Exit found food and couches during their installations thanks to an association of artists called L’Associazione Serendippo. Together, these artists say, they and other organizers want to send a “strong signal” by creating “one of the largest museums of ephemeral street art ever made”. The new coalition named this project “R.U.S.Co” (Recupero Urbano Spazi Comuni) or (Urban Renewal Common spaces).

The new 16,000 m² open-air art show may appear as a rather curious development because its method of protest runs completely counter to that of the shows’ most vocal and high-profile critic, BLU, who last week protested the same show by defiantly destroying 20 years of his own public paintings, rather than making new ones…Continue reading here

No. 5
Raising Yellowcake in Grand Canyon: Icy & Sot, Jetsonorama in Arizona

Icy & Sot. “Nuclear Plant” Navajo Nation. Arizona. June 2017. (photo © Icy & Sot)

“Yellow Cake: A simple sweet dessert confection that gets its signature color from 8 egg yolks and a cup of butter, and is great with either vanilla or chocolate icing.

Yellowcake: A type of uranium concentrate powder obtained from leach solutions, in an intermediate step in the processing of uranium ores. Also, its radioactive. Also, Colin Powell showed off a vial of it at the United Nations to sell the Iraq invasion in 2003 to that body and the world.

Being more knowledgeable about the dessert variety of yellow cake than the desert variety of uranium contamination, we turn to Street Artists Jetsonorama and Icy & Sot to educate us about the active uranium mines that are at the North Rim of The Grand Canyon. The three worked jointly in June to create new public works addressing the topic and we have each of them here for you to see.

“The issue of uranium contamination and nuclear waste is timely as there is an active uranium mine at the North Rim of the Grand Canyon presently and a proposal to start mining at the South Rim,” explains Jetsonorama (Chip Thomas), who is a local artist, a practicing doctor, and a social activist advocating for the people who live on the reservation and the natural environment in general…Continue reading here

No. 4
Nychos Slays in New York : IKONS Revealed as Never Before

Nychos. “Dissection of Sigmund Freud”. Vienna Therapy. Manhattan, NY. June 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“Scientists, psychologists, surgeons…in the end we’re all driven by a similar curiosity.”

This month has been a whirlwind in New York for Austrian Street Artist /fine artist /illustrator named Nychos and he’s made quite the iconic impression. Anchored by a show that opened last weekend of canvasses and illustrations at Jonathan Levine Gallery in Chelsea named “IKON” and assisted by a co-branded sculptural event with the Vienna Tourist Board, the surreal dissectionist didn’t rest there.

In the weeks leading up to and after these events he also managed to hit a number of walls in Coney Island, Bushwick, and Jersey City…oh and he knocked out a box truck as well.

In addition to pulling out an astounding sculpture of Sigmund Freud looming over a couch that drew a crowd to the foot of the (also iconic) Flatiron Building at 23rd and 6th, the afterparty and reception featured Dominic Freud, the great grandson of the founder of psychoanalysis, who surmised that if he were alive today he would definitely have wanted to put Nychos on his couch…Continue reading here

No 3
35 Artists in Barcelona Trying To Save The Arctic with Greenpeace

La Castillo. Save The Arctic. Barcelona, Spain. April 2016. (photo © Lluis Olive Bulbena)

“Yesterday our posting was about artists in London creating works about endangered species and today we go to Barcelona where 35 artists joined with Greenpeace and a local group named RebobinArt on April 9^th to create works centered on environmental issues, especially the quickly disappearing polar ice cap.

Only three days later scientists announced that the Greenland “Melt” has happened one month earlier than usual this year, smashing records and causing scientists to reexamine their measuring instruments to make sure they were working correctly.

The art-platform model of RebobinArt is interesting because they are a community organization that manages spaces and issues permits for painting for competitions, festivals, exhibitions, educational programs, and cause-based events like this one.

Under the guidance of Director Marc Garcia, RobobinArt promotes and facilitates a different sort of public painting that is not strictly commercial and yet it is clearly not the freewheeling graffiti/street art based stuff that made Barcelona such a magnet for artists in the early-mid 2000s…Continue reading here

No. 2
Chip Thomas’ New Mural, Indigenous People, and #NoDAPL

Chip Thomas. The original photograph of JC Morningstar holding her dog on a swing. Indigenous People’s Day at Fort Lewis College. Durango, CO. (photo © Chip Thomas)

“Street Artist and activist Jetsonorama (Chip Thomas) saw his work pull together a number of people in Durango, Colorado on October 10th as the city and the college celebrated their first ever “Indigenous People’s Day”. His photograph of an indigenous youth named JC Morningstar swinging and kissing her dog was chosen by a group of students from Fort Lewis College, where 24% of the population is indigenous.

