All posts tagged: Trek Matthews

60 Artists at a Moscow Street Art Biennale: “Artmossphere 2016”

60 Artists at a Moscow Street Art Biennale: “Artmossphere 2016”

The Moscow Manege Hosts International and Local Street Artists for a Biennale

Moscow presents a Street Artist’s exhibition, but the streets have almost none.

When Street Art and it’s associated cousins move inside the possible outcomes are many. With exhibitions like this you are seeing urban becoming very contemporary.brooklyn-street-art-sozyone-jaime-rojo-09-04-2016-web

Belgian artist SozyOne at Artmossphere Biennale 2016, Moscow. photo © Jaime Rojo

The Artmossphere Biennale jump-starts the debate for many about how to best present the work of Street Artists and organizers here in Moscow chose a broad selection of curators from across a spectrum of private, commercial, academic and civically-inspired perspectives to present a solid range of artists from the graffiti and Street Art world inside a formal hall.

To be clear, unless it is illegal and on the street, it is not graffiti nor Street Art. That is the prevailing opinion about these terms among experts and scholars of various stripes and it is one we’re comfortable with. But then there are the commercial and cultural influences of the art world and the design industries, with their power to reshape and loosen terms from their moorings. Probably because these associated art movements are happening and taking shape before our eyes and not ensconced in centuries of scholarship we can expect that we will continue to witness the morphing our language and terminologies, sometimes changing things in translation.

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A working carousel provides wildly waving optics for riders in this room by The London Police at the Artmossphere Biennale 2016, Moscow. photo © Jaime Rojo

Definitions aside, when you think of more organic Street Art scenes which are always re-generating themselves in the run-down abandoned sectors of cities like Sao Paulo, New York, Melbourne, Paris, Mexico City, London, and Berlin, it is interesting to consider that this event takes place nearly on the grounds of the Kremlin under museum like security.

An international capital that ensures cleanly buffed walls within hours of the appearance of any unapproved Street Art or graffiti, Moscow also boasts a growing contingent of art collectors who are young enough to appreciate the cultural currency of this continuously mutating hybrid of graffiti, hip hop, DIY, muralism, and art-school headiness. The night clubs and fashionable kids here are fans of events like hip-hop and graffiti jams, sometimes presented as theater and other times as “learning workshops” and the like.

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Madrid-based Paris born artist Remed at the Artmossphere Biennale 2016, Moscow. photo © Jaime Rojo

Plugging into this idea of street and youth culture is not a singular fascination – there is perhaps an association with the rebellious anti-authoritarian nature of unregulated art in the streets that fuels the interest of many. With graffiti and hip-hop culture adoption as a template, newer expressions of Street Art culture are attractive as well with high profile artists with rebel reputations are as familiar in name here as in many cities. New festivals and events sometimes leverage this renegade free-spirit currency for selling tourism and brands and real estate, but here there also appears to be an acute appreciation for its fine art expression – urban contemporary art.


MOSCOW’S MANEGE AND “DEGENERATE ART”

So ardent is the support for Artmossphere here that a combination of public and private endorsements and financial backing have brought it to be showcased in a place associated with high-culture and counter-culture known as the Moscow Manege (Мане́ж). The location somehow fits the rebellious spirit that launched these artists even if its appearance wouldn’t lead you to think that.

The 19th century neo-classical exhibition hall stands grandly adjacent to Red Square and was built as an indoor riding school large enough to house a battalion of 2,000 soldiers during the 1800s. It later became host to many art exhibitions in the 20th century including a famous avant-garde show in 1962 that Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev famously derided as displaying ‘degenerate’ art.

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Polish painter Sepe says his wall speaks to those who would pull the strings behind the scenes. He finished it within three days at the Artmossphere Biennale 2016, Moscow. photo © Jaime Rojo

One of the artists whose work was criticized, painter and sculptor Ernst Neizvestny, challenged the label defiantly and won accolades afterward during his five decade career that followed, including receiving many awards and his work being collected worldwide by museums. Russian President Vladimir Putin is quoted as calling him “a recognised master and one of the best contemporary sculptors”. In January of this year at the age of 90, Neizvestny’s return to Menage featured an extensive exhibition. He passed away August 9th (The Moscow Times), only weeks before Artmossphere opened.

In some kindred spirit many of these artists at Artmossphere have done actual illegal work on the streets around the world during their respective creative evolutions, and graffiti and Street Art as a practice have both at various times been demonized, derided, dismissed and labeled by critics in terms synonymous with “degenerate”.


A CLEAN CITY

“Moscow is mostly very clean,” says Artmossphere co-founder and Creative Director Sabine Chagina, who walks with guests during a sunny afternoon in a busy downtown area just after the opening. “But we do have some good graffiti crews,” she says as we round the corner from the famous Bolshoi Theater and soon pass Givenchy and Chanel and high-end luxury fashion stores. Shortly we see a mural nearby by French artist Nelio, who painted a lateral abstracted geometric, possibly cubist, piece on the side of a building here in 2013 as part of the LGZ Festival.

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Barcelona based Miss Van had one of her paintings translated into a woven wool rug with artisans in Siberia. Here is a detail at the Artmossphere Biennale 2016, Moscow. photo © Jaime Rojo.

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Miss Van at the Artmossphere Biennale 2016, Moscow. photo © Jaime Rojo

If there was graffiti here in Moscow, it was not on full display very readily in this part of town. In driving tours, rides on the extensive metro train system, and in street hikes across the city a visitor may find that much of the illegal street art and graffiti common to other global capitals is illusive due to a general distaste for it and a dedicated adherence to buffing it out quickly.

For a pedestrian tourist Moscow appears in many ways as fully contemporary and architecturally rich as any international world-class metropolis. One of the cleanest places you’ll visit, the metro is almost museum-like in some instances; the historic districts spotless, public fountains, famed statues of important historical figures. All is efficiently ordered and – a welcome surprise – most public space is free of advertisements interrupting your view and your thoughts.

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Chile-born, Berlin-based artist and sculptor Pablo Benzo curated by The Art Union at the Artmossphere Biennale 2016, Moscow. photo © Jaime Rojo

Come to think of it, the sense of commercial-celebrity media saturation that is present in other cities doesn’t appear to permeate the artists psyche here at the Biennale – so there’s not much of the ironic Disney-Marilyn-supermodel-Kardashian-skewering of consumerism and shallowness in this exhibition that you may find in other Urban Art events.

Also, unlike a Street Art-splattered show in London for example that may rudely mock Queen Elizabeth or art in New York streets that present Donald Trump styled as a pile of poo and Hillary Clinton as Heath Ledger’s Joker, we didn’t see over-the-top Putin satires either. So personality politics don’t seem directly addressed in this milieu. According to some residents there was an outcropping of huge festival murals by Street Artists here just a few years ago but more recently they have been painted over with patriotic or other inspiring murals, while others have been claimed for commercial interests.

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Brazilian Claudio Ethos at Artmossphere 2016. photo © Jaime Rojo


A REAL LIVE MURAL FROM L’ATLAS

Starved for some gritty street scenes, it is all the more interesting to see the one live mural painting that we were able to catch – a 6-story red-lined op-art tag by the French graffiti writer L’Atlas. Far from Manege, placed opposite a cineplex in what appears to be a shopping mall situated far from the city’s historical and modern centers, our guide tells us half-jokingly that he is not sure that we are still in Moscow.

