All posts tagged: Steven P. Harrington

A New Knitter on the Block, London Kaye Brings her “Ballerinas”

January 7, 2014 Artists

Yarn Bombing! Yarn Storming! Tell me another yarn.

Knitting and crocheting for the street is hardly new, but it is experiencing a great surge of interest right now – to the thrill of some who find it adorable and cute, and to the utter disgust of graffiti and Street Art dudes and dudettes who think it is all a trifle – not hardcore or STREET enough to be allowed up on walls and fences or on the, uh, STREET.

Also there are those mild-mannered fans who just think it is a cool thing to stumble upon some seemingly random hand knitted yarn things in a loud grimey underpass.

London Kaye (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Ah, but that is just the point isn’t it? Artists who put their work up in the public sphere don’t usually ask for anyone’s permission and London Kaye joins that ever-growing list of bad-ass bombers, even if they are ballerinas.

On a side note: Have you noticed ballet has been all the freaking rage for Street Art over the last year? Faile did their Pas de deux with the New York City Ballet last spring, JR is getting ready to mount his project with them presently, and this series of dancers climbed a fence sometime in mid-December. Remember our first picture of the year LAST year? It’s like it was a telepathic message from the street – a vast conspiracy of so-called HI and LOW culture. It’s just as well that ballet get a kick in the leotards; since it was becoming an art form enjoyed by a dwindling number of patrons who are clumped on both ends of the human timeline but few in between those core constituencies of 6 year olds and 600 year olds.

London Kaye (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Back to our main story; A genuine newcomer on the street scene, knitter London Kaye follows her own whims and subject matter – not just ballerinas. She actually did a pretty cool reinterpretation of one of Invader’s tile pieces just after his went up at the turn of November, and which we posted that week. She joins the Street Art scene like most do and did – an artist in her early 20s who is churning out new work almost daily, a relatively new type of “bomber” who just wants her stuff to be seen by as many passersby as possible – before it dances away.

London Kaye (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Please note: All content including images and text are © BrooklynStreetArt.com, unless otherwise noted. We like sharing BSA content for non-commercial purposes as long as you credit the photographer(s) and BSA, include a link to the original article URL and do not remove the photographer’s name from the .jpg file. Otherwise, please refrain from re-posting. Thanks!

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El Sol 25 – New Figurative and “Ransom Note” Style Wheatpastes

January 6, 2014 Artists

El Sol 25 has appeared again suddenly with a handful of the collage style paintings in two distinct styles that have distinguished his work from many others on the New York scene for the last handful of years.

We are now getting accustomed to the ransom letter style phrases that he began over the last year or so – bringing to mind other font fans on the street like D*Face, Eine, and Greg Lamarche. The difference here is the technique where El Sol 25 hand paints each collaged message on paper in studio and then wheatpastes the one-of-kind piece on the street.

El Sol 25 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The figurative works that you are more familiar with are also back, a product of mixing and matching limbs, torsos, and heads from myriad sources that result in unusual, nearly incongruous compositions stretching your area of acceptance and narrative comprehension ever further to consider what is harmony, and what is chaos. Again you may see similarities to others on the street – most notably the sort of slash and slice and recollecting collage work currently on the street by practitioners like Judith Supine, Dain, and more recently, Dee Dee. Not surprisingly, El Sol 25 takes it in a more painterly direction again by hand painting with brushes the entire collaged figure on butcher paper (or similar) and pasting the one-off composition on a wall.

El Sol 25 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

It is perhaps because of this highly labor intensive one-off process that you do not see the former graffiti bomber on the street very often. If he had made multiples and repeatedly placed them all over the city like taggers in the graffiti tradition, the name would be possibly be more ubiquitous. But as it turns out, these one-of-a-kind pieces appear quietly and loudly and singularly and standing in a doorway or on a wall for a few months, then fading and decaying and disappearing without a lot of fanfare.