The unveiling ceremony for the mural began with a traditional pow wow prayer by a drum circle and Chip says “the highlight of the day for me was having JC, her dog and her family travel 4 hours to Durango to attend the unveiling before going to the Tribe Called Red show that evening.”…Continue reading here

No 1
Chihuahua, a Mexican Desert City with a Few “Street Art” Blooms

Paola Delfin. Chihuahua, Mexico. Centropolis Art Festival 2014. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“Chihuahua is like one big ranch,” says a local reporter who guides you around this desert city known for beef, cheese, sotol, cowboy boots… and a growing middle class – thanks to the hundred plus multinational maquiladoras operating here with a focus on aerospace, medical equipment, and automobile manufacturing.

The “ranch” metaphor is meant to be welcoming, but it also lets you know that this city of nearly a million can still feel like a small town. This is the capital of Mexico’s largest state, which goes by the same name. And yes, the diminutive and scrappy dog originated here – as did Pancho Villa, and you can visit his homestead if you like.

It’s not the typical city where you might expect to find Street Art, yet only a few blocks from the government palace downtown that holds two stories of wall paintings by Mexican muralist Aarón Piña Mora, you will find new paintings in the dusty side streets that indicate a more international flavor is present…Continue reading here

Top 15 Videos on BSA Film Friday From 2016

In Memory: Giulio Vesprini

From BSA Film Friday: 07.15.16

“Murals have an entirely different function in the urban environment than Street Art and graffiti, although some folks use the terms interchangeably. One of the time-honored functions of a public mural in many cities has been the “memorial mural,” the one that recalls a person or people or a significant event that has impacted a neighborhood, even a nation. Because it is artwork mounted publicly, it can be used as a meeting point for people in a community to gather and talk about it, trading stories and impressions and gaining understanding. At its’ worst, a memorial mural can be superficial or overwrought, moralizing, even stunningly unartful.

Sometimes however, it can provide to a community a sense of pride or history, and it can be empowering. Other times there is a mental, emotional catharsis that takes place with the artwork providing a forum, a safe space to discuss the undiscussible in a public forum or simply to share in a common sense of loss, or experience some sense of healing.

‘It’s not mere decoration, but deals with ethics,’ says Giulio Vesprini as he paints this mural remembering Camp No.70 Monte Urano, a WWII prison camp a mile or two from the sea and Porto San Georgio, in Italy. ‘So it has been very important to me that I could give my contribution.’ “

We dedicate this compilation to the filmmakers who bring so much joy, knowledge and awareness with their artistry and technical wizardry every day and especially every Friday from BSA Film Friday to all of us here at BSA and to our readers. Cheers for a wonderful 2017…

BSA’s 15 Most Popular Murals Of 2016 – A “Social” Survey

December 11, 2016 Artists

Murals have captured so much of the popular imagination about what the Street Art scene is today and although they may be part of the definition, murals remain only a part of the entire scene; a visual conversation that includes legal, illegal, small, anonymous, massive, deliberately confounding, low-energy scrawl, stickers, tags, poetry, diatribes, culture jamming, ad takeovers, sculpture, installations. Every week we aim to present a varied selection of expressions currently represented on the street, and then it is your turn to respond.

During 2016 BSA readers responded to images via our website, Instagram, Twitter, Tumbr, and Facebook pages. In a thoroughly unscientific survey that calculates “likes” and “clicks” and “re-Tweets” and “impressions”, we tallied up which murals (or images) got the most interest from you all. Care to read into the results?

The top 3 really sum it all up for 2016 and shouldn’t surprise us, but they still do; Militarism, Mis-information, and the Man of the Year.

If you ever doubted how much art on the street reflects the psyche of a society back to itself, no need to wonder anymore. If only we could read these tea-leaves and tell the future…

No 15.
David Choe’s Portrait Of Martha Cooper for Wynwood Walls / Art Basel 2016.

David Choe. Detail. Wynwood Walls / Art Basel 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Originally appearing here:

No 14
Plotbot Ken’s car installation on the Teufelsberg Hill in Berlin.

