All posts tagged: Jaime Rojo

Hush “Twin” Opening Tonight at New Image Gallery (Barring Rapture)

May 21, 2011 Artists

“That’s Great, It Starts With An Earthquake”

Well folks it’s the End of the World, as we know it. How’re you feeling? Actually, according to a certain sect of clairvoyant Christians today is Judgement Day, and the end of the world is not until October, so you should still forget about that Christmas Layaway Plan you have at Walmart.

New York subways and buses have been pummeled for weeks with pulp novel style posters impugning the good name of the Devil and overweight puff pastry people from the Midwest have been milling around Times Square in sensible shoes telling us that repenting from our sins is pretty much going to be the only way out of the Late Great Planet Earth. As usual, these wild eyed tourists never make it out to Brooklyn, so our borough is going now to Hell – which will be big news to the Hasidic population.

HUSH (photo © Todd Mazer)

For those of you unwashed who are still here after the 6 o’clock earthquakes roll through each time zone across God damned America we bring you the gloriously sanctified beauty of “Twin”, the new HUSH show at that den of iniquity called New Image Gallery in God forsaken West Hollywood.

HUSH (photo © Todd Mazer)

“Tagging, Graf, Street Art and art; each is always a choice, an action,” HUSH told us a couple of years ago when discussing his work, and his open approach to borrowing from comic books, graffiti, and traditional Japanese iconography is what makes his work modern.

Internalizing and interpreting the energy from Krazy LA has been a dream for a free expressionist like HUSH, who likes to throw everything at the wall – tagging, painting, collage, – deconstructing and reconstructing until it achieves balance. “I’m big on progression and I’m always looking at how to take my work forward, pushing it while still retaining pointers back to previous works,” says the artist. With a number of shows and countries and street pieces under his belt, the British native is also quietly achieving a mastery of his technique, as urban turns urbane in the finely sprayed misty glow surrounding these peaceful idyllic visages, rising from the blue cacophony.

HUSH (photo © Todd Mazer)

Marsea Goldberg, a wild and fine former Brooklyn gal, has been looking out for and championing the new talent on the graffiti/Street Art/fine art scene at New Image since the mid nineties, including artists like Bäst, Cleon Peterson, Clare Rojas, Date Farmers, Ed Templeton, Jo Jackson, Neck Face, Os Gemeos, and Retna, so she knows what she is looking for and knows how to create a charged environment for artists to stretch in.

“Hush is a fantastic artist and he has a down to earth, hard working vibrant spirit,” Marsea explains, “I’ve liked his work for a long time – The first time I saw his work was at the “Cans Festival” which Banksy put on in London 4 years ago. When I saw his colorful, ornate murals in the long tunnel I was beyond impressed. The interesting thing about Hush’s art is the combination of influences.”

HUSH (photo © Todd Mazer)

For his part, HUSH is taking the opportunity seriously, “It’s great to be at New Image because of its history… I’ve always admired the rawness and energy of the place and Marsea’s commitment to whatever this art movement is.”

As his work mutates and configures across mediums, one might wonder how much of this has meaning to him and whether it is an involuntary stream of favorite symbols and techniques combined and recombined. “I feel like my works have matured and I’m creating my own visual language, even though it’s probably only me who understands it,” he says smiling.

HUSH (photo © Todd Mazer)

“It’s funny – I’ve had this work in my head for the last few years but it’s just fitting into the story now. I think I’ve got until the year 2014 in paintings now but I’ll have to take you through it in real time… I’m looking forward to showing how it all pans out in the future though.” We would love to stick around here on Earth to see how his work turns out in ’14, but there is someone knocking on the door…

HUSH (photo © Todd Mazer)

Photographer Todd Mazer captured the artist working outside this week on the “Barracuda” wall where Saber and Shepard Fairey did their near iconic flag interpretations. And through Todd’s lense we get to see Hush tagging the gallery walls and the installation underway.