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L’Atlas on a Moscow wall for Artmossphere 2016. photo © Jaime Rojo

Here L’Atlas says that he has painted his bar-code-like and cryptic nom-de-plume with an assistant on a cherry picker for a few days and he says that no one has stopped to ask him about it, neither to comment or criticize. Actually one man early one morning returning home from a disco did engage him briefly, but it was difficult to tell what he was talking about as he may have had a few drinks.

This lack of public commentary is mainly notable because in other cities the comments from passersby can be so ubiquitous that artists deliberately wear stereo headphones to prevent interruption and to be more productive. Sometimes the headphones are not actually playing music.

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The inside installation by L’Atlas for Artmossphere features multiple abstract iterations of his tag in day glo. photo © Jaime Rojo


WALKING THROUGH THE OPENING

This Street Art Biennale nonetheless is gaining a higher profile among Urban Art collectors and its associated art dealers and the opening and later auction reaches directly to this audience. Included this year with the primary “Invisible Walls” exhibition are satellite events in association with local RuArts Gallery, Tsekh Belogo at Winzavod, and the Optika Pavilion (No. 64) at VDNKh.

The opening night event itself is wide and welcoming, a mostly youthful and populist affair with celebratory speeches and loosely organized group photos and an open bar. Added together with a press conference, a live DJ, virtual reality headsets, interactive artworks, major private business sponsors, government grants, ministers of culture, gallerists, and quirkily fashionable art fans, this is a polished presentation of a global culture that is filtered through the wide lense of the street.

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Wes21 from Switzerland is a graffiti artist blending reality and fantasy in this lunar-like landscape for Artmossphere features multiple abstract iterations of his tag in day glo. photo © Jaime Rojo

Perhaps because the exhibition hall is a cavernous rectangle with exposed beams on the ceiling and many of the constructed white walls that mimic vendor booths, it has the air of an art fair. There are thankfully no salespeople pacing back and forth watching your level of interest. People tend to cluster before installations and talk, laugh, share a story, pose for a selfie.


INVISIBLE WALLS

Similar in theme to the multidisciplinary exhibit about borders and boundaries curated by Raphael Schacter this spring in St. Petersburg at the Street Art Museum, Artmossphere asked artists to think about and address the “invisible walls” in contemporary life and societies.

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Domo Collective present “Fair Play III” an enormous world map functioning ping pong table with a triple razor wire fence right down the middle. “We play an unhealthy game in which nobody believed to be responsible.” At Artmossphere 2016 in Moscow. Photo ©Jaime Rojo

The theme seems very appropriately topical as geopolitical, trade-related, social, digital, and actual walls appear to be falling down rapidly today while the foundations of new ones are taking shape. Catalyzed perhaps by the concept and practices of so-called “globalization” – with its easy flow of capital and restricted flow of humans, we are all examining the walls that are shaping our lives.

With 60+ international artists working simultaneously throughout this massive hall, newly built walls are the imperative for displaying art, supporting it, dividing it. These are the visible ones. With so many players and countries represented here, one can only imagine that there are a number of invisible walls present as well.

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Domo Collective at Artmossphere 2016 in Moscow. Photo ©Jaime Rojo

The theme has opened countless interpretations in flat and sculptural ways, often expressed in the vernacular of fine art with arguable nods to mid-20th century modernists, folk art, fantasy, representational art, abstract, conceptual, computer/digital art, and good old traditional graffiti tagging. Effectively it appears that when Street Art and graffiti artists pass the precipice into a multi-disciplinary exhibition such as this, one can reframe Urban/Street as important tributaries to contemporary art – but will they re-direct the flow or be subsumed within it?

The work often can be so far removed from street practice that you don’t recognize it as related.

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Vitaly Sy created a visualization of “Fear” as the main causes of internal barriers. The pieces are built around a central axis with elements at right angle to one another, and the man’s head on a swivel. Artmossphere 2016 in Moscow. Photo ©Jaime Rojo

Aside from putting work up in contested public space without permission and under cover, an average visitor may not see a common thread. These works run aesthetic to the conceptual, painterly to the sculptural, pure joy and pure politics. But then, that is we began to see in the streets as well when the century turned to the 21st and art students in large numbers in cities like New York and London and Berlin skipped the gatekeepers, taking their art directly to the public.

Perhaps beneath the surface or just above it, there is a certain anarchistic defiance, a critique of social, economic, political issues, a healthy skepticism toward everyone and everything that reeks of hypocritical patriarchal power structures. Perhaps we’re just projecting.

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Moscow Manege exterior opening night of Artmossphere 2016 in Moscow. Photo courtesy of and © Artmossphere

Looking over the 60+ list of names, it may be striking to some that very few are people of color, especially in view of the origins of the graffiti scene. Similarly, the percentage of women represented is quite small. We are familiar with this observation about Urban Art in general today, and this show mirrors the European and American scene primarily, with notable exceptions such as Instagrafite’s home-based Brazilian crew of 4 artists. As only one such sampling of a wide and dispersed scene, it is not perhaps fair to judge it by artists race, gender, or background, but while we speak of invisible walls it is worth keeping our eyes on as this “scene” is adopted into galleries, museums, and private collections.

Following are some of the artists on view at Artmossphere:

ASKE

Certainly Moscow native ASKE is gently mocking our mutated modern practices of communicating with his outsized blocked abstraction of a close couple riveted to their respective electronic devices, even unaware of one another.

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Moscow Street Artist ASKE at Artmossphere 2016. photo © Jaime Rojo

NeSpoon

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“Precariat” by Polish Street Artist NeSpoon at Artmossphere 2016 with Urban Nation photo © Jaime Rojo

Warsaw based NeSpoon creates a sculpture of another couple. Heroically presenting her vision of what she calls the iconic “Graffiti Writer” and “Street Art Girl”, they face the future with art instruments in hand ready to make their respective marks. She says her work is emblematic of a permanent financial insecurity for a generation she calls the “PRECARIAT”.

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“Precariat” by Polish Street Artist NeSpoon at Artmossphere 2016 with Urban Nation photo © Jaime Rojo

“ ‘Precariat’ is the name of the new emerging social class,” says curator, organizer, and NeSpoon’s partner Marcin Rutkiewicz when talking about the piece during the press conference. “These are young people living without a predictable future, without good jobs, without social security. It’s a class in the making and probably these people don’t have any consciousness or global unity of interest. But they are the engines of protest for people all over the world – like Occupy Wall Street, Gezi Park in Turkey, or the Arab Spring.”

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“Precariat” by Polish Street Artist NeSpoon at Artmossphere 2016 with Urban Nation photo © Jaime Rojo

The artist developed the sculpture specifically for this exhibition and planned it over the course of a year or so. Born of a social movement in Poland by the same name, the sculpture and its sticker campaign on the street represent “a kind of protest against building walls between people who are under the same economical and social situation all over the world,” says Rutkiewicz.

 

LI-HILL

Artist Li-Hill says his piece “Guns, Germs, and Steel” directly relates to the divisions between civilizations due to a completely uneven playing field perpetuated through generations. Inspired by the 1997 trans-disciplinary non-fiction book by Jared Diamond, Li-Hill says the Russian sculptural group called “The Horse Tamers” represents mankind’s “ability to harness power of the natural world and to be able to manipulate it for its advantage.”

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“Guns, Germs, and Steel” by Li-Hill at Artmossphere 2016 with Urban Nation photo © Jaime Rojo

“The horse is one of the largest signifiers and is a catalyst for advancement in society because it has been for military use, for agriculture, for transportation,” he says. “It was the most versatile of the animals and the most powerful.” Here he painted a mirror image, balanced over a potential microbial disaster symbol, and he and the team are building a mirrored floor to “give it this kind of infinite emblem status.”