Not sure if this panda in a suit is part of the piece from El Sol 25, but it probably is. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The pileup manner that the pieces are placed on walls that are sometimes already heavily bombed has also brought attention to the artist from writers and other Street Artists because it sometimes is interpreted as being too close to other works or placed directly over works that may not be considered to have had their full run or to have fallen far enough into disrepair. That is probably why you see new tags or works appearing quickly over El Sol’s sometimes. Other times the painted paste ups lay amidst the visual chaos untouched as if the new composition/collaboration/conversation has been deemed amenable to all parties.

To the majority of passersby who are not tuned into the conversation among artists or even the concept of it, El Sol 25 is an unusual and puzzling and usually gratifying discovery. Like so much Street Art and graffiti, you are welcomed to make your own storyline to accompany it.

El Sol 25 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Images Of The Week: 01.05.14

January 5, 2014 Artists

It’s been weeks since we had an “Images of the Week” posting with you, due to the end of the year spectacular we presented for 13 days; a solid cross section of the talented photographers who are documenting this important moment before it passes.

As a collection 13 From 2013 exemplified the unique and eclectic character of Street Art and graffiti photography today. Each person contributed a favorite image and along with it their insight and observations, often personal, very individual, and with a real sense of authenticity. Each day we were sincerely grateful for their contributions to BSA readers and to see the street through their eyes.

Thank you again to Yoav Litvin, Ray Mock, Brock Brake, Martha Cooper, Luna Park, Geoff Hargadon, Jessica Stewart, Jim Kiernan, Bob Anderson, Ryan Oakes, Daniel Albanese, James Prigoff, and Spencer Elzey for 13 from 2013. Also if you missed it, that list kicked off just after our own 2013 BSA Year in Images (and video) were published here and on Huffington Post, all of which was also a great honor to share with you.

And so we bring back to you some documentation of moments before they passed – our weekly interview with the street, this week including $howta, Appleton Pictures, ASVP, BAMN, Chase, Dceve, Doce Freire, EpicUno, Hot Tea, Jerkface, Judith Supine, Leadbelly33, LoveMe, Meres, Olek, Rambo, Ramiro Davaro-Comas, Square, and Swoon.

This weeks top image is a reprieve from the winter we’ve been enduring – a small hand cut frog clinging to a verdant fern – created by Swoon and snapped during a visit to her studio over the holidays. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

EpicUno (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Rambo (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Leadbelly33 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

LoveMe (photo © Jaime Rojo)

BAMN (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Judith Supine (photo © Jaime Rojo)

ASVP and Square (photo © Jaime Rojo)

$howta (photo © Jaime Rojo)

JerkFace (photo © Jaime Rojo)

HotTea (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Olek’s very latest piece completed on New Year’s Eve in Vancouver, Canada. (photo © Olek)

Olek. “Kiss the Future” detail. (photo © Olek)

Meres has a message for Gerry. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Meres (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Chase (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Doce Freire in Sharjah City, UAE for the Al Qasba Festival. (photo © Doce Freire)

Dceve (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Appleton Pictures (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Artist Unknown (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Ramiro Davaro-Comas (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Untitled. Manhattan, December 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Entes Y Pesimo del Barrio, New from Peru

January 4, 2014 Artists

Peru’s Entes & Pésimo are back in Lima after a nice few days painting in Miami last month and have brought their eye popping color palette to the side of a handful of homes that line the hills of this city. Local favorites who consider their work to be as close to the community as it can be, the graffiti artists are integral to the cityscape, telling the stories of its inhabitants one or two at a time.

Entes y Pesimo. Lima, Peru. December 2013. (photo © Entes/Pesimo)

Sometimes E&P consider themselves community activists because of their advocacy for people on the ground but even moreso they are poets in love with their culture. Using citric hues on forms that are serious yet resolute in their longing, perhaps the color acts as a lantern to shine a universal light on the struggle and joy intertwined with daily life in densely populated cities where populations outpace our will to meet their needs.

Entes y Pesimo. Lima, Peru. December 2013. (photo © Entes/Pesimo)

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Canemorto (Dead Dog) at the Side of Road

January 2, 2014 Artists

There is something about the billboard takeover that still feels like a world of possibilities untapped. Billboard Liberation Front showed how to subvert with style, and urban pranksters like Ron English showed how to integrate soft social critique in the détournement dance, but in many cases the visual language has remained within the advertising rubric.