Plotbot Ken’s post-apocolyptic installation on a car at the abandoned NSA spy compound in Teufelsberg Hill in Berlin. Berlin, 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Click here to see the original posting on BSA.

No 13
Faust and Shantell Martin in Manhattan, NY.

Handstyle and all New York, baby. Faust. Shantell Martin (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Click here to see the original posting on BSA.

No 12
Swoon in Brooklyn, NY.

One of Swoon’s new additions to the street in 2016 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Click here to see the original posting on BSA.

No 11
ASTRO in East Harlem.

ASTRO in East Harlem for #NotACrime campaign in collaboration with Street Art Anarchy. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Click here to see the original posting on BSA.

No 10
Nychos in Manhattan, NY.

More than his multiple murals published here this year, this sculpture on 23rd Street in Manhattan in the spring captured the imagination and gave his work an added dimension. Nychos. “Dissection of Sigmund Freud”. Vienna Therapy. Manhattan, NY. June 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Click here to see the original posting on BSA.

No 9
MadC in Marrakesh, Morocco.

Click here to see the original posting on BSA.

No 8
Maya Hayuk in Brooklyn, NY.

Click here to see the original posting on BSA.

No 7
Invader in Jersey City, NJ.

Click here to see the original posting on BSA.

No 6
Collin Van Der Sluijs. Super A in Berlin.

Collin Van Der Sluijs . Super A. Detail. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. One Wall. Berlin, Germany. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Click here to see the original posting on BSA.

No 5
Kurar in Berlin

Kurar for Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. NOTE: This piece was created late in 2015 but we got to it early in 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Click here to see the original posting on BSA.

No 4
Biggie Smalls in Brooklyn, NY.

Click here to see the original posting on BSA.

No 3
Otto “Osch” Schade in Brooklyn, NY.

Click here to see the original posting on BSA.

No 2
Klops in Brooklyn, NY.

Klops for The Bushwick Collective illuminates the concentration of 90% of the media in the hands of 6 companies. In 1983 there were 50. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Click here to see the original posting on BSA.

No 1
Ron English in Brooklyn, NY.

Ron English brings Donald Trump as Humpty Dumpty on a wall – in collaboration with The Bushwick Collective. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Click here to see the original posting on BSA.

BSA HOT LIST : Books For Your Gift List from 2016

December 10, 2016 Artists

Nothing can replace the experience of reading a printed and bound collection of images and texts – and the number of Street Art and graffiti related books that come out every year continues to grow in quantity and quality. We don’t receive all of them, and we don’t get the chance to thoroughly review them sometimes, but many of them do pass our desk and we take time to highlight ones that strike a chord throughout the year.

Here is a BSA Hot List selection from 2016 – a cross section really – that impressed us for one reason or another. Full disclosure: we were fundamental to the design and structure of the Icy & Sot book and wrote the Afterword and worked closely with the artists for months, and Ella & Pitr drew us into one of their illustrations, so there is a little more than usual bias in those choices. But otherwise, we’re confident that you’re well served by choosing from these titles for Christmas presents or Hanukkah gifts or Solstice offerings …

“Tracing Morocco”, Hendrik Beikirch

From BSA:

Dignity in “Tracing Morrocco” gives pause, requests your consideration.

Last year we wrote about Hendrik Beikirch’s journey to Morocco, The Trades. With the support of the Foundation Montresso he embarked on a project to paint the portraits of people whose trades might be in danger of becoming obsolete and/or disappearing due to the complexities of the modern world. Tracing Morocco, the book about the project is now out…

Hendrik Beikirch’s Tracing Morocco published by and in collaboration with Montresso Art Foundation. November 2016.

Click HERE for more about this book.

Alan KET Brings You “Urban Art Legends”

From BSA:

“This book is about the artists who have pioneered, promoted and transformed this ‘other’ art world,” says the author, himself a graffiti writer, artist, curator, activist, advisor and entrepreneur. What is fresh about his approach is the egalitarian respect that is given to artists regardless of their genre or associated scene, something we have always tried to balance as well amid a sometimes turbulent volley of antagonism that can sometimes distinguish graffiti/street art discourse.

KET: “Urban Art Legends” Lom Art. London 2015

Click HERE for more about his book.

Ella & Pitr Draw You Their Diary of World Travels in “Baiser D’Encre”

From BSA:

Who knew that babies could use so many diapers! What to do when you are in a foreign city and both of you are sick as dogs? Also, we may need a crane to help us finish the world’s largest roof mural.

