New Territories, is a series of four new paintings by Michael De Feo installed across the street from (and sponored by) the Woodward Gallery, NYC. These new works are an extension of De Feo’s acclaimed self-portrait series and continue to investigate his play between spontaneity and structure, universal patterns in nature, and how the world is connected. Painting on maps is Michael’s way of going “all city” or painting the entire world, a desire shared by creators of graffiti and street art alike. Most recently, De Feo has installed other self portraits in his series in Hong Kong, Buenos Aires, Amsterdam, Miami, and New York.
New Territories coincides with Woodward Gallery’s opening of Cristina Vergano’s exhibition, “Just For You” in their indoor space.
Michael De Feo New Territories
Opening reception: Saturday, November 7, 6 – 8 pm
Woodward Gallery
133 Eldridge Street
New York, NY 10002
Dan touches up some fingers on his new installation at Carmichael Gallery (image courtesy Carmichael)
You’ve walked by his work a hundred times on the street in plain view. No really, you probably have, and didn’t know it. Dan Witz specializes in detailed work that when fully realized, can be be easy to miss.
“Dark Doings” is getting a lot of attention along North LaBrea Avenue.
A Chicago native, Witz has been in New York since he was an art-school punk at Cooper Union during a drug deranged haze that reigned in the economically bombed-out Lower East Side at the dawn of the Reagan Revolution. Graffiti art was expanding and morphing into many styles as this thinking-man explored an anti-graffiti that did anything but seek attention for it’s own sake.
Gallery preparations are underway for the show. (image courtesy Carmichael)
Over the years Dan has specialized in conceptual pranks, street interventions, and Dutch master inspired palm-sized oil paintings. While inspired by graffiti writers as a student, he instead practiced a more studied craft on the street that almost asked to be overlooked. Much of his work has adorned quietly, a subtle strong commentary to those who would observe.
A ghostlike female visage appears behind the cracked wire-inlaid window (Dan Witz) (courtesy the artist)
Tomorrow at Carmichael Gallery the prolific Witz, now from Brooklyn, will be expanding on a series he began a few years ago that was meant to draw attention to the new boom in soul-less building design in “up-and-coming” neighborhoods like Williamsburg. The fake exhaust vents, placed appropriately along the facades of “ugly” buildings, feature fingers and gloved hands pressing between the grates in an act of escape.
Can you keep a secret? (Dan Witz) (image courtesy the artist)
“Dark Doings”, the new show, takes the experiment a step further to the safety windows that beckon from steel doors in industrial areas. Attached in such a realistic manner, you may think that a woman has her face pressed up against the glass from inside. Or you may not notice his work in plain view.
New pieces by Dan Witz waiting to be hung for Thursday’s show (image courtesy Carmichael)
Brooklyn Street Art: Dan, my front doors have those same square wire-veined windows! One night a drunk neighbor couldn’t find his key so he smashed one with a can of coke and there were little pieces of glass all over the floor. Your people definitely look trapped in there. Little portholes of desperation. Or is that just me?
Dan Witz: I like that story. But I’d change it to little portals of desperation.
Dan did a special installation this week in L.A. for Halloween. Um, scary (Dan Witz) (image courtesy Carmichael)
Brooklyn Street Art: Sometimes your pieces on the street are so well camouflaged that people will not know they are there. Would you rather that your work is discovered or looked over?
Dan Witz: I know it’s perverse and probably not in my best self-interest but I love the idea of thousands of people walking by my pieces every day and not seeing them. Eventually though the law of averages (I put up so damned many of them) will catch up with you and you’ll see one. Then I’m hoping you’ll go, ‘Holy shit!” and begin to wonder what else you’ve been missing out there.
Dark doings definitely happening in the gallery (Dan Witz) (image courtesy Carmichael)
Brooklyn Street Art:You like to be outdoors, and many of your pieces in Brooklyn are about people trying to get out through vents of ugly new buildings. Is this work autobiographical in any way?
Dan Witz: The Ugly new Buildings projects is autobiographical inasmuch as I live in the neighborhood that these arrogant architectural abominations have been inflicted upon. The subtext of the piece was never one of escape, but more of frustration and powerlessness. As a street artist I take what’s happening on my own streets very personally.
Another project was to re-create street signs that contain characters or body parts in them, like this one with a scuba diver. (Dan Witz) (photo Jaime Rojo)
Brooklyn Street Art: “Dark Doings” still retains a punk rock flavor. And yet, so much of your work seems luminous and glowing and warm. Does a punk ever lose that rebellious dark side?
Dan Witz: It’s true that much of my youth was spent romanticizing the dark side. I believed that the truth could only be found by a violent rejection of the status quo. I still believe this, especially concerning creativity, but the truth about the so called dark side is that it’s mostly a pose and that the rest is ultimately sad and is the graveyard of a lot of wasted talent.
