All posts tagged: Tou Scene

NUART 2014 Roundup : Activism, Muralism, Graffiti and Aesthetics

NUART 2014 Roundup : Activism, Muralism, Graffiti and Aesthetics

The Norwegian mural festival named Nuart took place last week with a marked tilt toward the conceptual and the interventionist, a direct debate about the relevance of activism amidst a rising tide of sanctioned murals, and Tilt leading us down a path toward traditional graffiti.

Ironically graffiti seemed a rather tame topic for once.

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TILT. “Panic Room” Installation at TOU Scene. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Henrik Haven)

“Urban interventionism is about not only making social commentary through artistic expression, but actually intervening in a public and social space in a poetic, unexpected or provocative way,” said architect and organizer Nicola Markhus when speaking to the local Stavangernews. Markhus may have been thinking about the Portuguese artist ±Maismenos±, who constructed a miniature oil tanker platform from found objects and installed it temporarily atop a sculpture honoring canning workers in Lervig Courtyard, by way of contrasting the past with the present.

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±MaisMenos± NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Henrik Haven)

Or maybe she was thinking about the Madrid-based SpY, who painted a massive red-lettered “ERROR” on two sides of a brutal block long building in decay down by the waterside, an ironic judgment on the eyesores of unfortunate urban decay. Among the contextual social commentary as well were the oil-dripping sentiments of geologist/artist Andreco, who regaled the façade of a classic Norwegian building with his geometric interpretation of rocks found poking up from the soil, and the three dimensional mural of homeless people by Brooklyn-based Iranian brothers Icy & Sot only three blocks from an outdoor encampment of homeless travelers whom some locals call gypsies.

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SpY. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

Such is one of the traditions of Street Art: social and political commentary that some call activism because of its advocacy, or at least its stubborn acknowledgement of imperfections in the human condition. This year’s Nuart fosters the spirit and intellectual pursuit associated with academic examination and in doing so again separates itself from the growing number of Street Art festivals who implicitly or explicitly censor the choices of the invited due to commercial or political pressures. Even during the painting this year there were conversations among artists about a high profile festival underway elsewhere that had just dis-invited certain Street Artists because of their “political” work in the past.

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John Fekner. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

As if to drive the point home, New York street and multimedia artist John Fekner, who created hundreds of environmental, social, political and conceptual works consisting of stenciled words in NYC beginning in the 1970s that highlighted failed urban planning and public policy, was invited to reprise his classic text based “False Promises” stencil here. The choice of Fekner was perhaps atypical and one that could be overlooked if Nuart founder Martyn Reed didn’t decide to champion the artists work in his mini-retrospective indoors.

And need we mention that his indoor installation space for Saturday’s gallery opening was shared by Fra.Biancoshock’s instantly controversial merging of the nazi flag with the Facebook logo? Moments after we posted an early image of the installation in progress, cheers and condemnation populated our social media feeds – a happy discord that Nuart isn’t traditionally spooked by.

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Fra.Biancoshok. Installation at TOU Scene. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

“This is a representation of two different iconic movements; the Nazis and the Facebook age,” says the Milan based Fra.Biancoshock who specializes in street interventions, not Street Art, per se. “I wanted to unite the two concepts in a unique logo as a way of describing two different ways to have control of the masses in two different ages. It is a provocative representation that is meant to say, ‘Imagine if these two things had met in the same period,’ ” he explains of the illuminated wheel of instantly recognizable letter f’s popping from a four alarm red background at the temporary gallery show in “tunnels” at Tou Scene.

“Obviously the story of the Nazis is very dramatic and heavy and Facebook is only social media but for me if it is not used in the right way it could result in some serious damage; in the areas of privacy, in having control (of people). So I wanted to make this interpretation of our contemporary situation of a certain totalitarianism in our communications today.”

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DOT DOT DOT. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

Comparatively the graffiti writer on display this year is a relative lightweight! Toulous-based Tilt actually created one of the more visually compelling installations (and an instant hit) at the indoor gallery of Tou Scene entitled “Panic Bathroom”, which consists of a tiled men’s restroom evenly split between YMCA and CBGB. The untouched half is pristine and gleaming white while its brother across the line is slaughtered floor to ceiling by pugilistic color, swollen bubbles and drippy tags; all just out of reach of the velvet rope that holds guests back.

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±MaisMenos± NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

For the Norwegian born Street Artist named Strøk, Nuart this year is as much about aesthetics and the beauty of the moment as it is the intellectualizing that was on display here during the pub debate and two days of presentations for Nuart PLUS, organized by Eirik Sjåholm Knudsen. He shows us his rendering of figures casting long shadows across the wall on his glossy tablet and he talks about composition, negative space, and the serendipity of catching figures in motion.