Canemorto shows that it’s possibly even more arresting to repurpose a commercial space with blunt hand-rendered artistic imperfection, converting the space into an actual painters canvas.

Canemorto. Milano, Italy. (photo © Canemorto)

We have grown completely accustomed to the slick billboards alongside highways luring us with $69 motels and attorneys who promise to make you rich if you just put on a neck brace and dial 1-800-WESUE4U. When they are thoughtfully subverted/inverted/perverted you may run the risk of missing the new message entirely, so inured we have become to the medium and its methods.

Italy’s Canemorto troupe thinks that a large raw Picassoesque portrait painted on it, however maniacal and disturbed it may be, is an improvement. It is also possible that this visual jolt will cause you to steer your car into a ditch. Still, a wild-eyed portrait is possibly more edifying than seeing a real estate tycoon comb-over or a warning about the Judgement Day that came and left you here with the sinners.

Canemorto shared some images here of roadside madness they recorded last summer including three new pieces off a highway near Milan. They admit that the pieces themselves “are not our best”, but the personal hand, the brute rawness of the images, make them stand out in this impersonal no-mans land and offer perhaps a counterbalance to a different sort of brutishness that sends roaring truck and car traffic to saw jaggedly through the natural beauty we inherited.

Canemorto. Milano, Italy. (photo © Canemorto)

Happy New Year 2014 from BSA

January 1, 2014 Artists

Thanks for all of your support and all the best wishes from us at BSA to you and your loved ones for a happy healthy new year.

13 from 2013 : Spencer Elzey “A Once in a Lifetime Moment”

December 31, 2013 Artists

Happy Holidays to all you stupendous and talented and charming BSA readers! We thank you from the bottom of our socks for your support this year. The best way we can think of to celebrate and commemorate the year as we finish it is to bring you 13 FROM 2013 – Just one favorite image from a Street Art or graffiti photographer that brings a story, a remembrance, an insight or a bit of inspiration to the person who took it. For the last 13 days they will share a gem with all of us as we collectively say goodbye and thank you to ’13.

To close out our 13 FROM 2013 series we bring you photographer Spencer Elzey who has been a contributor to BSA periodically and who took a cool trip to Europe this year and who was featured for a full week on this site. The image he chose of eL Seed’s piece on the side of a soon to be demolished building captures the “La Tour 13” project and the ephemeral quality of Street Art. It is an apt metaphor for the passage of time itself that reminds us to celebrate and cherish what we have today.

Tomorrow? Tomorrow is 2014.

Spencer followed his passion, seized the opportunity to meet new people and to experience new street environments and he shared with us all his sense of wonder and celebration. As we say goodbye to 2013 we thank him and all our readers for keeping that spirit of discovery alive and for being an active participant in the creative spirit.

el Seed. Paris, France 2013. (photo © Spencer Elzey)

A Once in a Lifetime Moment

~ Spencer Elzey

I selected this picture for a few different reasons. Firstly, I liked this picture from an aesthetic standpoint. The way that the orange building pops against the monochromatic Parisian landscape makes it hard to miss, especially to someone who is a fan of public art and has an eye peeled for these things.

The fact that this art – and even more so this building – was short lived made it almost a once in a lifetime moment. Usually a Street Artist goes into painting a mural with the awareness that his or her canvas is temporary and that within a few months it will be covered up.

Knowing that the whole building was going to be knocked down put this on a whole other level. Out of the 100 plus works of art that were painted and installed within the building there were lots that were better, however, I chose to submit the picture of the exterior almost as a symbolic tombstone for everything that it contained. This picture also represents a series of big accomplishments for myself from a personal level.

I couldn’t imagine a better way to memorialize my whirlwind trip around Europe then by having a weeklong feature on BSA. To top that off Steve and Jaime choose one of the articles for publication on their weekly column at The Huffington Post Arts & Culture and this photograph was the banner picture.