These considerations are things you draw into your travelogue diary when you are Ella & Pitr, the painters of enormous kings, pilots, and couples cuddled in bed on fields, rooftops, and beaches around the world.

Ella & Pitr. Les Editions Papiers Peintres. France. November 2015.

Click HERE for more about this book.

MIKE MAKATRON : In 10 Cities and Multiple Worlds

From BSA:

Wanderer Mike Makatron has been spending his young manhood traveling the globe and painting walls and experimenting with styles of art ranging from fantasy illustration to loose and leafy botanicals, with symbols of indigenous spirits, psychedelic mushrooms and plenty of the time honored ying/yang.

Mike Makatron – In Ten Cities published by Trojan Press. Melbourne, Australia 2015.

Click HERE for more about this book.

“Daze World”, the Artist and Book from City to Canvas and Back

From BSA:

“This is not an autobiography in the practical sense. I didn’t cover the day-to-day minutia of my childhood or formative teenage years all the way to the present. Rather, I have chosen to take the reader on a journey that covers some of the seminal moments in my life. Those moments shaped my art and allowed me to continue to evolve as an artist,” says graffiti/street/studio artist DAZE of the brand new collection of images and essays that make up “Daze World,” the new hardcover from Schiffer.

DAZE WORLD: The Artwork Of Chris DAZE Ellis available through Schiffer Publishing.

Click HERE for more about this book.

“The Art Of The Mural: Volume 01″ Captures a Moment

From BSA:

Murals hold their own place onstage in public space today for a variety of reasons that we discuss regularly on BSA. From grassroots and public, to private and corporate, we have watched the genre professionalize as Street Art festivals and other initiatives are often coupling artists with brands and are selling canvasses through the organizers’ galleries. Today we have the first of a promised four-part book series by Art Whino gallerist and organizer of the Richmond Mural Project in Virginia, Shane Pomajambo, that features many artists he has worked with in the brand new “The Art of the Mural”.

The Art of The Mural: Contemporary International Urban Art. Volume 01 by Shaen Pomajambo. Schiffer Publishing

Click HERE for more about this book.

Rubin: “Scandinavia / New York” Studio Works and Murals

From BSA:

An immigrant’s tale, Rubin’s, and a New York story as well. For his first artists monograph the Fin by way of Sweden brazenly tells you his story in a most deliberate and considered way. It’s brazen because it’s a truth that has taken him a long time to be ready to tell, ready to be vulnerable. It’s carefully considered because – that’s his style.

Rubin. Scandinavia / New York. Studio Works and Murals. Published by Dokument Press 2016. Sweden.

Click HERE for more about this book.

“Street Art / Today” features 50 of the Most Influential Street Artists

From BSA:

It’s nearly impossible to arrange the work of Street Artists into lists of “top” or “most popular” or “most influential”, but it happens all the time now particularly as the street art world morphs into a commercial and professional scene for some. But it’s a dodgy business when one tries to rank art and artists – and most people will disagree with your list no matter what.

Street art / today: The 50 most influential street artists today by Bjørn Van Poucke & Elise Luong published by Lannoo. Belgium.

Click HERE for more about this book.

Graffiti Murals: Exploring The Impacts Of Street Art

From BSA:

New Book by Patrick Verel Attempts to Untangle the Graffiti Mural Discussion

In Graffiti Murals: Exploring The Impacts Of Street Art, a methodical study of graffiti and murals in Manhattan, Brooklyn, The Bronx, Staten Island, Jersey City, Philadelphia, and Trenton (New Jersey), author Patrick Verel talks to all of the stakeholders he can find, revealing much in the telling of his findings. The author says he created this book from a paper he was researching for while completing his masters degree in urban studies, and you can tell his intention was to turn over as many stones as possible to study the impact this grassroots art movement is having on the communities that murals appear in.

Graffiti Murals: Exploring the Impact of Street Art. Patrick Verel. Schiffer Publishing. 2016

Click HERE for more about this book.

Stik : His First Collected Volume of Work

From BSA:

An unusual little tall man, this Stik man.

Deceptively simple, he expresses profound truths that are anything but. Since the turn of this century in his hometown of Hackney, the formerly homeless Stik has been bringing his unassuming line drawn character out to the streets of northeast London, often Shoreditch. With few details and is as uncluttered as a logo, Stik towers above on the side of a housing behemoth, or a water tower, or a doorway.