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The artist Li-Hill inside his piece at Artmossphere 2016. photo © Jaime Rojo

M-CITY

Afloat in the middle of some of these walled areas M-City from Poland is choosing to be more direct thematically in his three dimensional installation of plywood, plaster, aerosol and bucket paint, and machine blown insulation.

“It is an anti-war piece,” he says, and he speaks about the walls between nations and a losing battle of dominance that ensures everyone will be victim.”

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The artist M-City at Artmossphere 2016. photo © Jaime Rojo

“It’s kind of a monster who destroys arms,” he says of this temporary sculpture with a lording figure crushing tanks below.

“He is destroying the tanks but at the same time he is also a destroyer – so it’s a big circle. Nothing is positive that can come out of this. There is always someone bigger.” He says the piece is inspired by the political situations in Europe today and the world at large.

HOTTEA

Minneapolis based HOTTEA usually does very colorful yarn installations transforming a huge public space, but for Artmossphere he is taking the conceptual route. The walk-in room based on the Whack-A-Mole game presents holes which a visitor can walk under and rise above.

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The artist Hot Tea at Artmossphere 2016. photo © Jaime Rojo

Visitors/participants will experience the physical separation of space, and perhaps contemplate facing one another and interacting or ignoring one another. It is something he says he hopes will draw attention to how many walls we have allowed ourselves to distract from human interactions.

 

SICK BOY

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Climb over a wall to slide into Sick Boy’s “The Rewards System”. photo © Jaime Rojo

Englands’ Sick Boy calls his project The Rewards System, where guests are invited to climb a ladder over a brick wall and descend down a slide into a darkened house, setting off a series of sensors that activate a variety of multisensory lights and tantalizing patterns. After landing and being rewarded the visitor is forced to exit on hands and knees through a too-small square door.

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A young visitor exits Sick Boy’s “The Rewards System”. photo © Jaime Rojo

“The concept of the show is about invisible walls so I was thinking about there being barriers in your life and I thought about the reward of endorphins one experiences for achieving a task – a small amount of endorphins. So I thought I would build a house that signifies the reward system,” he explains.

DEREK BRUNO

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Temporary installations : Slab Fence PO-2. Derek Bruno. photo © Jaime Rojo

Atlanta/Seattle based Derek Bruno reached back to the Leonid Brezhnev years and into Moscow’s Gorky Park for his series of site specific installations based on Soviet Cement Fence type PO-2. The iconic fence was re-created in a nearby studio and Bruno shot photographs of his 10-15 minute “interventions” in the park itself, revisiting a field of design called “technical aesthetics.”

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A photo on display for his installation from Derek Bruno “MOSCOW PO2 Escalator” for Artmossphere. Photo ©Derek Bruno

In a statement Bruno explains “Since the end of the Soviet Union, the iconic fence has become a persistent and ever present reminder of former delineations of space; while new forms of boundaries shape the digital and sociopolitical landscapes. “

REMI ROUGH

Remi Rough is known for his smartly soaring abstract geometry in painted murals and smaller scale works, and for Moscow he wanted to strip it back to the basics, approaching a white box with one undulating graphic composition.

“My idea was that Moscow’s a bit ‘over the top’,” he says, and he decided to strip back the audacity and go for simplicity, which actually takes courage.

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Remi Rough, “Fold”. photo © Jaime Rojo

“I said ‘you know what?’ – I want to do something with the cheapest materials you can possibly get. These two pieces literally cost 3000 rubles ($50). It’s made of felt, it’s like a lambs wool. I think they use it for flooring for construction.” Depending on the angle, the pink blotted material may translate as a swath of otherworldly terrain or a metaphorical bold vision with all the hot air let out.

“I wanted to do something peaceful and calming and use natural materials – something that’s different from what I usually do – but I use the folds in the fabric and the pink color – two things that I usually use a lot.”

ALEXEY LUKA

Moscow’s Alexey Luka is also challenging himself to stretch creatively by taking his wall collage installations of found wood and converting them into free-standing sculptures.

“For this biennale I tried to make something different so now I am going from the assemblages to 3-D.” The constructed media is warm and ordered, reserved but not without whimsy.

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Alexey Luka at Artmossphere Biennale 2016 photo © Jaime Rojo

“My work is made from found wood – I use it with what I found on the street and my shapes and my graphics – so it’s kind of an experiment with three dimensions,” and he confirms that most of this wood is sourced here in Moscow.

We ask him about the number of eyes that peer out from his installation. Perhaps these eyes are those of Muscovites? “They are just like observers,” he says.

MIMMO RUBINO AKA RUB KANDY

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Mimmo aka Rub Kandy at Artmossphere 2016. photo © Jaime Rojo

Torino’s Mimmo recreated the Moscow Olympic Village from the 1980 games in miniature presented as on a plainly brutalist platform. The sculpture is austere in detail on the hulking towers save for the tiny graffiti tags, throwies, rollers, extinguisher tags, and the like at the bases and on the roofs.

Curator Christian Omodeo tells us that Mimmo recreated the massive village based on his direct study of the site as it stands today; a housing project that has hundreds of families — and a hip-hop / graffiti scene as well.

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Mimmo aka Rub Kandy at Artmossphere 2016. photo © Jaime Rojo

It is striking that the scale reduces the impact of the graffiti – yet when experienced at eye-level it retains a potency. Even so, by recasting the relationship between viewer and mark-making, this graffiti actually seems “cute” because of its relative size to the viewer.

BRAD DOWNEY

Brad Downey and Alexander Petrelli hi-jacked the opening of the Biennale by circulating within the exhibit as a gallery with artworks for sale. With Downey performing as a street-huckster pushing his own art products, Mr. Patrelli showcased new Downey photo collages and drawings inside his mobile “Overcoat Gallery”

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Alexander Petrelli exhibits work by Brad Downey at Artmossphere 2016. photo © Jaime Rojo

A charming Moscow art star / gallerist / performance artist, Mr. Patrelli is also a perennial character at openings and events in the city, by one account having appeared at 460 or so events since 1992 with his flashing overcoat. The artworks also feature Patrelli, completing a self-referential meta cycle that continued to circle the guests at the exhibition.

International artists participating in the Artmossphere Biennale 2016 include: Akacorleone, Alex Senna, Brad Downey, Chu (Doma), Orilo (Doma), Claudio Ethos, Demsky, Christopher Derek Bruno, Filippo Minelli, Finok, Galo, Gola Hundun, Hot Tea, Jaz, Jessie and Katey, Johannes Mundinger, L’Atlas, LiHill, LX One, M-city, TC, Mario Mankey, Martha Cooper, Miss Van, Nespoon, Millo, Pablo Benzo, Pastel, Paulo Ito, Proembrion, Remed, Remi Rough, Rub Kandy, Run, Sepe, Sickboy, Smash 137, Sozyone Gonsales, SpY, The London Police, Trek Matthews, Wes 21.


This article is a result of a Brooklyn Street Art partnership with Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art in Berlin and was originally published at Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art


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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Images of The Week 08.18.13

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This week in Atlanta we’ve had a blast meeting the artists and organizers and capturing the new works for you to see here. We’ve published many of the walls in the last few days so here are some that we have not, including works by 3TTman, JR, Pastel, Elian, Gyun Hur, Joshua Ray Stephens, Nanook, Trek Matthews

Top image is by 3ttman (photo © Jaime Rojo).