Thinking about these moments still puts a smile on my face.

Artist: el Seed

Location: Paris, France. 2013

#13from2013

Check out our Brooklyn Street Art 2013 Images of the Year by Jaime Rojo here.

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Please note: All content including images and text are © BrooklynStreetArt.com, unless otherwise noted. We like sharing BSA content for non-commercial purposes as long as you credit the photographer(s) and BSA, include a link to the original article URL and do not remove the photographer’s name from the .jpg file. Otherwise, please refrain from re-posting. Thanks!

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13 for 2013 : James Prigoff “Complexity of Apex in San Francisco”

December 30, 2013 Artists

Few people can claim to have the actual historical knowledge of the modern day graffiti age that James Prigoff does. To put it another way, he wrote to us a few months ago to tell us about a celebration he attended this year celebrating the 40th anniversary of Hip-Hop, a cultural movement that began when Jim was 46.

An internationally respected photographer, artist, author, and lecturer on the subject of worldwide urban murals, his seminal 1987 book “Spraycan Art” with co-author Henry Chalfant is considered one of the the earliest published books on aerosol art, graffiti practices and street culture.

Asking Mr. Prigoff to chose just one image is like asking Paul McCartney to pick one song – the volume and depth of knowledge is hard to condense for today’s age of short-attention spans. But he’s a champ and this one is his choice for 2013.

Apexer. San Francisco, CA 2013 (photo © James Prigoff)

A complexity of styles in an Historic SF Location

~ James Prigoff

From a historical point of view, we must remember that modern day Graffiti started with the most rudimentary tags. Few, if any, of the writers had any sense of calligraphy. As more and more youth began to participate in street writing, style began to enter their thinking. Among the very early style masters, Daim from Germany and Ernie from Brooklyn began creating complex 3-D styles that made their hand writings as distinguishable as Impressionist artists like Monet and Matisse. 3-D styles have been adopted by many writers worldwide, but Apex has taken the creation to a new level of sophistication combined with an exceptional sense of color.

Also significant is the location of the painting, on the back of a large building, that is part of the Stephenson parking lots in San Francisco. This was the home of Psycho City for over ten years, before it was buffed and had been named for a great Dug One piece. Psycho City was a west coast “Hall of Fame” where writers would come from countries all over the world. It was also a non-permission venue. As times have changed, the two large pieces that are there now are part of a permission renaissance to upgrade the area through the use of Graffiti (Urban) Art … a la Wynwood in Miami and others.

Psycho City is a place of a thousand memories; The Zulu Nation event where the visiting policeman found his car completely tagged on returning to it, the celebration of “OAKLAND DREAM” one of the legendary names in west coast graff, Brett Cook’s “Dizney’s” political pieces, Nate and Omen’s (MPC) blockbuster walls, HEX (LA) and Omega’s piece that didn’t last eight hours before someone buffed it, ad infinitem.

I chose this photo because it is a fine example of the evolution from a very simple art form that has developed in many different ways to become a complexity of styles.

ARTIST: Ricardo Richey (Apex – Apexer) 2013

LOCATION: STEPHENSON PARKING LOT – COLUSA AT COLSON. – SAN FRANCISCO

#13from2013

Check out our Brooklyn Street Art 2013 Images of the Year by Jaime Rojo here.

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Please note: All content including images and text are © BrooklynStreetArt.com, unless otherwise noted. We like sharing BSA content for non-commercial purposes as long as you credit the photographer(s) and BSA, include a link to the original article URL and do not remove the photographer’s name from the .jpg file. Otherwise, please refrain from re-posting. Thanks!

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13 from 2013: Daniel Albanese “A Yawning Morning Cat from Dee Dee”

December 29, 2013 Artists

“Photographer of Street Art, Strangers, Protests, & Urbanity”, Daniel Albanese has been documenting New York street life for more than a decade with his blog The Dusty Rebel. To Daniel Street Art is not a phenomena full of hype, it is an every day part of city life that he treasures and is regaled by as he passes through the city.