I’m just glad I made it back to report on it with my faculties (somewhat) intact. At some point after I hit thirty, I noticed that all I wanted to paint was light, and I needed to make it as warm and luminous and spiritually nourishing as I could. Not too ‘hip’ a career concept one would think, but somehow this turned out to be a rebellious act as well–at least for me. I can’t claim the metaphor was intentional but it’s not the first time my work has benefitted from such a suspiciously lucky coincidence.
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The exhibition “Dark Doings” will have an opening reception
Thursday November 5 from 7-10 PM at Carmichael Gallery in West Hollywood, CA.
Featuring the Artwork of Dark Cloud, Goreb, Armer & Deekers
November 13th thru November 29
Show Opens Friday, November 13th from 7-10pm
This November, Factory Fresh brings together four elusive artists who each work seamlessly in between the worlds of graffiti and streetart. These two art forms look identical to the untrained eye but in actuality are more like brawling brothers to those who are part of the movement. Artists Armer, Darkcloud, Goreb and Deeker are a few exceptions. Each of their work ranges on the street one day a large scale mural, another day carefully placed signs or paintings, sometimes even a junk sculpture is installed onto a crowded street. As a result these artists cannot be dismissed by any group of urban artists and have been validated by their acceptance from multiple ranges of critcs.
The Darkcloud image has been a constant staple in the urban art scene since 2003 and can be seen all over the east and west coast. Darkcloud is attributed with having more hand painted stickers up than anyone on the scene today. The meaning being unclear for most, it stems from the concept that angst is always following us. A visual representation of the darkness in our lives we are unable to escape. Darkcloud will be showing a mix of paintings on glass, metal, wood, and more. Also, prints may be available for the first time in his artist career.
Deeker is a rogue, pessimistic bastard who comes out and paints when the weather is at it’s worst. This bottom feeder lurks around the other three, drops hints of doomsday, tells tales of perpetual unemployment and generally depresses everyone. His work will consist of ghastly character paintings and painstakingly fine cut wooden words and botanical elements. The likes of which you can find hidden all around the streets of New York, if you look carefully.
GoreB’s work was first noticed in Dumbo in the summer of 2004 and people discussed his work in tones you might use to talk about a griffin or a chimera, a former math prodigy who’d been corrupted in his teen years by something called hobo freight art, then spiraled into a life of nomadic polymath street-art savanthood and touched down, for a few years, in New York. Goreb currently resides on the West Coast in Santa Cruz and has created new oil paintingsfor the show featuring collages of birds, black and white photos, and fonts with hints of older paintings underneath.
With GoreB and Deeker as mentors and occasional sidekicks, young Armer paints large, uncomfortable faces on both coasts. His streetwork is powered by the painterly and gestural satisfaction he gets from working on a grand scale and from the belief in American graffiti as a way to respect the past while fighting the present. This show gives Armer his first crack at gallery walls. Pared down to a self-retrospective, mixed media work will echo his presence in the street (color combinations he loves; how he processes and releases information) but also will chronicle a day/night in the life.
Street photographer Vinny Cornelli joins Brooklyn Street Art today to contribute his voice to the dialogue of the street, in what we hope will be an ongoing conversation.
An enthusiastic traveler and documenter, with his images Vinny reveals an inner world that lies behind the camera; affecting his choices of subjects and how he frames them.
In addition to shooting street art, he specializes in something he calls street layers; those accumulated overlapping stratum of posters and wheatpastes common on abandoned buildings and work-sites, layers of paper torn back to reveal the inside guts of the street and it’s history. Part collage, part archeology, the resulting street layers are finished presentations in his view, as much as they are one more ethereal moment in street history.
This week is the first of a two-part photo essay by Cornelli focusing on one of New York’s more recently famous addresses in street art’s oeuvre. Before it became a celebrated event space, this location was one of the destinations regularly visited by myriad street artists.
As is often the case, it was also an urban scene of neglect and, in Vinny’s eye, beautiful decay. Vinny takes this first opportunity to talk to BSA’s readers in these, some of his first contemplative images of the street early in this decade.
I was a telemarketer for one day when I was eighteen years old. Actually it was half a day. I never came back from lunch.
I bring this horrible memory freshly to mind because I just learned that Mr. Jago and Will Barras, two artists showing new works at FIFTY24SF Gallery in San Francisco, first met each other when they were both working at telemarketing jobs. They both seem like they are unscarred, but sometimes these things are not obvious on the surface.
Walrus TV Artist Feature: Mr. Jago & Will Barras Interview from “The Run Up”
Mr Jago, a pioneer of the doodle, is a founding member of Scrawl Collective and a veteran in the street art movement. Jagos interests in art and design with influences from classic Marvel comics, graffiti and hip-hop culture have help forge his unique freehand style and distinct colour palette. http://www.mrjago.com/
Will Barras
Living and working London, Will Barras is an artist and illustrator best known for his work with the Scrawl Collective, a collaboration of artist’s centered around Bristol, UK. He has been hailed as one of the artists that best represent the skate and snowboard lifestyle. http://willbarras.com/
All that doodling at your telemarketer job could pay off!