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3ttman. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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JR (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Pastel (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Pastel (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Elian (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Gyun Hur (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Gyun Hur (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Joshua Ray Stephens (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Nanook (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Trek Matthews (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Trek Matthews (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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Living Walls 2013 ALIVE in Atlanta

The artists are having breakfast at the Goat Farm, and Georgie is yelping in his cage. The year old beagle wants to get out and jump on everybody’s lap and help clean off their plates with his pink tongue and but for right now Emily is looking at the weather channel on her laptop and transfixed by the forecasted rain that could hit tonight’s block party in Edgewood and Know Hope is debating a second helping of scrambled eggs. Somebody plows through the screened door with fresh copies of the local arts newspaper that features JR on the front and the Living Walls 2013 official map inside, and assorted bearded bros are pawing through their iPhones to answer emails and catch Instagram shots of the walls that have gone up so far here in Atlanta.

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Mr. Chicken feeling it at The Goat Farm. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The Goat Farm is the central meeting spot for the 20 or so artists in this, the 4th Living Walls festival, and you are free to wander the grounds of this 19th-century complex of industrial buildings that made cotton machinery and munitions during two of its previous iterations. Now it has a few hundred artists studios, performance spaces, and cool little places to hang out and talk about the new walls by artists like 2501, Inti, Agostino Iacurci, and many others in neighborhoods like Summer Hill and Edgewood. Naturally, you can also hang out with the goats in their penned off area or be entertained by the personality-plus chickens that walk freely around the sprawling grounds.

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Axel Void. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Inti. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Inti. Detail. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

 

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Last night was the kick off Movie Night party at Callenwolde Arts Center and BSA gave the room of 200+ guests an entertaining tour of about 15 Street Art videos from around the world called “Street Art in Motion”. After giving a bit of history about BSA and our involvement with the arts in general and Street Art in particular we introduced three categories that we think represent Street Art in video right now – “Explorers, Experimenters, and Anti-heroes”. Drawn from the archives of BSA Film Friday we looked at works from a group in Tel Aviv, Vhils in Brazil, Vexta in India, Conor Harrington in Norway, Creepy in the Australian outback, MOMO in Jamaica, Various and Gould in Instanbul, and Jay Shells in Brooklyn, among others.

It was great to invite special guest RJ Rushmore from Vandalog introduce a video from Evan Roth and we ended the hour and half presentation with the most popular video of the year so far, “Infinite” featuring Sofles slaying wall after wall in a mammoth abandoned building – a perfect combining of stop action editing and low-tech special effects that pulls together all three of our themes of exploration, experimentation, and a bit of the badass anti-hero stance. By the time the drums and bass stopped pounding on the speakers we were ready for a visit to the bar and some excited talking about music, spraycans, and the city’s longest continually operating strip club, the Clermont Lounge.

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3TTMAN at work on his wall. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Living Walls 2013 typifies the rolling feast of Street Artists, neighborhood and volunteering that can put together like-minded creators and fans in a harmonious collaborative way. With so many energetic and organized volunteers, its just a good vibe, and the work on the walls reflect a quality and a developed sense of concept that sets up Living Walls Atlanta as a standard of sorts that you may want to study. Even when your car battery goes dead and you need to find a new one to continue touring, its great to see that there is a genuine sense of that thing called southern hospitality here in the city, and we have already met some great neighbors on the street who are happy with the artists and the walls, some even honking and giving the “thumbs up” from their passing cars.

Here’s our first group from Living Walls Atlanta this year. Hope you dig.

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Alex’s car having an emergency boost to send us on our way. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Freddy Sam at work on his wall. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Agostino Iacurci. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Know Hope. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Gyun Hur at work at her first wall ever with her assistant Yoon.  Yoon, as it turns out, is a huge fan of Judith Supine. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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JR. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Elian with Howdy Neighbor. 3TTMAN wall in progress on the left. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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2501. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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2501. Detail. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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JAZ. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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JAZ. Detail. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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JAZ. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Brandon English of the media team setting up a shot. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Matt Haffner and Laura Bell. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Pastel at work on his wall. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Nanook at work on his wall. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Trek Matthews at work on his wall. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Know Hope and 2501 working on their collaboration on a sculptural installation for Saturday’s Main Event Exhibition at The Goat Farm . Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (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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Roofing It in Brooklyn : A Summer Tradition on Top of the City

Your cousin Harvey is a “Roofing Technologist”, which he told you with spicy sausage and beer breath at the family BBQ on Memorial Day. He says it means that he has attained proficiency in roofing technology, including roof system types, roof system design and basic installation.  Also, he periodically patches holes with black boiling tar.

As the sun begins to smite the bejesus out of your average Street Artist who is looking for spots in dirty old Brooklyn, you will also find that a number of the barbeque-ists of this species can become what we like to call “roof cosmetologists”. This means that they apply learned and impromptu methods of paintology to the plain or ugly sections of industrial grade roofs, veritably transforming their appearance aestheticallistically. Armed with lawn chairs, cans, and a 40 oz. (and possibly a grill if somebody wants to carry it), these Street Artists clammer up skinny metal ladders to play some tunes, get some sun, and have their version of a picnic in the park.

Yeah, you wish there was a tree up here. Icy & Sot (photo © Jaime Rojo)

We’ve waxed about summertime roofs before when we published A Roof With a View : Looking at Art Up Above, so this is sort of your Roof Update: Summer 2013.  It’s true, lately rooftop parties in Brooklyn have become as ubiquitous as Olive Gardens and Applebees in strip malls and the stimulating conversations there are probably just as likely. But you won’t need a cute outfit at this cookout. Wait, well, why not, as long as your coming, and grab some Slim Jims.

But for summer funnification nothing beats the swarthy sweaty delirium of being baked alive on a chrome coated roof with no shade in the brutal sun and humidity and wielding a pile of cans of eye popping colors across the bricks – with clouds of aerosol wafting by in a fine mist and sticking to your sunglasses. That’s the ticket, bro/sis.

Recently we found this smorgasbord of new stuff on some rooftops and aesthetically, stylistically, these new pieces are strutting a pared-down new simplified look. Instead of the sweeping extravagant pieces of traditional graffiti, with many handstyles and spray tricks competing for star position, many of these are one-off soliloquies or two person collabos with a story behind them. Not that we know what the stories are – guess it’s part of the “inside baseball” side of this scene to leave you guessing. But we’ll probably all agree that some of these bricks and beams and exhaust vents have never looked so slammified, even if no one but your cousin Harvey gets to see them.

Solus (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Solus (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Vexta (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Trek Matthews (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Ian Ross (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Ian Ross. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Never (top) ZZ (bottom) (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Creepy (photo © Jaime Rojo)

MCity (photo © Jaime Rojo)

MCity. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Icy & Sot (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Icy & Sot (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Yok . ND’A (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mata Ruda . ND’A (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Royce Bannon . SeeOne (photo © Jaime Rojo)

LNY (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Feral . GATS (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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Bushwick Is Hot Now. Hurry!

Bushwick Open Studios is Paved With Street Art

Brooklyn’s already percolating artists neighborhood called Bushwick continues to thrive despite the circling of real estate agents, lifestyle brands and celebrity chefs. Born in the mid-late 2000s as it’s older sister Williamsburg to the West began to professionalize, this noisily industrial and dirty artists haven got a reprieve from gentrifying forces when the deep recession slowed the rise of rents for artist spaces, which remained still relatively cheap by Manhattan’s standards. Today the area boasts a diverse influx of artists, students, cultural workers, and entrepreneurs who are experimenting and collaborating on projects and shows.

Spagnola (photo © Jaime Rojo)

That radical economic downturn probably also nurtured the nascent Street Art scene here, which was one of the early outliers of a cultural influx as artists and explorers began to skateboard to the local delis and stare at laptops for hours in the one or two cafes that offered  Wi-Fi. Outcroppings of this new art movement combined with old-school graffiti to pop up on selected concrete and corrugated walls, signposts, and deteriorated blocks where the authorities were disinterested and the neighbors only partially curious in their activities.