HUSH (photo © Todd Mazer)

HUSH “Twin” (photo © Todd Mazer)

The plumbs have just blossomed, but not yet the Sakura. Almost Blue Geishas at the height of springtime’s charm. HUSH, “Twin” at New Image Gallery (photo © Todd Mazer)

HUSH “Twins” (photo © Todd Mazer)

This is where it all began for HUSH, who is shown tagging the walls of New Image before “Twins” (photo © Todd Mazer)

HUSH “Twins” (photo © Todd Mazer)

New Image Art Gallery

7908 Santa Monica Blvd.

West Hollywood, CA 90046

323.654.2192

Italian Street Artist Göla and His Fantastical Hybrids in Brazil

May 19, 2011 Artists, Brazil, Events, Gallery, On the Street, São Paulo

Italian Street Artist Göla is in Curitiba, Brazil working with Brazillian Paulo Auma as part of a public art / street art exhibition called “Hibrido”, or Hybrid. Engaging the children, adults, and walls with fantastic and glaring color drenched combinations of genetically modified animals, insects, food, and technological wonders is meant to be more than entertaining eye candy – while it clearly succeeds in doing that. As the French Street Artist Ludo does with his animal/techno fantasy combinations, this four month exhibit is an explicit call for us to think about the goals and results of our experimentation with the natural world, our ethics, and our blind obeyance to scientific endeavors for their own sake.

Göla. Curitiba, Brazil (photo © Fernando Cesar)

“I try to ask about the relationship between man and all other living beings,”says Göla about the influences in his work. With his painting and subject matter a meditation on the laws of nature, he warns of the dangers of messing with it. Fascinated with the hybrids that are coming about, his depictions profess affinity for the natural world.

As he name checks futurist artists like Eduardo Kac and Alexis Rockman , Göla explains “My work is influenced by an ever-present closeness with the animal sphere,” as your thoughts wander to discussions of trans-human futurism, fluorescent fish, all terrain dog-robots delivering bombs, and flying nano bugs watching you through the window while you drool over a Lady Gaga video.

Göla. Curitiba, Brazil (photo © Fernando Cesar)

Heady stuff for Street Art you say? Not really when you consider that today’s generation of Street Artists is coming from a huge variety of backgrounds with a flood of abilities, carrying with it bags of tricks only imagined in the aerosol infused reveries of yesterdecade. Göla, for all of this heavy thinking, is a jubilant ombudsman of a hopeful future, bringing an extremely playful and childlike wonder to his work, making it all so much more engaging.

While in Brazil, Göla took time to explore the country and to get up in various towns big and small. Here is the product of his work and collaborations with some local artists.

Göla. Curitiba, Brazil (photo © Fernando Cesar)

Göla, Paulo Auma “Hibrido” Curitiba, Brazil (photo © Fernando Cesar)

Göla. “Hibrido” Curitiba, Brazil (photo © Fernando Cesar)

Göla, Sao Paulo, Brazil (photo © Göla)

Göla, Niguem Dorme Sao Paulo, Brazil (photo © Göla)

Göla, Milo, Tim Tchais, Dedo Verde. Sao Paulo, Brazil (photo © Göla)

To experience Göla’s world click on his site:

http://www.golanimal.com/

“Hibrido” is on view from March 20-June 19, 2011.

To learn more about “Hibrido” click below:

http://www.hibridoart.net/

El Mac and Augustine Kofie : Two Cats in an Alley

May 18, 2011 Artists, On the Street, Pasadena

It happens on a roof in LA, in a back alley. El Mac and Augustine Kofie, two gifted graff writers, street artists, fine artists, balanced assuredly on ledges and ladders, cans in hand and collaborating on a new piece. It’s a dreamlike sequence of scaling and balancing, backing away and re-approaching, scanning the sky as day folds into night and looking back at the bricked canvas to see a gentle babe gazing upward from an abstract future past.

El Mac. Augustine Kofie. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Photographer and videographer Todd Mazer, a regular contributor to BSA, circled and treaded nimbly and quietly in panther-like pursuit of the right screen capture while the artists worked. Over time, perched camera in hand, he documents the dexterous and purposeful movement and focus of two big cats on the top of their game. And roof.

“For me I feel like that’s as good as it gets,” says Mazer.

El Mac. Augustine Kofie. (photo © Todd Mazer)

El Mac. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Augustine Kofie. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Brick: You’ll make out fine. Your kind always does.

Maggie: Oh, I’m more determined than you think. I’ll win all right.

Brick: Win what? What is, uh, the victory of a cat on a hot tin roof?

Maggie: Just stayin’ on it, I guess. As long as she can. *

El Mac. Augustine Kofie. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Read our interview with Augustine Kofie with photos by Todd Mazer here:

http://www.brooklynstreetart.com/theblog/?p=18806

The piece was created behind 33third in Los Angeles http://www.33third.com/ A Graff and Street Art supply store in conjunction with:

The Street Cred Art show in Pasadena http://www.pmcaonline.org/exhibits/61/index.html

* from “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof”, a play by Tennessee Williams

Blowing Up a Tag : Gary Stubelick Lights the Street On Fire

May 17, 2011 Artists, Boston, On the Street

Using sparklers and an open shutter, artist Gary Stubelick creates glowing panegyrics to light up the urban night. The Boston based creative director has been exploring the fine art of time and light for a few decades and creates incandescent odes to hot summer nights in the city with his interpretation of mundane features of the urban landscape.