A Yawning Morning Cat from Dee Dee

~ Daniel Albanese

Ever since works by the mysterious Dee Dee began to appear around NYC, I’ve loved finding them. This piece is a prime example of their aesthetic, which often consists of contrasting images coupled with curious text.

I took this photograph early one morning; I was running late, and as I came around a construction barrier and made my way through the crowd of commuters, I was greeted by this yawning cat. Kneeling down to take the photo, several people—who just moments before were rushing to work—stopped to see what caught my eye.

For me, it was was one of those moments when it becomes clear that we all walk around this city with very different perspectives, and how street art has the ability to slow us down and take notice of our environment.

Artist: Dee Dee

Location: New York City, 2013

#13from2013

Check out our Brooklyn Street Art 2013 Images of the Year by Jaime Rojo here.

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Please note: All content including images and text are © BrooklynStreetArt.com, unless otherwise noted. We like sharing BSA content for non-commercial purposes as long as you credit the photographer(s) and BSA, include a link to the original article URL and do not remove the photographer’s name from the .jpg file. Otherwise, please refrain from re-posting. Thanks!

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13 from 2013 : Ryan Oakes “Shooting a Banksy in Brooklyn”

December 28, 2013 Artists

2013 brought the level of enthusiastic participatory fandom to new heights for the Street Art scene and the October New York “residency” by international man of mystery Banksy revealed both the full integration of social media with the street and the avid following that some Street Art can engage. We invited sincere New York Street Art fan Ryan Oakes to share with BSA readers one of his favorite Banksy shots and to tell us why it appeals to him.

Shooting a Banksy in Brooklyn

~ Ryan Oakes

This was my favorite piece from the Banksy month-long exhibition, but not only because I was actually able to catch it in the wild before it was defaced – a mere two hours after getting posted to Banksy’s Instagram.

I was determined to find one of the pieces during the month, and waited eagerly each day for the posts. When this one went up on his site, I seemed to recognize the area stores in background of the photo. Combining some online chatter and Google Maps Street View I was able to locate the building in Red Hook.

My wife and I happened to be home that morning, as we were expecting the birth of our first child any day that week. Realizing we would soon be losing the ability to be quite as spontaneous once the little guy arrived, we instantly jumped in the car.

It was a lovely moment for us to find the Banksy heart balloon sitting there in Red Hook…. my wife and I had gotten married just a few blocks down the street on the Red Hook waterfront.

Banksy

Red Hook, Brooklyn. 2013

“The day we find out the true identity of Banksy, you might as well pull the beard off of Santa Claus too.” Read Banksy’s Final Trick on the Huffington Post

Check out our Brooklyn Street Art 2013 Images of the Year by Jaime Rojo here.

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Please note: All content including images and text are © BrooklynStreetArt.com, unless otherwise noted. We like sharing BSA content for non-commercial purposes as long as you credit the photographer(s) and BSA, include a link to the original article URL and do not remove the photographer’s name from the .jpg file. Otherwise, please refrain from re-posting. Thanks!

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13 from 2013 : Jim Kiernan “Snowden – Eyes Are Watching”

December 26, 2013 Artists

The intersection with culture and politics and the street is not always evident in Street Art in an explicit way, but photographer Jim Kiernan will be glad to show you more than just a pretty mural or happy face if it means there is a dialogue to be had. 2013 was the year that some of the veil regarding domestic spying by our leaders fell from American eyes, and of course that theme was visited by art on the street. In his choice for image of the year Jim shares one he shot in ’13 that he values because it raises awareness, takes a position, and transcends aesthetics in the service of a larger message.

Snowden – Eyes Are Watching

~ Jim Kiernan

“Being called a traitor by Dick Cheney is the highest honor you can give an American… If they had taught a class on how to be the kind of citizen Dick Cheney worries about, I would have finished high school.” – Edward Snowden

There are a number of reasons why I like this image. The composition is straight forward and self-explanatory which is something I typically like. I enjoy simple things that appear clear on the surface.