It’s an age-old New York story by now; a neglected or winding down post industrial neighborhood reacts to the incoming and odd-looking artists with a sort of bemused affection, happy that at least the block is getting some attention for a change. Puzzlement eventually leads to familiarity and then buying you a sandwich – and then asking you to paint a mural inside his foyer. While national and international Street Artists were already making Bushwick a stopping point thanks to some of the earliest galleries like Ad Hoc and Factory Fresh, the scene recently got newly shot in the arm by a local resident who is facilitating much desired legal wall space to a crowd of artists who otherwise would be hunting and hitting up less-than-legal spots.  Not to worry, there are plenty of aerosol renegades and ruffians scaling walls at night too; this is New York after all, yo.

Zimad (photo © Jaime Rojo)

But for now the Bushwick Collective, as it is newly christened by wall-man Joe Ficalora, has infused an adrenaline rush of creativity inside and outside the area that is roughly bordered by Flushing Avenue, Starr Street, Knickerbocker Avenue and Cypress Avenue.  The Collective has guidelines on content (nudity, politics, profanity) so the works are not completely unfettered in the true spirit of Street Art/graffiti, but most artists are happy for the luxury of time to complete their work and not look over their shoulder. With a selection of murals that are densely gathered and easy to walk through, the new collection has attracted attention from media folks (and tour guides) on the main island brave enough to venture into the gritty wilds of Brooklyn for a Street Art safari.

As Bushwick hosts its 7th annual open studios cultural event this weekend, intrepid pedestrians who march through opening parties, rooftop DJ jams, dance performances, live bands, transcendent costumery, sidewalk barbecues, open fire hydrants and more than 600 open artist studios will also be buffeted by a visual feast on the streets themselves. As long as the L Train is running (fingers crossed) you can just get off at the Morgan stop. From there it should be pretty easy for any curious art-in-the-street fan to be regaled with big and small works of graffiti, Street Art, tags, wheat-pastes, stencils, rollers, murals, and ad hoc installations all day and night.

Trek Matthews (photo © Jaime Rojo)

A shout out to Arts In Bushwick, an all volunteer organization that has steadily grown and fostered an open sense of community inclusiveness each year for Bushwick Open Studios and to the many volunteers who have contributed greatly to the success of many of the cultural workers here.  Without an open studios event many of these shy and quirky artists and performers would simply have stayed unknown and unknowable.

So far Bushwick still has the unbridled imperfect D.I.Y. enthusiasm of an experiment where anything can happen, but grey ladies with kooky bright colored spectacles have already begun to flip it over to inspect it with one hand while pinching their nose with the other, so savor this authentic moment.  Ethereal by nature, you know the Street Art scene is never guaranteed to you tomorrow – neither is the mythical artists bohemian hamlet of New York’s yesteryear.  For now we’re hopping on our bikes to catch a golden age of Bushwick before it’s repackaged and sold back to us at a price we can’t afford.

The first series of images are walls from the Bushwick Collective, followed by a series of walls that you may also see in the neighborhood.

MOMO (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Solus (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Alice Pasquini (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Toofly and Col Wallnuts (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Stik (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Billy Mode and Chris Stain (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Nard (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Overunder and LNY (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Pixel Pancho (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Brett Flanigan and Cannon Dill (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Gats (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Sheryo and The Yok (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Here are a series of walls not related to Bushwick Collective.

ECB (photo © Jaime Rojo)

A portion of a wall by the 907 Crew, Sadue. Don Pablo Pedro, Smells, Cash4, and Keely (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Phetus (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Rubin (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Peeta (photo © Jaime Rojo)

BR1 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Apolo Torres (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Chris, Veng, RWK and ECB (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Cruz (photo © Jaime Rojo)

KUMA (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Free Humanity (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Keely and Deeker (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Icy & Sot (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Kremen (photo © Jaime Rojo)

For a full list of activities, studios, schedules and directions for Bushwick Open Studios 2013 click 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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Images of the Week: 04.07.13

DUDE! We’re on Instagram! http://instagram.com/bkstreetart#.  @BKStreetArt E’rbody Holla! and Follow! Now we can stop this whole wack blog thing, right?

Here’s our weekly interview of the street, this week featuring Billy Kid, Don John, Iced Coffee, ND’A, NYCe, Poster Boy (or some variant), RONE, Trek Matthews, and some slight alterations Al Pacino, Helen Mirren, and Tom Cruise.

Top image > Don John on a Brooklyn door (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Atlanta based Trek Matthews did a new mural on a wall at Bushwick Collective, formerly known as Buschwick Five Points.  (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Iced Coffee (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Billi Kid (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Tom Cruise sporting some 90s facial hair and an even tan, despite the post apocalypse. We’ll credit Poster Boy, or his minions. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Helen Mirren is red-eyed and sad while Al Pacino has just dropped some acid of some sort. Poster Boy. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Rone (photo © Jaime Rojo)

ND’A (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Don John’s show “Darwin’s Finches” is currently on view at Kunsthalle Gallery in DUMBO. Click here for more details. (photo © Don John)

Don John and Faust in Copenhagen. (photo © Don John)

But you’re going to need SOMETHING to wash them down with. Martha Raoli (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Gilf! suggests Liberty Kool-Aid (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Artist Unknown (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Artist Unknown (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Artist Unknown (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Untitled. Manhattan Bridge. Dumbo, Brooklyn. March 2013 (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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Best Miami Street Art: BSA Picks Awesomest for Basel ’12

BSA Recommends: Where to Hit for the Best Street Art

Art Basel is set to whip Miami into a sea-foamy art-star laden froth this weekend, but art on the street is the unofficial engine that will be keeping it real. No one can doubt that the wave of Street Art, this first global grassroots peoples art movement, is sort of everywhere now, haters be damned.

The ugly streets of the Wynwood District easily get as much traffic as the big commercial art fairs even though there is no guest list or ticket price. It feels remarkably different to see the marbled horde exploring art in the public realm, posing for photos with each other in front of pieces, talking with the artists as they paint, sharing their favorite discoveries on Instagram.  This is the art of this moment, and there is just something more democratic about it all.

Our list, in no particular order, doesn’t even include the main fair actually. Hit the streets!

1. Wynwood Walls
2. Fountain Art Fair
3. The Factory Art Show
4. Scope Fair
5. Pulse
6. Miami Project Art Fair
7. Context
8. Primary Projects
9. BLADE at Adjust Gallery
10. A Box Truck Caravan from Klughaus
11. Snyder “Urban Pop Up Gallery”

We have sifted through the offerings in Miami for 2012, and made some selections to help you see Street Art inside and outside, by brand new artists and some with 40 years in the game.  Take your camera, take your sneakers, and take your love of the creative spirit.

Wynwood Walls

Arguably one of the main reasons that Street Artists began pouring into Miami in the late 2000s, Wynwood Walls opened the streets to the gallery world and increasingly galleries are opening doors to these artists from street. Wynwood Walls founder Tony Goldman would have wanted it that way and is credited by many artists as the first guy to give their art a chance to be seen.

WW doesn’t stop this year even as the recently departed real estate developer will be on many minds, not the least because of the huge wall installation by Shepard Fairey honoring him as a benefactor of the arts.