A time lapse photographer since 1973, the artist “paints” objects discarded, overlooked and discovered with sparklers, incandescent tungsten, and highway flares, giving them shooting star status, if just temporarily. This public art art is less than ephemeral – it only existed briefly and linearly, with it’s layers collected here and displayed as one perfect moment.

Blowing up a tag and this messengers’ bike while he’s inside delivering a pizza. “Urban Frontier” (photo © Gary Stubelick)

“The idea behind the shot was to combine the renegade nature of graffiti with the explosive energy of pyro. I utilized ballistic sparklers to achieve the splattered paint effect. The bike is a Schwinn Frontier mountain bike which accounts for the title, ” says Stubelick.

The humble fire hydrant is set ablaze. Gary Stubelick “Fire Hydrant #7” (photo © Gary Stubelick)

Gary Stubelick “Target Glass” (photo © Gary Stubelick)

Gary Stubelick “Firebird” (photo © Gary Stubelick)

Transforming a mound into a rumbling mountain of bubbling lava. Gary Stubelick “Urban Volcano” (photo © Gary Stubelick)

Gary Stubelick “Fire Balls” (photo © Gary Stubelick)

To see more of Mr. Stubelick’s work click on the link below:

http://g-flip.deviantart.com/

BSA Presents “Street Art Saved My Life : 39 New York Stories”

May 16, 2011 Artists

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

May 15, 2011

Brooklyn Street Art Presents Street Art Saved My Life : 39 New York Stories in collaboration with ThinkSpace Gallery, an art show to exhibit at C.A.V.E. Gallery in Venice (LA), California on Friday, August 12, 2011.

Street Art Saved My Life : 39 New York Stories heralds the new highly individual character of stories being told on the streets of New York by brand new and established Street Artists from all over the world. Steven P. Harrington and Jaime Rojo, founders of BrooklynStreetArt.com focus on this flashpoint in modern Street Art evolution by curating a strongly eclectic story-driven gallery show with 39 of the best storytellers hitting the streets of New York.

Street Art Saved My Life : 39 New York Stories, the gallery show, accompanied by an LA street wall series by selected artists and a public panel lecture and discussion, intends to stake out the New Guard in street art while recognizing some powerful near-legendary forerunners.

The mainly New York lineup exhibits talent from other parts of the US and internationally (Australia, France, UK, Canada, Israel, Germany) and it is as steely, idiosyncratic and storied as the New York scene itself, including Anthony Lister, Adam Void, Broken Crow, C215, Cake, Chris Stain, Clown Soldier, Creepy, Dan Witz, El Sol 25, Ema, Faile, Futura, Gaia, Gilf!, Hargo, Hellbent, How & Nosm, Imminent Disaster, Indigo, Judith Supine, Kid Acne, Know Hope, Ludo, Mark Carvalho, Miss Bugs, Nick Walker, NohJColey, Over Under, Radical!, Rene Gagnon, Skewville, Specter, Sweet Toof, Swoon, Tip Toe, Troy Lovegates AKA Other, Various & Gould, and White Cocoa.

The staunch individualists in Street Art Saved My Life : 39 New York Stories give voice to the evolution of the Graffiti, Mash-Up, and D.I.Y. movements that birthed them; creating an eccentric, highly individual, and raucous visual experience on the street. With widely varied backgrounds, techniques, and materials at play, “The Story” is the story. With truths as diverse and difficult as the city itself, each one of these artists is a part of a fierce, raw, new storytelling tradition that is evolving daily before our eyes.

Show Name: Street Art Saved My Life : 39 New York Stories
Location: C.A.V.E. Gallery, 1108 Abbot Kinney Blvd, Venice, California 90291
Date: Opening reception Friday August 12, 2011
Duration: August 12 – September 4, 2011.
Online Press Release: http://mim.io/692a11
Contact: Info@BrooklynStreetArt.com

Presented by Brooklyn Street Art in collaboration with ThinkSpace and C.A.V.E
Curated by Steven P. Harrington and Jaime Rojo of BrooklynStreetArt.com

Brooklyn Street Art is proud to collaborate with ThinkSpace Gallery and C.A.V.E. Gallery. Please note that the show will be at C.A.V.E. Gallery. Thank you.