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Strøk. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

“I like watching people running around and seeing these movements, these frozen moments when they are heading somewhere but you don’t know exactly where – like a moment when time has frozen,” he says. “It’s a snapshot and you just happened to be there.”

Fortunately for many Nuart still knows how to produce a memorable shot of art in the public sphere, and we have some here for you to enjoy.

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±MaisMenos± created Norway/No Way as a commentary about joining the European Union. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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±MaisMenos± Detail. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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±MaisMenos± Installation at TOU Scene. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

 

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TILT. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Andreco. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Andreco. Deatil. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Andreco. Detail of his installation at TOU Scene. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Henrik Haven)

 

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SPY. Installation at TOU Scene enabled you to see the “error” part of the word only when the black light revealed it. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Henrik Haven)

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Martin Whatson. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Martin Whatson. Installation at TOU Scene.  NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Henrik Haven)

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Martin Whatson completed this new mural at the airport – after being stranded on top of the cherry picker for a few hours the first day because the balance was off. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Henrik Haven)

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Strøk’s new mural on the right and a large ground installation on the left by ±MaisMenos±. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Anders Gjennestad)

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Levalet was one of many of the artists this year who made direct or indirect reference to the oil industry – the one that powers the economy in this town and much of the country. Installation at TOU Scene. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Henrik Haven)

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Levalet. Installation at TOU Scene. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

 

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Icy & Sot created this mammoth 3-D installation with wooden cut-out stencils rising above the edge of the the building. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Icy & Sot. Installation at Tou Scene. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Not an official guest this year Hama Woods was one of a number of artists who autonomously brought work to put up during NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Etam Cru. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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M-City. Installation at TOU Scene. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Henrik Haven)

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Borondo. Installation at TOU Scene. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Henrik Haven)

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Borondo. By scratching paint from the front of the glass and painting diagrams or symbols on the back, Borondo created a full illustration with shadow on the wall when illuminated correctly. Detail of the installation at TOU Scene. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Levalet’s outside installations. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Henrik Haven)

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Levalet. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Henrik Haven)

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Mathieu Tremblin created an interactive piece that guests could participate in by photographing themselves before a bluescreen wall and sending the image to him. Installation at TOU Scene. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Henrik Haven)

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Due to torrential rains Borondo couldn’t complete this wall before we left for NYC. Here is a composite image of the wall in progress. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

BSA would like to extend special thanks to photographers Butterfly and Henrik Haven for sharing their work with BSA readers.

Our sincere thanks to Nuart director Martyn Reed and the entire staff of Nuart and Nuart PLUS, including all of the volunteers and organizers.

 

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NUART 2014 Begins with “Broken Promises”

ETAM CRU AND NUART 2014 X BSA

NUART 2014 X BSA UPDATE 3

NUART 2014 X BSA UPDATE 4

NUART 2014 X BSA UPDATE 5

NUART 2014 X BSA UPDATE 6

 

 

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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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This article is also published in The Huffington Post 

 

 

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NUART 2014 x BSA Update 4 : Andreco, Icy & Sot, Martin Whatson, Tilt

NUART 2014 x BSA Update 4 : Andreco, Icy & Sot, Martin Whatson, Tilt

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Stavanger is fully in action today with Borondo, Fra.Biancoshok, Mathieu Tremblin, Evan Pricco, Henrik Haven, and others newly arriving and taking their respective places in the Nuart festival. Sophie at Nuart headquarters got BSA a bicycle yesterday and it was easy to discover that all these hills are much more easy to trek!

Creative Director Martyn Reed is eagerly unpacking classic stencils and ephemera from John Fekner to help with the rather retrospective installation he is creating of the artists’ presageous public work for the Tou Scene opening, and Leon from Dotmasters is giving a punchlist tour of work to be done by the lighting and electric crew that will give artists work in the best stage for Saturday.

Very close to finishing their rather elaborate indoor installation, Iran-via-Brooklyn brother duo Icy & Sot have begun to spray their 80 piece hand-cut stencilled piece on a wall outside now that the Kristel Tav has shown them how to use the lift, and in only two days Andreco has clearly changed the city-scape of Stavanger already with his oil-dripping rock placed primely on the ocean-facing exterior of a quintessential example of Norwegian architecture.

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Andreco at work on his wall. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

For inspiration, the geologist, artist, and researcher only had to look down and dig through the soil of the city to decide what he would paint. “I found these rocks here in the soil,” he says, “I always look at the rocks where I am and I take reference from the shape and the material.”