A well mixed list of internationally known and emerging names are featured on a slightly shorter list this year including: How & Nosm, MOMO, DAZE, Shepard Fairey, Jesse Geller (Nemel, IRAK), Faith47, Daleast, Santiago Rubino, POSE and Kenny Scharf. The out door walls are complemented with an indoor exhibition featuring new works on canvas by AIKO, Logan Hicks, How & Nosm and Futura.

How & Nosm. Wynwood Walls 2011. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

For more information about wall locations and all the artists click here.

Fountain Art Fair

A loosely spun ball of misfits and future art stars, Fountain Art Fair always flies just under the radar of it’s more tony neighbors with its somewhat haphazard staging and the kind of unpretentious collaborative punk flophouse environment that gives rise to many Street Artists on the scene today. If you don’t need your art spoon-fed, you’ll find a link to the future here in the motley D.I.Y. parade. Also, a few really strong talents. As usual Fountain is making certain to spill outside the white box, onto the streets and onto the walls. This year line up of Street Artists painting the Fountain Wall include:

Rone, Australia | LNY, New Jersey | PLF, Atlanta | Trek Matthews, Atlanta | Jaz, Argentina | Elian, Argentina | Ever, Argentina | Dal East, China | Faith 47, South Africa | Molly Rose Freeman, Tennessee | Dustin Spagnola, North Carolina | Pixel Pancho, Italy | Never 2501, Italy | Sam Parker, Atlanta | GILF!, NYC | EnMasse, Canada | Lauren Napolitano, Oakland CA | Joe Iurato, NJ | Anne Preece, LA | Nobody, NYC | Pastel, Argentina | Hec One Love, Miami.

RONE. Wynwood Arts District, Miami 2011 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

For more information and schedule of events for Fountain Art Fair click here.

The Factory Art Show

A little more on the commercial tip, Juxtapoz Magazine and its minion are leaders in blasting open minds to help you enjoy delicious tattoo art, graffiti art, Street Art, pop surrealist and dark pop, erotic art, and of course hypnotically animated gifs. Here Jux teams up with Mixed Media Collective to bring you an indoor and outdoor exhibition featuring a left coast imbued view of the street with national and international artists including: 131, Abstrkt, Alex Yanes, Myla (of Dabs & Myla), DALeast, Evoca1, Faith47, Jose Mertz, Lebo, Tatiana Suarez, Toofly, and La Pandilla among others.

Tatiana TATI Suarez at The RC Cola Factory in The Wynwood Arts District of Miami, 2009. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

For more information about THE FACTORY art exhibition click here.

Scope Fair

Scope Art Fair is a few steps removed from the street, even as it deeply mines that vein and packages it for sale. Big sale. Usually high quality and undoubtedly commercial, the fair aims for deeper pockets and the art trade while still trying to maintain the accessible, challenging works that accomplished GenX collectors are looking for.  Not surprisingly, artists once known exclusively as Street Artists are all up in there too.

Scope’s roster of galleries includes many that represent Street Artists from around the world including:  Cory Helford Gallery from Culver City, CA will be presenting D*Face and Buff Monster. Galerie Swanström from NYC will be presenting Gilf!  White Walls Gallery from San Fransico, CA. will be presenting C215, Herakut, Augustine Kofie, Logan Hicks and Niels Shoe Meulman. Andenken Gallery / The Garage from Amsterdam, Spoke Art Gallery from San Francisco and Thinkspace from Culver City, CA will also have booths at Scope. Scope Art Fair includes a large variety of programs along with their main exhibition including Red Bull Curates with artists Cosbe and Claw Money among others and Anthony Spinello curates TYPOE.

Buff Monster at Wynwood Arts District, Miami. 2011 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

For a full listing of exhibitors, programs and other details click here.

Pulse

Pulse Art Fair insists on paring works on canvas with art installations as a way to engage the public and make the art viewing experience (and hopefully the art buying experience) far less clinical and more accessible. Detailed, immaculate, and approachable, Pulse is always a must to visit if you are doing the fair circuit. This year as in previous years Pulse has included some of the most important art galleries representing and promoting the work of internationally established Street Artists. Some examples: LeBasse Projects from Culver City, CA will be presenting Herakut, The Joshua Liner Gallery from NYC will be presenting Stephen “ESPO” Powers, and The Jonathan LeVine Gallery from NYC will be presenting a solo exhibition by French Street Artist and tilest INVADER.

Invader. South Beach, Miami. 2010 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

For a full listing of exhibitors, programs and other details click here.

Miami Project Art Fair

One to watch, The Miami Project Art Fair originates from peeps in Williamsburg, Brooklyn and has about 70 galleries in its inaugural showing with contemporary and modern art offerings.  We expect this fair to provide the already charged air with an extra bolt of energy. One worth hitting is the Cooper Cole Gallery from Toronto, Canada will be presenting Brooklyn’s own Maya Hayuk.

Maya Hayuk. Monster Island, Brooklyn, NYC. November, 2009. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

For a full listing of exhibitors, programs and other details click here.

Context

Context is one of the newest fairs, and will feature French Street Artists RERO and Speedy Graphito, represented by the Fabien Castanier Gallery from Studio City, CA.

Speedy Graphito “Urban Dreamer” (photo courtesy of the gallery)

For a full listing of exhibitors, programs and other details click here.

Primary Projects

Honorable mention here for the originators of the Wynwood outdoor graffiti (and Street Art) exhibitions that pre-date the official Wynwood Walls and were run on a shoelace budget and lots of hustle, Primary Flight. This year as a gallery project they have refocused their scope and present a full installation by multidisciplinary artist Kenton Parker. He is planning to bring his “Taco Shop” to the 8th floor of the Soho Beach House in Miami Beach.

Kenton Parker. “Las Lucky’s” Taco Shop. (photo © Peter Vahan)

From the Primary Flight press release: “How do you encapsulate the underground, past-midnight culture of Los Angeles into a single structure? For multimedia artist Kenton Parker, his establishment stationed outside the fashionable Las Palmas nightclub brings the beautiful people back to their basic needs; everyone pays the same dollar for the same after-party, hangover fare. Sharply crafted from tile mosaic, Parker’s standalone shop offers patrons everything from sodas to recovered fake Louis Vuitton wallets, from spray paint to Nerds candy boxes”

For a full listing of Primary Projects exhibitions and other details click here.

ALSO HAPPENING IN MIAMI THIS WEEKEND:

In addition to the perhaps 100 or so Street Artists participating this year in the established art fairs and galleries, there will be dozens of installations outside the sanctioned venues. So far Miami is still in love with it all – both legal and illegal installations provide the essential ethos of an art world invasion. Without these artists and independent stagings away of the glitzy openings and glare of cameras, these art fairs and  just feel like “commerce”.  Some other gigs to check out :

BLADE at Adjust Gallery

Adjust Gallery in Miami will be hosting an exhibition of legendary Graffiti New York artist BLADE. Vernissage: December 6 from 4:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. at Adjust Gallery Miami, 150 NW 24th Ave (305) 458-2801.

Blade in MoCA Los Angeles for Art in The Streets. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

A Box Truck Caravan from Klughaus

Klauhhaus Gallery has been mounting some of the best graffiti/Street Art/tattoo/low brow shows in NYC since the gallery opened in Chinatown in 2011. We give it up for these ruggedly smart idea people who will be making their inaugural trip to Miami. With a caravan of box trucks parked strategically in the Wynwood Arts District their artists will be live painting on the trucks and the trucks will parade around showcasing a mobile gallery as the trucks will in fact be moving canvases. The trucks will feature art by: RIME, TOPER, DCEVE, WANE, SP, CES, OBLVN, STAE2, GOREY among others.

Rime . Dceve . Toper (photo © Jaime Rojo)

For more information about live painting schedule and locations click here.