Thinkspace Art Gallery www.thinkspacegallery.com
6009 Washington Boulevard, Culver City, CA 90232 (310) 558-3375
Wed – Fri 1PM-6PM Sat 1PM-8PM contact@thinkspacegallery.com

C.A.V.E. Gallery (location of the show) www.cavegallery.net
1108 Abbot Kinney Boulevard, Venice CA 90291, (310) 450-6560
Wed – Sun 12PM-6PM or by appointment info@cavegallery.net

Steven P. Harrington and Jaime Rojo are founders of BrooklynStreetArt.com and co-authors of Brooklyn Street Art and Street Art New York, both by Prestel Publishing (Random House). Harrington and Rojo are also contributing writers on street art for The Huffington Post.

Hi-Graff Hybrids Through the Lens of Carlos Gonzalez

May 16, 2011 Artists

It may seem impossible to imagine, but rock music never dated classical till the Beatles, and before Run DMC married rock and rap there was no love between the two. Hardly seems worth mentioning now as the subgenres of music propagate nearly weekly – have you seen the Techno Hippie Disco people in your neighborhood yet?

Cryptic, Chor Boogie (photo © Carlos Gonzalez)

Likewise, it seems like only a decade ago the chasm could not have been wider between hardcore graffiti writers and the relatively new Street Artists popping up on the street. It’s not that the two didn’t know each other and see each other at barbecues and even get drunk together sometimes, but their divisions and personal alliances disallowed hanging out regularly. Those Cold War years are being chopped away brick by brick like the Berlin Wall 20 years ago, and a new language borrowing vocabulary from graffiti, street art, fine art, advertising, and pop/punk/hiphop/skater/cholo/tattoo culture continues to emerge in ways we never thought of before.

Cryptik, Chor Boogie (photo © Carlos Gonzalez)

The current show at Hold Up Gallery in the Arts District of downtown LA called “Hi-Graff” reveals the lengths that artists will go to work together these days, and the results are a surprising hybrid. Photographer Carlos Gonzalez took these shots to illustrate what curator Brian Lee refers to as graffiti’s “embellishment period”.

Says Gonzalez, “Hi-Graff” is “an impressive show featuring some of graffiti’s greats as well as some notable up and comers. ” It’s a thrilling sign to see everyone can actually get along, and with frequently stunning results.

Foreground detail NICNAK, Background Cryptik, Chor Boogie (photo © Carlos Gonzalez)

“Clearly, the show succeeds in more ways than one and it points very much toward a street art movement where trends and talents can all merge into one cohesive unit, both inside a gallery space and on the concrete streets,” Carlos Gonzalez

Left -Vyal, Defer, Slick. Right -Cryptik (photo © Carlos Gonzalez)

Right Wall -Cyrcle. Left Wall -Risky, OG Abel (photo © Carlos Gonzalez)

Left Wall -Cyrcle, Teal. Center Wall -Augor, Zes, Bonks, Right Wall – Vyal, Defer, Slick (photo © Carlos Gonzalez)

Bonks (photo © Carlos Gonzalez)

Augor, Zes, Bonks (photo © Carlos Gonzalez)

Left -RTSYSTM, Right-Andy Rios (photo © Carlos Gonzalez)

James Haunt (photo © Carlos Gonzalez)

(let to Right) NICNAK, Axis, Rick Ordonez (photo © Carlos Gonzalez)

Left Wall -Vyal, Defer, Slick. Right Wall -Spurn, Codak, Kym CBS (photo © Carlos Gonzalez)

Left Wall -Spurn, Codak, Kym CBS. Right Wall -Risky (photo © Carlos Gonzalez)

Spurn, Codak, Kym CBS (photo © Carlos Gonzalez)

Codak, Spurn (photo © Carlos Gonzalez)

Carlos Gonzalez is a contributor photographer to BSA. To see more of his work click on the link below:

www.facebook.com/CarlosGonzalezPhotography

“Hi-Graff” at Hold Up Art

Featuring the work of Alec Monopoly,Augor,Cache,Chor Boogie,Codak,Coto,Cryptik,Cyrcle,Defer,Free Humanity,Midtz,Rick Ordoñez,RISK,ROOTSYSTM,Slick,Spurn,Teal,Vyal, and Zes

358 E.2nd St., Los Angeles, CA, 90012

URL: http://www.holdupart.com/

On View May 7th-June 2nd, 2011

Images of the Week: 05.15.11

May 15, 2011 Artists, Brooklyn, Manhattan, NYC, On the Street

Our weekly interview with the street, this week featuring Elle, Googly Eyes, Julia Langhof, Karat, Kid Zoom, Money Population, Sweet Toof, The Dude Company and scenes on the street from photographer Jaime Rojo.