Beyond that there are several levels to this image for me. The first and most obvious is the political message. I am personally appalled by the surveillance state which has been exposed that are we are living under and even more so by the nearly complete apathy from the American public and the lack of outrage.

Another level for me is that this piece was part of the inspiring Welling Court project that Garrison & Alison Buxton put on every year. They’re friends of mine and I love what they’ve been doing, dating back to the Ad Hoc days.

Finally, the coolest thing was seeing the beginning of this mural. The artist showed up towards the end of one of the final days to begin working on it. When I first saw this work, the pulldown was just being whitewashed/prepped for the piece. I had no idea what was going up here but when I returned the next day to see the finished piece I loved it.

A huge motivation for me & my photography is to highlight social justice issues and to shine a light on places, people, ideas and events that otherwise might go unnoticed. This pieces hits all of these marks for me.

Artist: Bamn

Location: New York City, 2013.

#13from2013

Check out our Brooklyn Street Art 2013 Images of the Year by Jaime Rojo here.

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13 from 2013 : Jessica Stewart “The Roman Nun and the Spray Can”

December 25, 2013 Artists

If anyone knows Rome’s Street Art scene, it is photographer Jessica Stewart, who has been capturing a side of the city not typically seen since 2008, publishing Street Art, urban decay and more from the Eternal City on her RomePhotoBlog.

With a love of Renaissance and Baroque art as a baseline her eye is trained to see lighting and angles like a painter, and in this heart of Roman Catholicism, she is familiar with the iconic. In 2013, Jessica says she knew the exact moment when she had captured just such an image with her camera.

The Roman Nun and the Spraycan

~Jessica Stewart

So it’s of course incredibly difficult to think of just one photo, but when it really comes down to it, this image is the one that for me was a stand out moment of 2013. It’s one of those times that as it’s happening, you are internally jumping for joy at the fact that you’re on hand to capture it.

Plus, I really think to myself “in no place but Rome could this happen.”

I think with the whole street art and graffiti movement becoming more commercialized and organized, you can almost forget some of the original joy behind what made you get involved in the first place. In this case, GraffDream, one of two graffiti shops in the city, was holding it’s 6th anniversary jam in May. Skeme was in town from NYC for the occasion and already they day was special seeing him get swarmed by young Roman kids dying for an autograph.

As is the norm here, many of the wall spaces are owned by the church and in this case, the wall used for the jam was the side of a Catholic school who agreed for the usage in exchange for a lesson in graffiti for its young students. We were getting toward the end of the day when two of the sisters came out to collect the ladders and lock up items in the school.

I’m not sure if they were just swept up in the congenial atmosphere of the day or what, but before I know it one of the sisters takes a can and starts to pretend to work on Skeme’s piece! The look on everyone’s faces was priceless and Skeme lit up like a Christmas tree at the sight of it all.

To capture that moment was priceless and I love this shot for how happy the sister looks with her spray paint. Only in Rome! You don’t know how many people have asked me, “Is this photo for real?”

Yes, it is, and it is a time like this that makes you fall in love with photographing all over again.

Artist: Skeme

Location: Rome, Italy. 2013

#13from2013

Check out our Brooklyn Street Art 2013 Images of the Year by Jaime Rojo here.

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Please note: All content including images and text are © BrooklynStreetArt.com, unless otherwise noted. We like sharing BSA content for non-commercial purposes as long as you credit the photographer(s) and BSA, include a link to the original article URL and do not remove the photographer’s name from the .jpg file. Otherwise, please refrain from re-posting. Thanks!