Snyder “Urban Pop Up Gallery”

And finally there is Snyder, who is just one of the intrepid D.I.Y. artists who inspire you with their will to succeed – even without being plugged in to the scene. From the artist’s press release: “Snyder, a Southern California based street artist, will be installing his ‘Urban Pop Up Gallery’ in the streets of Miami. With no contacts, no pre-arranged walls, no assistants and in a city never previously visited, Snyder attempts to install 30+ pieces of art in the streets of Miami over a 7 day period, ultimately curating his 2nd large scale ‘Urban Pop Up Gallery”.

 

 

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Living Walls Atlanta 2012 Begins, 26 Artists Converge!

 It’s Time for the Women to Represent as LW ATL Breaks New Ground Again

Sarah Emerson at work (photo © Dustin Chambers)

For the last two years at Living Walls Atlanta it’s been like graffiti summer camp; bodies and pillows and aerosol cans intermingled and stacked indiscriminately across the living room floors of friends apartments.  Sketchbooks. Pizza boxes. Condoms. Campfire songs.

The third installment of the conference for Living Walls, The City Speaks, starting today and running through the 19th, will build on the comaraderie established since then and on the lessons learned by those organizers who dared to mount this huge Street Art event on a shoe string budget and a dream. The number one change this year is that there is a bit of funding. Thanks to diligent fundraising and the donations of generous people like BSA readers who clicked a banner and gave, the Street Artists and other participants this year are actually staying in hotel rooms and everyone has a bed.

“All of the out of town artists are here, Hyuro just got in last night,” excitedly reports Living Walls organizer and BSA contributor Alexandra Parrish. So everybody is rested and ready to go.

The second important change this year is that it is all about the women.

In a completely unheard of and shocking move, the organizers/curators have invited only female Street Artists to participate this time, making this the World’s First All Female Paint Fest!  It’s a remarkable achievement in a scene that has been dominated by the male of the species, almost by definition, since the graffiti scene began in US cities about a half century ago. In most people’s opinion, it’s about time too. Speculation abounds about how the atmosphere and the output will be affected. For one thing, there will probably be fewer toilet seats thoughtlessly left up.  Also, better hair care products (no offense Gaia).

Sheryo at work (photo © Dustin Chambers)

“Over the past two years, 50 artists have participated – only two were female, and neither of them had a chance to paint a wall,” remarks Parrish as she illustrates the imbalance.

Of course there are already new pieces up to greet the participants that were done since March leading up to today’s opening that were not done expressly by females. Readers of BSA have seen an array of international artists from all over the world that came to paint big murals every month since including Gaia, Nanook, La Pandilla, Trek Matthews, Interesni Kazki, Evereman and Neuzz.

BSA has brought you full detail coverage of all those walls going up and now we’re gonna shout it from the roof tops as all this female power is loosed on the streets of Atlanta. And what an amazing lineup it is! The list includes: Indigo (Canada), Fefe (Brazil), TIKA (Switzerland), EME (Spain), Hyuro (Argentina), Martina Merlini (Italy), Miso (Australia), Cake (New York), Swoon (New York), Martha Cooper (New York), Sheryo (New York), White Cocoa (New York), Jessie Unterhalter and Katie Truhn (Baltimore), Molly Rose Freeman (Memphis), Teen Witch (San Francisco), olive47 (Atlanta), Paper Twins (Atlanta), Sarah Emerson (Atlanta), Sheila Pree Bright (Atlanta), Marcy Starz (Atlanta), Sten and Lex (Italy), Karen Tauches (Atlanta), Knitterati (Atlanta), Plastic Aztecs (Atlanta), Nikita Gale (Atlanta), Patricia Lacrete (Atlanta), Mon Ellis (Atlanta), and Andrzej Blazej Urbanski (Poland).

Here’s a Teaser for DAY 1

 

For a full list of events, schedules maps and other details click here:

TONIGHT:

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 15TH
Vandalog Movie Night
Wren’s Nest in West End
9:00pm-11:00pm
RJ Rushmore from Vandalog will present a series of street art and graffiti short movies.

See the BSA posts this year for all of the installations leading up to this day:

“The Sunrise of Edgewood”, GAIA & Nanook open Living Walls Atlanta 2012

La Pandilla and Trek Matthews in Cabbagetown for Living Walls Atlanta

Interesni Kazki at Living Walls Atlanta

Priceless Culture: Mexican Artist Neuzz in Atlanta For Living Walls 2012

 

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La Pandilla and Trek Matthews in Cabbagetown for Living Walls Atlanta

Let’s start off the week with our 2nd installment of Living Walls in Atlanta for 2012, a splendid overview of Cabbagetown and the installation by three of this years participants creating new murals over a nearly two week stretch, just finished and fresh for you.

La Pandilla and Trek Matthews

Text by Alexandra Parrish
Photos by Dustin Chambers
Video by Albert Lebron

Before I engage you with an individual take of La Pandilla and Trek Matthew’s twelve-day long mural production, I must foray into a brief history lesson; Cabbagetown is a tight-knit neighborhood in Atlanta that is rich with folklore and idiosyncrasies. Adjacent to the Fulton Bag and Cotton Mills, the neighborhood began as a mill town complete with shotgun-style houses built by Jacob Elsas, the factory owner. After recruiting poor whites from the Georgia Appalachian region to work in his factory, Elsas offered free housing to compromise for insignificant wages and working conditions. Legend has it that the neighborhood assumed the moniker “Cabbagetown” after a truck-load of cabbages spilled across the neighborhood; many recount a brutal smell of cabbages that could be assumed to have followed the accident or maybe it just permeated from their kitchens.

La Pandilla (photo © Dustin Chambers)

After an extensive effort towards revitalization (some would say gentrification), Cabbagetown reigns as a treasured locality in Atlanta. Although Krog Tunnel features an ever-changing display of graffiti and street art, the CSX walls that enclose the neighborhood have remained four shades of grey. Surprisingly, when Living Walls contacted the Cabbagetown Neighborhood Association to allow La Pandilla, from Puerto Rico and Trek Matthews from Atlanta to paint two murals, they more than accommodated.

La Pandilla (photo © Dustin Chambers)

As soon as La Pandilla and Trek Matthews began on their wall, joggers, walkers and rubberneckers routinely stopped to chat and observe. Throughout production, community support yielded endless tokens of gratitude – fresh baked bread, beer runs, grilled cheese sandwiches, salvaged fresh-till packaged meals, oral histories and loud music. Even the infamous rogue buffer that verbally threatened La Pandilla (yes, Cabbagetown is home to it’s very own vigilante, occasionally violent buffer) grew to appreciate the finely detailed work that replaced decades of juvenile tags.

The truth is, Alexis Diaz and Juan Fernandez of La Pandilla are insane. Their method of using Chinese ink to translate immensely detailed drawings into full-scale murals costs a lot of time. Although they’d camp out at their wall from sunrise to sunset each day, they failed to finish on time. Hardly defeated, La Pandilla opted to stay an extra day and completed their 25-foot mural in their last hours.

La Pandilla (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Three blocks down, Trek Matthews, an emerging artist from Atlanta, began on his first public wall. His work incorporates a mash of Aztec patterns and Native American designs, which turns out nicely on the grey concrete. Despite the daunting height of his wall, Trek toughed it out on a scrappy extension ladder.

In a perfect world Living Walls would serve as proverbial residents of Cabbagetown forever. I could tell Juan felt the same way as he waved saying “bye y’all.