“Darling,We’re Leaving!” features new works on display at FIFTY24SF Gallery from November 5 – November 24, 2009.
I was a telemarketer for one day when I was eighteen years old. Actually it was half a day. I never came back from lunch.
We were living through a different recession and I had no practical skills and almost zero job experience and no college education. That’s why I even considered the job – desperation for bar money and phat threads. All I remember was sitting on a folding metal chair inside an O-configuration of folding banquet tables in a room looking down to the street with my black telephone, my phone number list, my order form, and my script.
We were selling tickets for the Shriner Circus and we were supposed to stress what a great philanthropic organization they were and how the kids were just thrilled. I didn’t know what a Shriner was, and I didn’t care either. I tentatively dialed people on my list and had a big lump in my throat and my hands were shaking and I would take the slightest hint of rejection personally, like an anvil had come smashing through the ceiling directly onto my head. So, around the third time someone said “NO”, I was emotionally destroyed and my nerves were numb and scarred for life. Wimp. I know. Things haven’t gotten a whole lot better in the self-confidence area, if you want to know the truth.
Mr. Jago and Will Barrass discuss their original gig. (image courtesy Upper Playground)
I bring this horrible memory freshly to mind because I just learned that Mr. Jago and Will Barras, two artists showing new works at FIFTY24SF Gallery in San Francisco, first met each other when they were both working at telemarketing jobs. They both seem like they are unscarred, but sometimes these things are not obvious on the surface.
Walrus TV Artist Feature: Mr. Jago & Will Barras Interview from “The Run Up”
Mr Jago, a pioneer of the doodle, is a founding member of Scrawl Collective and a veteran in the street art movement. Jagos interests in art and design with influences from classic Marvel comics, graffiti and hip-hop culture have help forge his unique freehand style and distinct colour palette. http://www.mrjago.com/
Will Barras
Living and working London, Will Barras is an artist and illustrator best known for his work with the Scrawl Collective, a collaboration of artist’s centered around Bristol, UK. He has been hailed as one of the artists that best represent the skate and snowboard lifestyle. http://willbarras.com/
“Darling,We’re Leaving!” features new works on display at FIFTY24SF Gallery from November 5 – November 24, 2009.
American jazz saint and snappy dresser Louis “Sachmo” Armstrong is back in New York, courtesy of MBW. Born poor in New Oleans, he ended up in the borough of Queens. (Jaime Rojo)
Transformer viking warrior dude is just so frustrated and verbally constipated that he resorts to giving the finger. (Pimax) (photo Jaime Rojo)
Gimme Shelter (QRST) (photo Jaime Rojo)
Stupendous collage and stencil work. Definitely the Dude Company – but who is the collaborator? (photo Jaime Rojo)
The Dude Company (Detail) (photo Jaime Rojo)
Revs is also doing collaborations more (photo Jaime Rojo)
“Eat Fruit and Die” (Specter) (photo Jaime Rojo)
You must be my Lucky Star (MBW) (photo Jaime Rojo)
A new Marilyn and a Red Velvet Underground banana (Pimax) (photo Jaime Rojo)
From that classic New York underground album referenced above, Femme Fatale
Itinerrance Gallery opened its location in the 13th arrondissement in 2004. Close to the Grande Bibliothèque and to the Frigos, it fits in an urban area that is economically and culturally growing.
With referential street art exhibitions to its credit – such as Berlin based Evol & Pisa73 in 2008, YZ Open Your Eyes, Marko 93, Seize Happy Wallmaker and recently the Franco-Austrian Jana & Js – and an exceptionnal space – 130 meters square, 7 meters high, and rough concrete walls – Itinerrance Gallery has got everything to succeed and become a must-see place in Paris.
Partnering with Samantha Longhi of Stencil History X for its programming, Itinerrance Gallery is now positioned in the field of street art exclusively and stencil art in particular. Chic’n’stencil opens the 2009-2010 new season that will see the international passage of major artists such as Belgian Roa, American Logan Hicks, Italian Sten & Lex, Polish M-City, or French C215, who toured the world, both in the streets and in galleries.
Groupshow November 5, – December 5, 2009 Opening November 5 from 6 pm
Far from the 80’s, stencil art is now various. Chic that is so late 2000’s distinguishes the artists featured in this exhibition. Elegant and glamorous like Zalez and Tian, delicacy in the Japan world of Stew, and the mystery of the Betty Baron‘s wheatpastings combine aesthetics with architectural lines of the Polish duo Monstfur and with the gentle poetry of based Vancouver Indigo.
Galerie Itinerrance 7 bis rue René Goscinny – Paris 13e + 33 (0)1 53 79 16 62 Opening hours Wed-Sat 2-7 pm
Dan Witz, one of the most prolific NY street artists with work dating
back to the 1970s will be debuting new work throughout the Carmichael
Gallery. The exhibition “Dark Doings” will have an opening reception
Thursday November 5 from 7-10 PM.
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