Hiding behind a fern; an unknown artist’s wheat paste of a B&W photo (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Kid Zoom in Brooklyn (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Some people go into debt to bury their dead. Death is far from free – and what about those pesky estate taxes? (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Another fleeting moment on the streets of New York;

This construction worker appeared to mimic dance-like movements while working before this street level video installation of a dance troupe. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Looking to zone out? Here is as good a place as any. Artist unknown (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Sun dappled Elle is such a lamb. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Eve in the garden of Brooklyn and Evil. Julia Langhof (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Street Artists, illustrator, graphic novelist Karat recently installed these bronze plaques in locations in New York that mark historical events in her life. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Go NYC, yeah you know me. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Money Population (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Googly Eyes intervenes ever so slightly in this media campaign poster (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The Dude Company recently rolled through Brooklyn (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Sweet Toof (photo © Jaime Rojo)

With love from the streets of Brooklyn. Untitled (photo © Jaime Rojo)

With love from the streets of Manhattan. Untitled (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Street Artist JR In Brooklyn

May 14, 2011 Artists

Placement is Key in the New Installations

French Street Artist JR has begun his “Inside Outside” global art campaign as a result of winning the 2011 TED prize and the first results appeared in Brooklyn’s Park Slope neighborhood this week. Giving the photographing job to anyone who would like to participate, the campaign provides you with your own large scale print to install as you wish. Keeping with the innovative spirit in which JR has plastered his mammoth sized portraits elsewhere in cities around the world, these images of locals are installed in an integrated, human manner. Facing the world, they are not simply vanity exercises but anthropological in nature. Welcome to Brooklyn, JR! Hope to see you at the museum next spring.

JR (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Fun Friday 05.13.11

May 13, 2011 Artists, Brooklyn, California, Chicago, Events, Gallery, L.A., Los Angeles, Manhattan, NYC, Opening

A GUIDE TO WHAT’S UP, BROTHERMAN AND SISTERWOMAN

This weekend is a perfect storm of shows that are opening on the East, West and points in between.

Up Close And Personal: RJ Curates Street Artists Into an Upper West Side Apartment (NYC)

In the intimacy of a private residence in the Manhattan suburbs of UWS, RJ Rushmore of Vandalog fame along with Keith Schweitzer and Mike Glatzer of newly minted M.A.N.Y. have mounted a fresh new open house show just off Broadway. An exquisitely curated show with marquee names and a few newbies the selection is solid in quality and unusual in it’s scale.

Troy Lovegates aka Other (image courtesy of the curators)

Participating artists include:

Aiko, Chris Stain, Clown Soldier, Don Leicht, Edible Genius, Elbowtoe, Gaia, How & Nosm, Jessica Angel, John Fekner, Know Hope, Logan Hicks, Mike Ballard, OverUnder, R. Robot, Radical, Retna, Skewville, Tristan Eaton, Troy Lovegates aka Other and White Cocoa.

brooklyn-street-art-WEB-AIKO-vandalog-RJ-Rushmore-Keith-Schweitzer-Mike-Glatzer

Aiko’s cans are on proudly on display at the bachelor pad, and that’s not all (image courtesy of the curators)

Dates: May 12^th– 15^th, 2011

Times:

May 12th, 7 – 9pm
May 13th, 7 – 9pm

May 14th, noon – 9pm

May 15th, noon – 7pm

Note: Due to the limited exhibition space, people may be admitted in block times every half-hour.

Location: Apartment on the Upper West Side (217 West 106^th Street, Apartment 1A, New York, NY 10025) – Between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenues.

Cost for entrance: Free

Go to Hellbent and John Breiner Tonight in Brooklyn (NYC)

Mighty Tanka is presenting a show with two Brooklyn based artists: Hellbent and John Breiner.

brooklyn-street-art-WEB-hellbent-john-breiner-mighty-tanaka-gallery-1

Mr. Hellbent says of the show: “The best part of making a show like this is to finally see it up on the wall and the way that everything interacts. I have been thinking of these pieces as parts of a quilt, different fabrics being stitched together. The different colors, floral stencils, animals, and jaw bones melding together and playing off one another, even down to the different depths and sizes of panels, but until it was hung they were just pieces, not yet a whole. Its given me an opportunity to show the different elements that i am working with and how they have grown out of one another and to display all the different carvings and stencils patterns together, where on the street they are separated in different locations.”