The masking tape has been peeled from the intersections of planes in this stylized version of a rock that reminds you of 3-D digital renderings, but the dripping oil he is planning to add will make the connection more down to earth.

With a PhD in environmental engineering, this Street Artist takes the work quite seriously and with a surprisingly light disposition considering the weighty matters he works with. “This piece of work for me is a symbol of the environment and of the earth. Basically I took inspiration from rocks that I found around here and I created a shape to mimic the shape and the architecture of the buildings here. I decided to make the color template range from blues, greens and black. These are the colors of the rocks originally and when they are covered with oil,” he says.

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Masking tape that has been peeling tor reveal sharp geometric shapes as Andreco and assistants work on his wall. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Andreco at work on his wall. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Andreco is a geologist and his new work for Nuart 2014 is influenced and inspired directly by rocks he has collected here. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Andreco at work on his wall. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Andreco at work on his wall. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Icy & Sot installation at Tou Scene in progress. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Icy & Sot installation at Tou Scene in progress. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Icy & Sot prepare to tackle their wall outdoors. They came prepared with about 80 hand-cut stencils. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Icy & Sot at work on their wall. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Sot gives us a sneak peek of their compositional sketch that will feature a collection of images of people who are homeless. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Icy & Sot. As we said, they came prepared. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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A new collaboration: Icy & Sot’s lil’ friend walks by a DOT DOT DOT stencil from a previous Nuart edition. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Martin Whatson’s installation in progress at the bottom of a steep street. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

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Team Tilt busily tiling for his installation at Tou Scene in progress. NUART 2014. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

 

Click HERE for NUART 2014 full schedule of events and details.

 

NUART 2014 Begins with “Broken Promises”

ETAM CRU AND NUART 2014 X BSA

NUART 2014 X BSA UPDATE 3

 
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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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Dan Witz at Nuart: Gets Googly With the Kids

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If you are not familiar with Street Artist Dan Witz’s work, it won’t exactly scream for your attention. Rather it will position itself as a chameleon in the metropolis; a rusted weather beaten fixture of the urban landscape, a piece of municipal signage, a barely porous dirt-caked mesh metal air vent.  9 times you’ll overlook it, or maybe 99. But the day you notice it you’ll be caught, trapped by its guile, puzzled and possibly unnerved. What’s in there? More to the point, who?

This week at Nuart Dan had the opportunity to put up his darkly tricky all-in-one pieces at strategic locations in Stavanger where they will be overlooked, then discovered.

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Dan Witz “King Baby: Tou Scene.” (photo courtesy © Dan Witz)

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Dan Witz “King Baby: Tou Scene.” (photo courtesy © Dan Witz)

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And new for this Norwegian Street Art festival this year, a workshop for kids took place on Saturday, with Mr. Witz at the head of the class, passing out eyeballs and encouraging reimagining of the urban environment as personified. The simple addition of optical orbs entertained the youthful contingent and helped Dan spread his vision of public space as a playground of ideas.

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Dan Witz  (photo courtesy © Dan Witz)

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Dan Witz  (photo courtesy © Dan Witz)

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Dan Witz  (photo coourtesy © Dan Witz)

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A New Tou Scene : Inside Installations at Nuart 2011

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Herakut, Phelgm, Tellas, Escif, Hyuro, David Choe and The Mysterious DVS1

The Tou Scene is an important art center housed in a former brewery in Stavanger that dates back to the 1850s. The complex is now a setting for a number of site-specific installations by Street Artists involved in this years Nuart festival, where vignettes and full-blown scenes are conjured and lit to take visitors elsewhere for a moment. Indoor venues like this are great for many of these artists to have the luxury of time for exploration and the further development of their concepts. With a sense of intent, the support system in place at this festival is enabling a dimension of work that cannot be realized  during the turbulence and urgency that is the nature of most Street Art.  Here are some new spatial tableaus at the Tou Scene by Herakut, Phelgm, Tellas, Escif, Hyuro, David Choe and The Mysterious DVS1.

Thank you to photographer John Rodger who captured these beautiful images exclusively for BSA readers.

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David Choe and The Mysterious DVS1 installation in their tunnel is illuminated with ultra violet light. (photo © John Rodger)

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David Choe and The Mysterious DVS1. Detail. (photo © John Rodger)

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Escif and Hyuro collaborated on this installation with words by the late French theorist, writer, filmaker and Letterist Guy Debord, 1931-1994. (photo © John Rodger)

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Escif and Hyuro. Detail. (photo © John Rodger)

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Tellas (photo © John Rodger)

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Phlegm (photo © John Rodger)

With special thanks to Ada Zielinska.


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