STIK. Published by Penguin Books – Random House. New York City. 2016

Click HERE for more about this book.

Shepard Fairey: Earth Crisis

From BSA:

Artist and activist Shepard Fairey this week releases a 2 volume “Earth Crisis” set that commemorates a recent public environmental project and doubles as a collection of plates to jumpstart your collection which you could easily frame and hang. With it comes powerful socio-political messages common to his wheelhouse delivered with the artists often iconic sense of design.

Shepard Fairey / OBEY. Earth Crisis. Albin Michel Publishers . Galerie Itenerrance. Paris. July 2016

Click HERE for more about this book.

Icy & Sot “Let Her Be Free”

From BSA:

“We first met Icy and Sot the summer they arrived in New York. Their name was already preceding them on the Internet because even while still in Iran, they had developed a network of friends and collectors who had helped them to show their art in Europe. Images of their work had already caught our eye. We were lucky to be the first to interview them here.” – Steven P. Harrington and Jaime Rojo, Co-founders, Brooklyn Street Art

BSA is proud to tell you of this new book, the first monograph of Iranian Street Art brothers ICY & SOT, which we dedicated many hours of design, editing, interviewing, and writing to, in addition to contributing photographs by Jaime Rojo. Along with the brothers and book designer Cassandra Brinen, we spent many hours in New York meetings in each others apartments and Brooklyn cafes sorting through images and stories to find the narrative and the flow of the pages and chapters (even laying all the pages across a living room floor), all the time wondering if we could finish it in time and to the quality level and taste level everyone was looking for.

Icy & Sot “Let Her Be Free” Lebowski Publishers. Amsterdam 2016

Click HERE for more about this book.

Luna Park’s “(Un)Sanctioned” Book

From BSA:

The memory of the joy and the excitement of discovery of graffiti and Street Art is something we never take for granted, and we have always given voice to as many artists and photographers as possible on BSA for that reason. Luna, whose real name is Katherine Lorimer, this month introduces her first book-bound collection of many of her most electrifying moments of capture and documentation.

Heavy on New York artists, particularly her favorites and dear friends, the collection captures a splendid offering of the spine tingling pieces of ephemera one could stumble upon here in the last 11 years – if they did the hard work. Expertly collected and selected, this above all is a reflection of one personal journey.

Katherine ‘Luna Park’ Lorimer’s book (UN)SANCTIONED The Art On New York Streets from Carpet Bombing Culture

Click HERE for more about this book.

BSA Images Of The Week: 01.11.26
January 11, 2026
Welcome to BSA Images of the Week, our first of the year. We started 2026 with a Wolf Moon, which …Read More »
ONLY HUMAN at Wynwood Walls: Murals, Memory, and the Hand-Made Mark in Miami Art Week
January 8, 2026
Wynwood Walls made its presence felt throughout Miami Art Week this December with a familiar mix of new murals, established …Read More »
Buff or Delete Elfo? The Last One For ’25, the First One For ’26
January 6, 2026
Elfo isn’t wrong, as they like to say these days. This photograph shows the phrase “You can remove graffiti with …Read More »
Photos of BSA 2025 # 1
January 4, 2026
Street art doesn’t only regale walls, it often reflects us, cracks and all. Call it protest or simply commentary, this …Read More »
Photos of BSA 2025 # 2
January 3, 2026
Street art welcomes all manner of materials and methods, typically deployed without permission and without apology. This hand-formed wire piece …Read More »
Photos of BSA 2025 # 3
January 2, 2026
The most successful murals are created within the context of a community. Too often, street art festivals operate with little …Read More »
Happy New Year 2026 From BSA
January 1, 2026
Okay let's do this! The future is unwritten. Get out your marker.Read More »

BSA Special Feature: 5 in a row by Where’s Kong : USA Art of Beeing

The Art of Beeing – New York City #1

Louis Masai / The Art of Beeing Detroit

Louis Masai / The Art of Beeing California

Louis Masai / The Art of Beeing Arizona . Texas . Tennessee

Louis Masai / The Art of Beeing Miami

“I’m painting toys because if we don’t act now to stop extinction, only toys will remain in place of animals” – LM

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. The Bushwick Collective, Brooklyn. NYC. October 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Bog Turtle. Endangered. The Bushwick Collective, Brooklyn. NYC. October 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. New England Cottontail Rabbit. Vulnerable. The Bushwick Collective, Brooklyn. NYC. October 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“The media talks about Detroit as if it is a derelict forgotten city, but we discovered a whole community that has been here for a long time and they definitely wouldn’t agree with their city is a dead or abandoned space,” – LM

Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing. Gray Wolf. Endangered. Detroit. Michigan. October 2016. (photo © @teebyford)

Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing. Gray Wolf. Endangered. Detroit. Michigan. October 2016. (photo © Louis Masai)

“After 4 days of driving from Detroit to Reno we felt empowered by the incredible landscapes we had driven through, from salt lakes to deserts and the Rockies, not one part of the trip was unexciting,” says Louis Masai of the journey. “Well perhaps the 7 hours of corn fields.” -LM

Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing. Lahontan Cutthroat Trout. Endangered. Reno. Nevada. October 2016. (photo © Mia Hanak)

Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing. Lahontan Cutthroat Trout. Endangered. Reno. Nevada. October 2016. (photo © Louis Masai)

“We drove through snowy mountains from Reno to Lake Tahoe, and then descended a continuous downwards road for 6000 feet – which took about an hour to get into Sacramento,” he says. “What an incredibly diverse landscape! It’s just mind-blowing.” -LM

Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing. Coho Salmon. Endangered. Sacramento, California. October 2016. (photo © Louis Masai)

Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing. Coho Salmon. Endangered. Sacramento, California. October 2016. (photo © Louis Masai)

“We met some amazing beekeepers in San Francisco that really opened up this idea that nature and the engagement with nature can definitely start to generate a sense of love for oneself and the environment” – LM

Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing. Island Fox. Near Threatened / California Channel Islands. San Francisco, CA. October 2016. (photo © @lmnotree)

Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing. Island Fox. Near Threatened / California Channel Islands. San Francisco, CA. October 2016. (photo © @lmnotree)

Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing. Honey Bee. Jetty extracts Oakland. San Francisco, CA. October 2016. (photo © @lmnotree)

Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing. Honey Bee. Jetty extracts Oakland. San Francisco, CA. October 2016. (photo © @lmnotree)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Yellow Legged Frog. 90% have disappeared in the last 100 years. Downtown, LA. November 2016. (photo © Lmnotree)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Yellow Legged Frog. 90% have disappeared in the last 100 years. Downtown, LA. November 2016. (photo © Louis Masai)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Shasta Crayfish. Critically Endangered. Venice, LA. November 2016. (photo © Lmnotree)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Shasta Crayfish. Critically Endangered. Venice, LA. November 2016. (photo © Tee Byford)

“It’s always hard to formulate too much of an understanding of a city when you are only there for a very short time…and I guess a lot of this trip has been that way, but even more so in Phoenix, with only two nights and one day.” -LM

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Jaguar. Only 15K remain in the wild. Phoenix, AZ. November 2016. (photo © Emil Walker)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Jaguar. Only 15K remain in the wild. Phoenix, AZ. November 2016. (photo © Louis Masai)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Houston Toad. Endangered. Austin, TX. November 2016. (photo © Emil Walker)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Houston Toad. Endangered. Austin, TX. November 2016. (photo © Emil Walker)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Northern Flying Squirrel. Endangered. Nashville, TN. November 2016. (photo © Emil Walker)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Northern Flying Squirrel. Endangered. Nashville, TN. November 2016. (photo © Emil Walker)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Box Turtle. Critically Vulnerable. Atlanta, GA. December 2016. (photo © Tee Byford)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Box Turtle. Critically Vulnerable. Atlanta, GA. December 2016. (photo © Tee Byford)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Manatee. Vulnerable. Miami, FL. December 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Manatee. Vulnerable. Miami, FL. December 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Manatee. Vulnerable. Miami, FL. December 2016. (photo © Tee Byford)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. American Crocodile. Vulnerable. Miami, FL. December 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. American Crocodile. Vulnerable. Miami, FL. December 2016. (photo © Emil Walker)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Coral. Threatened. Miami, FL. December 2016. (photo © Louis Masai)

Louis Masai: The Art of Beeing USA Tour. Coral. Threatened. Miami, FL. December 2016. (photo © Louis Masai)

America as it happens is incredibly good at catering for vegans, I guess that’s mainly because people don’t cook at home in the states. Thumbs up America! Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing on The Huffington Post For for more information regarding The Art Of Beeing click HERE

Many people say that Street Art by its nature is necessarily ethereal because it is often damaged by the elements or destroyed by others. Your expectation for it’s brief lifetime is tempered with the realities on the street. On some occasions, indoor artwork has a similar fate.