To learn more about “Smiled Distress” at Mighty Tanaka tonight please click on the link below:

http://www.brooklynstreetart.com/theblog/?p=20787

Matt Siren and My Plastic Heart present “Ghost in the Machine” (NYC)

25 spirits in the material world have made tributes to Street Artist Matt Siren’s Ghost Girl character for this show on the Lower East Side tonight. The custom toy show transforms the character that appears in doorways around New York, each putting its own unique spin on his character.

The show includes work from 64Colors, Royce Bannon, Steve Chanks, Chauskoskis, DarkCloud, Deeker, Gril One, J*RYU, Jester, Keely, Abe Lincoln Jr., Map-Map, Marka27, Brent Nolasco, Lou Pimentel, Reactorss, Marc Reusser, Todd Robertson, Robots Will Kill, Chris Ryniak, Matt Siren, Scott Tolleson, Julie West, Wheelbarrow, Wrona

Click on the link below to learn more about this show:

http://www.myplasticheartnyc.com/gitm_051311/preview/gitm_051311_preview.html

210 Forsyth St New York NY 10002 | 646 290 6866

Ghost in the Machine
May 13th 2011 – June 12th 2011

Chicago Street Art Show Tonight (CHI)

Tonight the book “Chicago Street Art” is being released at the the Chicago Urban Art Society in conjunction with a show titled “The Chicago Street Art Show”

brooklyn-street-art-WEB-chicago-street-art-joseph-j-depre

Read all about it in yesterday’s BSA posting — “Chicago Street Art” Debuts with an Exhibition and a Book

Brooklyn’s AD HOC has a New Puppy in Los Angeles (LA)

On the West Coast the dynamic duo and husband and wife Garrison and Allison Buxton have curated a group show “I have a dream, I have a nightmare: Friday the 13th” at The New Puppy Gallery opening this Friaday from 7:00 to 11:00 pm

Artists include: Alison Buxton, Beau Stanton, Bill Fick, Broken Crow, Bunnie Reiss, Chor Boogie, Chris Stain, CRASH, Dabs & Myla, Daryll Peirce, David Loewenstein, Don Leicht, Ezra Li Eismont, Garrison Buxton, Hellbent, Joe Iurato, John Breiner, John Carr, John Fekner, Jordan Seiler, Know Hope, Lady Pink, Michael De Feo, Mikal Hameed, Paul Booth, Peat Wollaeger, Ray Cross, Rex Dingler, ROA, Robert Steel, Sean Starwars, TheDirtyFabulous, & Thundercut.

Ad Hoc Art – www.adhocart.org

New Puppy LA – www.newpuppla.com

WHERE: 2808 Elm Street, Los Angeles, California 90065

English Kills Group Show Saturday, “The Mother Ship” (NYC)

Chris Harding, owner and ringmaster of the Bushwick Brooklyn-based space station English Kills brings out his strong stable of artists for this group show aptly titled “The Mother Ship” opening this Saturday at 7:00 pm. It’s not necessarily Street Art – but this is a hotbed of new ideas so it is always worth your trip.

Participating artists include:

Brent Owens, Andy Piedilato, Vilaykorn Sayaphet, Jim Herbert, David Pacheco, Hiroshi Shafer, Gyles Thompson, Sarah H. Paulson, Holly Faurot, Tescia Seufferlein, Peter Dobill, Steve Harding, Judith Supine, Lenny Reibstein, Andrew Ohanesian, Jason Peters, Don Pablo Pedro, Steven Thompson, Andrew Hurst and Rob Andrews.

English Kills is located at:

114 Forrest St. Ground Floor
Brooklyn, NY 11206
(718) 366-7323

Specter is a “Repeat Offender” 5/14 at Pawn Works in Chicago (CHI)

Brooklyn based artist Gabriel Specter’s solo show “Repeat Offender” opens this Saturday at the Pawn Works Gallery.

Opening Reception Saturday, May 14, 2011/ 6-10pm

PawnWorks
1050 N. Damen Ave.
Chicago, Illinois 60622

Ph: 312.841.3986

London Police in Denver, “Amsterydynasty”

In Denver Colorado Black Book Gallery brings back the glamour of the 80’s with The London Police and Handiedan in a show titled “Amsterydynasty”

Opening reception May 14th at 7pm

Click here to learn more about this show

Olek Crochets for a Bicycle in Poland

ROA in San Francisco

Women’s Faces in Art

500 Years of Female Portraits in Western Art by Philip Scott Johnson.

MoCA Art in the Streets. Wisk, Ser, Chubbs and Prime destroy a wall.