La Pandilla (photo © Dustin Chambers)

La Pandilla (photo © Dustin Chambers)

La Pandilla (photo © Dustin Chambers)

La Pandilla (photo © Dustin Chambers)

La Pandilla (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Trek Matthews (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Trek Matthews (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Trek Matthews (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Trek Matthews (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Trek Matthews (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Trek Matthews (photo © Dustin Chambers)

La Pandilla and Trek Matthews by Albert Lebron (VIDEO)

 

 

To learn more about Living Walls Altanta: The City Speaks and to make a donation to help this year’s conference click here. BSA thanks you for supporting this good work.

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Fun Friday 03.23.12

Welcome to Friday! You made it!  It’s sunny and warm in New York this morning – time to hit the streets and parks and bookstores, before they’re all gone.

1. BOOKLYN in the House (VIDEO)
2. Adam Void “American Dream”
3. La Pandilla and Trek Matthews @ Living Walls Concepts
4. NSM “Justified Scriptures” (San Francisco)
5. Street Artist on the Street – Hugh Leeman (VIDEO)
6. Allan Dalla and Kero – Street Artists in Romania (VIDEO)
7. Slim Shady Mitt Romney (VIDEO)

BOOKLYN IN THE HOUSE

La Shea Delaney and Annabelle Quezada Go Hard on Books

Big Ups to these two serious readers. Read Books Ya’ll.

“(I) read so hard, libraries tryin’ to find me.”

“Animal Farm, Jane Eyre,
Barnes & Noble, FourSquare”

Adam Void Shares His American Dream (Baltimore)

Adam Void has a show called “An American Dream” at the MICA Decker Gallery in Baltimore, opening today. This is the artist’s MFA Thesis show. Congratulations Adam!

At work on an Adam Void piece on a wall in Venice, CA in 2011. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

For further information regarding this show click here.

La Pandilla and Trek Matthews at Living Walls Concepts (Atlanta)

Saturday Living Walls Concepts in Atlanta will be at The Jane with a show featuring new works from Street Artists La Pandilla from Puerto Rico and Trek Matthews from Atlanta in conjunction with their participation in this year’s edition of Living Walls, The City Speaks.

La Pandilla in Miami for Art Basel 2011. (Photo © Jaime Rojo)

For further information regarding this show click here.

NSM “Justified Scriptures” (San Francisco)

941 Geary Gallery in San Francisco invites you to the opening reception of an NSM solo show entitled “Justified Scriptures” this Saturday.

(photo courtesy of the gallery)

For further information regarding this show click here.

Street Artist on the Street – Hugh Leeman (VIDEO)

French videographer Clemence Demerliac filmed the San Francisco based Street Artist Hugh Leeman to understand his original thinking and in inventive approach to helping other with his work.

Allan Dalla and Kero – Street Artists in Romania (VIDEO)

Allan Dalla and Kero teamed up with Ion Bardaleanu for their most recent project.

Slim Shady Mitt Romney (VIDEO)

An INGENIOUS compilation of clips to create this parody of Eminem’s “Slim Shady”

 

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Living Walls Concepts Presents: New works featuring La Pandilla and Trek Matthews. (Atlanta, GA)

La Pandilla and Trek

 

This Saturday, Living Walls Concepts’ artists La Pandilla (Puerto Rico) and Trek Matthews (Atlanta) will premiere their gallery show at the Jane. This one night gallery opening will present 12 original works, a limited edition of artist prints and shirts by Kemeza, and the screening of the mural process video by Albert Lebron.

La Pandilla are internationally recognized street artists from Puerto Rico whose stunning detail remain intact from large-scale murals to works on paper. This art duo, comprised of Alexis Diaz and Juan Fernandez, invent surreal depictions of animals with human elements throughout their work.

Trek Matthews is an emerging, self-taught, Atlanta based artist. A unique mixture of sacred geometry, Native American designs, Aztec patterns, and Egyptian myth & culture inspires his pen and ink drawings.

Drinks and DJ will be provided along with an after-party featuring a performance by Mirror Mode. After the opening, the show at the Jane will hold special gallery hours Sunday 3/25 from 1:00-5:00pm. All profits from art sales will go to the artists. As always, this event is free and open to the public.

The Jane (behind Octane in Grant Park)
437 Memorial Dr
Atlanta, GA 30312

Gallery Opening, Saturday, March 24th 7:00-11:00pm
Extended Gallery Hours, Saturday, March 25th 1:00-5:00pm

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“The Sunrise of Edgewood”, GAIA & Nanook open Living Walls Atlanta 2012

“The Sunrise of Edgewood”, GAIA & Nanook open Living Walls Atlanta 2012

The 3rd Edition of Living Walls begins this spring and BSA is pleased to again partner with Monica Compana and her team to bring you the action in Atlanta for 2012. Supporting the ATL efforts since they popped in ’10, we’ll again bring you updates from the field as the artists converge in Atlanta to bring color, vibrancy and a dialogue with Street Art in the city.

Officially the 2012 conference begins in August but we’ll be bringing you a series of installations leading up to it. This years quality lineup will be a bit more international and focused with skillz on display from Gaia, Nanook, La Pandilla, Trek Matthews, Interesni Kazki, Everman, Neuzz, Pablo Gnecco, and Liqen.

So right now we want to give a huge shout out to our partners in non-crime, writer Alexandra Parrish, who is also Director of Communications for Living Walls, Charles Flemming, Living Walls Media team photographer and Albert Lebron, videographer who will all be BSA contributors to bring to you dispatches from the field. Thank you and welcome.

Gaia and Nanook

Text by Alexandra Parrish
Photos by Charles Flemming
Video by Albert Lebron

Gaia and Nanook (photo © Charles Flemming)

In terms of mural making, Gaia and Nanook believe public art has the ability to designate place. They are hardly strangers to the rich history layered in the gridded streets of Atlanta. Last weekend, Gaia and Nanook returned to the heart of the south to participate in Living Walls Concepts, a year-round conduit to the conference, which aims to create a more intimate relationship between the artist and the community.

The sketch came naturally – the wall, located on Edgewood Avenue in the heart of Old Fourth Ward sits firmly in the neighborhood Martin Luther King Jr. called home. Gaia and Nanook opted for an equivocal face to represent the street itself – and the passerby’s whom they interacted with regularly; Which is something I’m sure they revel, as Gaia took the time to explain what he was doing to anyone who cared to ask.

After three days and a stunted thunderstorm, Gaia and Nanook named their finished wall “The Sunrise of Edgewood.”

Gaia and Nanook (photo © Charles Flemming)

Gaia also sent us a description of the project:

“The collaboration that Nanook and I produced on Edgewood avenue is an observation on the neighborhood’s changing complexion. Historically, the Fourth Ward is considered in many regards as the epicenter of the Civil Rights movement so naturally creating Martin Luther King Jr’s face just down the block from the King Home seemed logical.

But rather we created a portrait that was more ambiguous, an everyman face that faded into a rising sun. This vibrant visage is surrounded by a turmoil of rope and vine forms that nanook created which is derived from one of his early street pieces. Now the mural is surrounded by a contentious area whose gentrification is imminent like the endless cycle of the sun.”

Gaia and Nanook (photo © Charles Flemming)

Gaia and Nanook (photo © Charles Flemming)

Gaia and Nanook (photo © Charles Flemming)

Gaia and Nanook (photo © Charles Flemming)

Gaia and Nanook (photo © Charles Flemming)

“The Sunrise of Edgewood” by Albert Lebron (VIDEO)

 

 

To learn more about Living Walls Altanta: The City Speaks and to make a donation to help this year’s conference click here. BSA thanks you for supporting this good work.

Read more