Creepy Gets Way Up in NYC

March 28, 2011 Artists, Brooklyn, Features, Interview, NYC, On the Street, Street Talker Interview

The Australian Street Artist Does a New Wall in Brooklyn (Video)

He calls it narrative-driven character-based folk art, and Street Artist Kyle Hughes-Odgers AKA Creepy has been taking his skinny armed and legged people to walls around the world since he started doing work on the street in 2005. Not uncommon for artists who work on the street, Creepy didn’t initially have any idea how to get his stuff into a gallery so his real audience began when he started hitting walls. Now New Yorkers are getting a chance to see the tightly droll and clean Creepy aesthetic.

Creepy (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Comfortable with tiny canvasses and massive walls installations, the startlingly sane Creepy had a pretty banner year in 2010 with his first solo show at Turner Galleries in his home town of Perth, including over 100 pieces on wood and 8 large works on canvas. He also painted for weeks on a commission for Murdock University’s art collection; a 7 piece project of large panels totalling 150 ft in length (45 meters) when finished. As the year ended he had some fun in Sydney with the Lo-Fi Collective on a show called “Microcosm” with Beastman, Max Berry, and Phibs.

Creepy (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Now he’s in New York for a visit to really get the rhythm of the street, meet cool peeps and hit up walls (and a van) while doing some sight seeing with his lady. Brooklyn Street Art had the opportunity to watch Creepy work with cans last week on a new piece in the BK that speaks of his signature brand of whimsy, and his affinity for textural patterns, symbols, and shapes. Peculiar and blithe, his illustrated characters go solo or hang out in pairs usually, contemplating ennui or maybe heavier thoughts, but somehow you can’t feel too dark looking at the playful juxtapositions and color palettes.

Creepy (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Brooklyn Street Art: Kind of cold up on the roof, no? Were you expecting it to be so cold?
Creepy: Freezing! I couldn’t bend my fingers at the end of the day.

Brooklyn Street Art: What is the inspiration for this piece?
Creepy: Currently my new works are based on ideas of burden, memory and nostalgia. I was trying to show a sinking feeling of lost time or of being somewhere else in your head apart from the immediate reality. I’m thinking of great moments of the past that you could never replicate – that kind of thing.

Creepy (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Brooklyn Street Art: Your sense of color, proportion, and geometry are excellent. Would you describe your style as being illustrative?
Creepy: I’m not sure – color and balance are really important to me. I came from a drawing background but I would rather paint these days. A lot of illustrators seem like painters to me. I don’t know what the different rules are that make you an illustrator or a painter.

Creepy (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Brooklyn Street Art: You like using patterns, and you sometimes you go back replace the pattern on part of the piece with something new. What are you evoking with the mix of shapes and colors?
Creepy: I like the idea that many smaller details (patterns) in life exist individually but make up a much larger picture or story, and each tiny detail is just as important as the next. They need each other to make up the bigger idea – like a city or a personality. Sometimes I replace the pattern while painting if I feel like the color balance is not quite right.

Brooklyn Street Art: We’ve seen a lot of monsters and women in your figurative pieces. Are they favorite topics?
Creepy: I just try to tell stories in my work from ideas and events I have experienced in life. Sometimes those stories need creatures, women and men.

Creepy (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Brooklyn Street Art: Thematically, where do you draw your inspiration?
Creepy: From dreams, memory and the harsh and humorous everyday.

Brooklyn Street Art: How has your visit to New York been? Have you seen any interesting art?
Creepy: It’s been such a great trip and really interesting. Scope/Volta/Armory week was on when I first arrived and I got tickets to those events (thanks to you guys!) which was a rocket launch into the NYC art world. I have seen a lot of inspiring works in galleries and on the street. My friend Sean Morris was in NYC for his show at Bold Hype in Chelsea, so it was great to be able to go to his exhibition as well.

Creepy (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Brooklyn Street Art: You have done tiny little 2 inch square pieces and massive building size mural installations. What size do you prefer to work in?
Creepy: I like working on all scales. It’s nice to get outside and paint massive works and then switch it up and head into the studio and do a small painting with tiny brushes.

Brooklyn Street Art:What are you going to try to do before you leave?
Creepy: Hopefully a couple more paints. I went to a Knicks game the other night so that pretty much made my year – even though they lost.