“Chicago Street Art” Debuts with an Exhibition and a Book

May 12, 2011 Artists, Book Review, Chicago, Events, On the Street, Opening, Street Talker Interview

Author Joseph J. Depre has been traveling around the world to photograph and write about Street Art for the last few years and and when he returned to his hometown of Chicago he rediscovered his love and appreciation for the art in the streets of his city. The images in his first book just released give a very good documentation of the current scene while his essays are personal, poetic and passionate.

Opening tomorrow at the Chicago Urban Art Society is a retrospective of work by many of the artists on that scene today. With brand new works curated in this not-for-profit gallery environment developed by Lauren Pacheco and Peter Kepha, visitors will have the chance to see the Street Art talent that is growing in their community, including pieces by Artillary, Bonus Saves, Brooks Golden, Chris Silva, CLS, Senor Codo, Cody Hudson, CRO, Cyro, Chris Diers, Don’t Fret, Emen, 80 Legs, Tom Fennell IV, “It’s Yours, Take It”, Goons, The Grocer, Juan Angel Chavez, Kepto Salem, Melt, Nick Adam, Oscar Arriola, Poor Kid, Safety First, Saro, Sighn, Solve, Tiptoe, The Viking, You are Beautiful, among others. More information about the show at the end of the post.

Debuting his book “Chicago Street Art” for the first time at the opening, Mr. Dupre is very excited to see the show come to fruition after nearly a year of planning. Brooklyn Street Art asked him about the Chicago scene today and his new book and he gives us some insights here. We also had an opportunity to shoot some art on the streets of Chicago last month – see photos by Jaime Rojo after the interview.

Brooklyn Street Art: How long have you been preparing this book “Chicago Street Art”?
Joseph Depre: I originally had the idea for a book on Chicago Street Art when I started to integrate into the Chicago Street Art community in 2004. I think that is about the time I started writing. I was fascinated by these unique artists and was lucky enough to be able to talk openly with a good number of them, bounce ideas off the artists and they helped me refine my thoughts. As I traveled I was able to get together with Street Artists in cities like New York, Berlin, Barcelona, and Sao Paulo. After experiencing the Street Art in these cities and got back to the States my thoughts reflected back to Chicago and the incredible history of Street Art we have here and I thought it was important to give Chicago the recognition it deserves. So I’ve sent the last 9 months talking to all of the Artists and putting this all together.

Brooklyn Street Art: Can you introduce us to the Chicago Street Art scene at this moment from an artist and creative perspective?
Joseph Depre: I won’t be so forward to say I can tell you anything from an artist perspective, but as a conscious observer I can say there are a lot of good things happening in Chicago at the moment. Nice-One seems have refined his characters with an air-brush technique that looks really nice. Don’t Fret has really been putting in his time and effort. His characters are always fun and expressive. He’s turning into to a great storyteller. Mental 312 has been hitting the streets hard and doing some really beautiful work. He’s one of my favorite artists right now.

TipToe (photo courtesy of the author) from “Chicago Street Art”

Brooklyn Street Art: Chicago has a very active anti-graffiti program, which cleans or “buffs” pieces, good and not so good, quickly with brown paint. Can you talk about how Street Artists have responded to the efficient and rapacious pace of buffing?
Joseph Depre: Most of the Street Artist I know really hate the buff and attribute the fact that Chicago has so little international Street Art respect to “the buff.” But all of these Artists just work harder in spite of the Buff. In New York one piece can stay up for years, in the Chicago the Street Artist has to do 20 pieces just to stay up through the season.

Brooklyn Street Art: Street Artists like Chris Silva and Cody Hudson have gone beyond two-dimensional painted works to create sometimes expansive sculptural set installations. Do you see more stuff like this around Chicago these days?
Joseph Depre: Oh Yeah. The first artist that comes to mind is CLS. It is really amazing what he has been able with scraps of wood and branches he finds on the street.

Brooklyn Street Art: Borrowing a tenet from the flash mob street manifestations of the last decade, Street Artists like BonusSaves devised something called “It’s Yours, Take It”. Can you talk about this practice of giving art to the public and how it has become an international programmatic approach to engaging communities?
Joseph Depre: The Internet has really helped out with this. Through sites like Flickr, BonusSaves is able to organize and direct hundreds of people from all over the place. All with the same state of mind and love of giving art to people and bringing communities together through gifting creativity. But it is not solely his doing… All the artists really believe in the idea and have been running installations in cities all over the world all by themselves. It really is a testament to the power of people to come together and do something really good just for the sake of doing something good.