Rubin 415 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The old Williamsburg factory building where Rubin 415 had his art studio was just sold for 25 million dollars, according to the artist, and is soon to be gutted. Artists tried to mount a legal battle to stay, but eventually lost.

Rubin 415 moved there about three years ago when his long-term art studio in Greenpoint raised rents exorbitantly suddenly to force out the artists who had brought life to that industrial sector when no one else wanted to be there.

Rubin 415 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

This is the fourth time he’s been uprooted while working as an artist in New York.

An optimistic fellow, he’s left a parting gift before the buildings’ destruction on the ill-fated walls and we caught them here for you and for posterity. Following those images is a recent mural outside he’s done that we haven’t published previously.

Rubin 415 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Rubin 415 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

A recent outside mural by Rubin 415 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Bordalo II . Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Bordalo II (photo © Jaime Rojo)

With the exception of The London Police pieces all the murals featured here were created this year from November 21st. through December 2nd. These photos can give you a taste of the new grassroots scene growing out of, or perhaps in response to, the madness that is Wynwood.

Miles Toland (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Miles Toland (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Miles Toland . Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The London Police (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The London Police (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mr. June (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Fio Silva . Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Fio Silva . Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Fio Silva . Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Galo (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Aquarella (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Phlegm. Wynwood, Miami. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Phlegm. Wynwood, Miami. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Phlegm. Wynwood, Miami. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Phlegm. Wynwood, Miami. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Phlegm. Wynwood, Miami. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Times Square. New York City. December 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Fernando Alcalá Losa 12/15 Also, in the event that you missed any of our end-of-year lists:

BSA’s 15 Most Popular Murals Of 2016 Let’s all bravely face the new year with our best intentions and talents and we’ll see how far we can go. Our best to you for 2017.

Jaime’s Christmas/Navidad-inspired sculpture on the beach in Florida on Christmas Eve. Materials: found pieces of driftwood, coconuts, seashells, and electric lights. December 2016. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

SpY. Street Art Museum (SAM). St. Petersburg, Russia. May 2016. (photo © Evgeniy Belikov)

Icy & Sot. Endangered Species Mural Project. Los Angeles, CA. January 2016 (photo © Jess X. Chen)

“I’m painting toys because if we don’t act now to stop extinction, only toys will remain in place of animals”
– LM

“The media talks about Detroit as if it is a derelict forgotten city, but we discovered a whole community that has been here for a long time and they definitely wouldn’t agree with their city is a dead or abandoned space,”
– LM

“After 4 days of driving from Detroit to Reno we felt empowered by the incredible landscapes we had driven through, from salt lakes to deserts and the Rockies, not one part of the trip was unexciting,” says Louis Masai of the journey. “Well perhaps the 7 hours of corn fields.”
-LM

“We drove through snowy mountains from Reno to Lake Tahoe, and then descended a continuous downwards road for 6000 feet – which took about an hour to get into Sacramento,” he says. “What an incredibly diverse landscape! It’s just mind-blowing.”
-LM

“We met some amazing beekeepers in San Francisco that really opened up this idea that nature and the engagement with nature can definitely start to generate a sense of love for oneself and the environment”
– LM

“It’s always hard to formulate too much of an understanding of a city when you are only there for a very short time…and I guess a lot of this trip has been that way, but even more so in Phoenix, with only two nights and one day.”
-LM

America as it happens is incredibly good at catering for vegans, I guess that’s mainly because people don’t cook at home in the states. Thumbs up America!

Louis Masai The Art Of Beeing on The Huffington Post

For for more information regarding The Art Of Beeing click HERE

Fernando Alcalá Losa 12/15

Also, in the event that you missed any of our end-of-year lists:

BSA’s 15 Most Popular Murals Of 2016

Let’s all bravely face the new year with our best intentions and talents and we’ll see how far we can go.

Our best to you for 2017.

“Yeah, It’s a cycle. We are all making a lot of trash – we are affecting the world. Then it all comes back to us,” says Sot… Continue reading here

No. 13
MIMA Museum: City Lights with Swoon, MOMO, Hayuk, Faile

We bring you some images of the works that were made by the visiting artists and some of their observations and experiences during the Conect-Arte program…Continue reading here

No. 11
Discovering a “Magic City” in Dresden, Germany