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Go Big or Go Home: Amsterdam’s Mick La Roc Paints Wild Style in Bushwick
January 13, 2026
New York has long acted as a magnet for graffiti and street artists from around the world—not just because of …Read More »
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 »

London Kaye (photo © Jaime Rojo)

London Kaye (photo © Jaime Rojo)

London Kaye (photo © Jaime Rojo)

London Kaye (photo © Jaime Rojo)

London Kaye (photo © Jaime Rojo)

El Sol 25 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

El Sol 25 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Not sure if this panda in a suit is part of the piece from El Sol 25, but it probably is. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

El Sol 25 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

El Sol 25 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

This weeks top image is a reprieve from the winter we’ve been enduring – a small hand cut frog clinging to a verdant fern – created by Swoon and snapped during a visit to her studio over the holidays. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

EpicUno (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Rambo (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Leadbelly33 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

LoveMe (photo © Jaime Rojo)

BAMN (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Judith Supine (photo © Jaime Rojo)

ASVP and Square (photo © Jaime Rojo)

$howta (photo © Jaime Rojo)

JerkFace (photo © Jaime Rojo)

HotTea (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Olek’s very latest piece completed on New Year’s Eve in Vancouver, Canada. (photo © Olek)

Olek. “Kiss the Future” detail. (photo © Olek)

Meres has a message for Gerry. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Meres (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Chase (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Doce Freire in Sharjah City, UAE for the Al Qasba Festival. (photo © Doce Freire)

Dceve (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Appleton Pictures (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Artist Unknown (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Ramiro Davaro-Comas (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Untitled. Manhattan, December 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Entes y Pesimo. Lima, Peru. December 2013. (photo © Entes/Pesimo)

Entes y Pesimo. Lima, Peru. December 2013. (photo © Entes/Pesimo)

Entes y Pesimo. Lima, Peru. December 2013. (photo © Entes/Pesimo)

Entes y Pesimo. Lima, Peru. December 2013. (photo © Entes/Pesimo)

Canemorto. Milano, Italy. (photo © Canemorto)

Canemorto. Milano, Italy. (photo © Canemorto)

Canemorto. Milano, Italy. (photo © Canemorto)

Tomorrow? Tomorrow is 2014.

el Seed. Paris, France 2013. (photo © Spencer Elzey)

The fact that this art – and even more so this building – was short lived made it almost a once in a lifetime moment. Usually a Street Artist goes into painting a mural with the awareness that his or her canvas is temporary and that within a few months it will be covered up.

An internationally respected photographer, artist, author, and lecturer on the subject of worldwide urban murals, his seminal 1987 book “Spraycan Art” with co-author Henry Chalfant is considered one of the the earliest published books on aerosol art, graffiti practices and street culture.

Asking Mr. Prigoff to chose just one image is like asking Paul McCartney to pick one song – the volume and depth of knowledge is hard to condense for today’s age of short-attention spans. But he’s a champ and this one is his choice for 2013.

Apexer. San Francisco, CA 2013 (photo © James Prigoff)

Dee Dee. NYC 2013. (photo © Daniel Albanese)

Ever since works by the mysterious Dee Dee began to appear around NYC, I’ve loved finding them. This piece is a prime example of their aesthetic, which often consists of contrasting images coupled with curious text.

Banksy in Red Hook, Brooklyn, NYC 2013. (photo © Ryan Oakes)

BAMN. Queens, NYC 2013 (Photo © Jim Kiernan)

If anyone knows Rome’s Street Art scene, it is photographer Jessica Stewart, who has been capturing a side of the city not typically seen since 2008, publishing Street Art, urban decay and more from the Eternal City on her RomePhotoBlog.

With a love of Renaissance and Baroque art as a baseline her eye is trained to see lighting and angles like a painter, and in this heart of Roman Catholicism, she is familiar with the iconic. In 2013, Jessica says she knew the exact moment when she had captured just such an image with her camera.

Skeme. Rome, Italy 2013. (photo © Jessica Stewart)

The Roman Nun and the Spraycan ~Jessica Stewart

Plus, I really think to myself “in no place but Rome could this happen.”

I’m not sure if they were just swept up in the congenial atmosphere of the day or what, but before I know it one of the sisters takes a can and starts to pretend to work on Skeme’s piece! The look on everyone’s faces was priceless and Skeme lit up like a Christmas tree at the sight of it all.

To capture that moment was priceless and I love this shot for how happy the sister looks with her spray paint. Only in Rome! You don’t know how many people have asked me, “Is this photo for real?”

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The Roman Nun and the Spraycan

~Jessica Stewart