Brooklyn Street Art: You dedicate a few pages of your book to the occurrence of a piece attributed to London Street Artist Banksy on a wall in Chicago, and the response of the city and other street artists to it. Is there such a thing as a “Banksy Revolution”?
Joseph Depre: I cannot say what Banksy’s actual intent is – only he knows what that is. For my part, I hope he’s attempting a revolution. If not then we are all the butt of a pretty sick joke. I also hope that he doesn’t get discouraged, I think people are just starting to listen. Maybe not the people who were introduced to Street Art through “Exit, Through the Gift Shop” but others.

Brooklyn Street Art: What do you think distinguishes the Chicago scene and why do you feel an affinity for it?
Joseph Depre: Other than Chicago being my home and my introduction to Street Art, I think there are quite a few things that distinguish it from the rest of the world. The sculptural history exemplified by the likes of Juan “Angel” Chavez, Cody Hudson, and Chris Silva would be a good place to start. The other thing is that all of the artists are personally close here. Everyone knows everyone. They don’t just meet up at shows and events but talk on a regular basis and are invested in each others’ lives and success.

Brooklyn Street Art had the fortune to be in Chicago for a day recently where photographer Jaime Rojo got an afternoon to run around shooting as much as he could find. Brooklyn artist Gaia had recently been in the city and he left some nice gifts for the Chicago art lovers to enjoy. The images below are from that visit to Chicago and are not a part of the book “Chicago Street Art”

Chicago Urban Art Society, 2229 South Halsted. The show will run until June 4. http://chicagourbanartsociety.tumblr.com/

Book Cover Artist: Chris Sliva

Skin Deep Beauty on the Subway in NYC : Poster Boy Interventions?

May 11, 2011 Artists, NYC, On the Street

The Reality-Show-Industrial-Complex continues to warp everyone’s perception of reality with its brain cell melting fusillade of advertising everywhere you turn. Street billboards, banner ads, barking taxi cab screens, and bone-headed subway posters spill bilious candy coated banality upon bystanders and passersby with entreaties to experience the misadventures of buxom babes and the buff boys who bang them.

You have to wonder how these funhouse images affect the self-perception of girls and boys and women and men who are surrounded daily by them. You will not escape the visual assault as you ride captive on the trains to your job or school or museum or library or the unemployment office – as the vast tentacles of the entertainment industry reach ever further in search of a market.

Of course, that doesn’t mean that citizenry doesn’t talk back.

From Keith Haring in the 80s to Poster Boy (s) and LUDO and a number of non street artists in the last couple of years, there is an occasional attempt to steer the conversation, stem the tide and claim the eyeballs and attention on the subway, if just for a minute. Some artists feel that the subways are a fair playground and an instant gallery, to the chagrin of those who see their art interventions as crimes or at least, damaging to profits.

Recently we spotted a series of ads with images of the new “celebrity” class marred with the tiniest “interventions” that ring of Jenny Holzer, Barbara Kreuger and even William Burroughs. Whether these are the work of Poster Boy or the Poster Boys he hoped to inspire, the placement short circuits the messaging and questions how women are being portrayed. Ultimately these little interventions are just a finger in the whole.

Signs of the BEAST Seen in California (Rapture Update)

May 10, 2011 Artists, California, Los Angeles, On the Street

I swear if the world does not burst into flames this year and the sky doesn’t cloud with locusts and the Chinese don’t bomb the shit out of the heartland and if Angelina Jolie does not ride naked and pregnant on an 8-headed lion with wings and Jesus Christ doesn’t appear floating in the sky with his arms open to welcome all the Republicans who just got sucked out of their cars up into his embrace – if all that does not happen on May 21, 2011, I will never again listen to any prophecies for the rest of my time here with you. I’m serious. I have spent my entire frickin’ life expecting supernatural star spangled annihilation and a prison planet and all I got was this orange “War on Terror” t-Shirt and a machine that scans my nuts at the airport.

Street artist Beast put up his/her own series of billboards in Los Angeles last week. In this case, we can actually say that we are seeing the Signs of the Beast. He used the back of 25 bus shelter benches, which usually advertise nasal decongestants and accident lawyers 800 numbers, to bring an uplifting message of impending pestilence and catastrophe and unemployment. Times are so bad that superheroes are trying to cut in line at the job fair.

You know, we spent $3 Trillion on something over the past 10 years with this war machine, surely someone could start up a World War to give these spandexed and bedazzled folks some work. Although I don’t see too many people carrying resumes in hand here, so they could also use some career coaching.

Beast (photo © Beast) This dude will face some stiff competition to snag a position with that crowd ahead of him. Hang in there buddy, Jesus is on his way.

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