The art crowd was jovial and dancing, with the help of DJ Rehka as she brought her Bhangra out of the basement and into the backyard Saturday night night in BedStuy. After taking in the new pieces by Guy Denning and David Walker, guests were encouraged to loosen their limbs by the colorfully dressed dance troupe on the grass. It worked!
CREST FEST 2010
Crest Hardware Art Show
Crest Fest 2010
Gaia
Gaia. "St. John"
Gaia: Urban Romantic
June 19 – July 24
Opening reception with the artist: Saturday, June 19, 6-8PM
Irvine Contemporary is pleased to present new works and on-site installations by gallery artist Gaia. In Urban Romantic, Gaia will present new compositions that combine decollage, linocut prints, and painting on wood panels and new on-site street mural installations. Opening reception with the artist: Saturday, June 19, 6-8 PM.
Drawing on his new and evolving body of imagery depicting human and animal figures, Gaia’s work reflects on the ancient themes of animal and human sympathies, but now in the context of the city and the human built environment. Working with myth and symbolic animal figures, Gaia’s street murals are like the works of an urban shaman drawing on a positive force from animal protectors.
Gaia employs recognizable animal figures to remind us of lost human connections to nature and the environment. He constructs an image of a reversal of the “natural order” where animals intervene as protectors and avatars for a new awareness of the human condition in the natural world. He is known world-wide for street murals placed in areas to elicit surprise and reflection by passers-by who encounter the symbolism and fragile narratives of his work.
About the Artist
Gaia is currently a student at the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore, Maryland, concentrating on printmaking and sculpture. His studio work and gallery projects have been exhibited in Brooklyn, New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Washington, DC. His work has been documented and featured in several recent books on urban art, including, most recently, Beyond the Street: The 100 Leading Figures in Urban Art, Patrick Nguyen and Stuart Mackenzie, eds. (Berlin: Die Gestalten Verlag, 2010). Gaia lives and works in Baltimore, MD, and Brooklyn, NY.
Artist’s Resume. Image gallery.
Location
Irvine Contemporary is located at 1412 14th St., NW, near P St., in the 14th Street Arts Corridor and Logan Circle area of Washington, DC.
Metro
The gallery is four blocks north of the McPherson Square Metro station, five blocks north-east of the Farragut North Metro, and five bocks east of the Dupont Circle Metro.
For further information and available works, contact Lauren Gentile, Director (202-332-8767, lauren@irvinecontemporary.com)
Image of piece Id-iom © Stencil HistoryX
Our weekly interview with the street, this week featuring Gaia, Ludo, Liv, MBW, Beau, Yote, Clown Soldier, Faile, Man Standing, Roa, Sweet Toof, Headhoods, and Holy Family
The Phun Phactory to Convert Williamsburg Industrial Zone into the World’s Largest Outdoor Mural Art Gallery.
The graffiti art pioneers, those who painted in the train yards in the 1960’s, 70’s and 80’s will come together to kick-off the new Phun Phactory and commemorate the life of legendary artist Iz The Wiz.This event is being curated by artists 2ILL and Blade and will feature more than 50 celebrated old school writers all painting on location.
The Phun Phactory Aerosol Art Corp. will re-launch this summer, converting the Williamsburg, Brooklyn Industrial Business Zone into a neighborhood of mural art. The Phun Phactory was founded in 1993 by founders Pat DiLillo and the late and pioneering aerosol artist Michael “Iz The Wiz” Martin. The original project occupied an industrial zone in Long Island City, directly across from the MoMA/PS1 museum and provided more than 200,000 sq. ft. of public space to showcase works of aerosol artists from around the globe. The new Phun Phactory will headquarter in Williamsburg, Brooklyn and will make available more than 500,000 sq. ft. of public space for artists of ALL mural mediums to showcase their artwork.
On June 19th 2010, The Phun Phactory will kick-off commemorating the anniversary of co- founder “IZ THE WIZ” with Ole Tymers Day. This event will take place on Wythe Ave. & N. 15th St. and will begin at 10AM. Ole Tymers Day will bring together the most celebrated aerosol
artists of the 1960’s, 70’s and 80’s, those that were painting in the train yards before their art
made it to the galleries. BLADE and 2IL, names recognized around the globe as pioneers in graffiti art will curate this event. On this day, The Phun Phactory will also feature dozens of mural artists from all parts of the world. This project has received unprecedented support from artists, city officials and business partners who will be present for the event.
The Phun Phactory Kick- Off Event
Date: Saturday, June 19th 2010
Loc: N. 15th St, & Wythe Ave Brooklyn
Time: 10 am- 8pm
Saturday, June 19th
rain date: Sat., June 26
10 am
Wythe ave & N. 15th st
Corporations routinely use the talents of artists to help sell the brand, the image, the story – from packaging to video to stickers to t-shirts to billboards to posters over urinals.
For BP, whose Helios logo was a re-branding of BP’s old image in ’02, the need for spin control these days is spinning out of control. We’ve had barrels of dispersant, drenched pelicans, plumes, dead zones, containment domes, junk shots, top kills, and top hats. Somehow, despite the cute names of strategies, the oil hasn’t stopped gushing into the gulf and no person is happy with BP. In a random act of “street art” just last week we showed you re-branding someone did with the BP gas station sign in lower Manhattan, “NYC Street Renders a BP Opinion”.
But they can still advertise: Type the words “BP and ____________________ ” (just about anything) into Google right now and see what pops up. Most likely you’ll see a little banner like this at the top of your search.
11 people died, the oil has continued to gush uncontrollably in unknown quantities for more than 50 days, and BP is committing a reported $50 million dollars to a new advertising and PR campaign across all major and minor media, including social media (BP is on FB). 
BP has purchased landing positions on your Google searches and cute little pop-ups for you to “Friend” BP on your YouTube Videos. When it comes to containment, the biggest gusher of all turns out to be how much damage is being done to the brand.
Since the folks over at LogoMyWay launched their logo redesign contest, they have received 557 entries from artists to re-design the BP logo. The editor says, “I think the (6000) creative logo designers at LogoMyWay should update the BP logo with a more suitable design and brand. The design community and the general public will vote on the winner.” 197,000 views of the contest indicate that people have great interest in the new BP logo design. Here are some of the logos that we think are most communicative.
To see all of the entries go to http://www.logomyway.com/contestView.php?contestId=1746
We’ve slimmed down the list, because we really want you to win! Chris from Robots Will Kill donated this original piece to you! Try again!
Below is a set of images focusing on a detail of the eyes on the artist work.
To win Chris’ original and signed piece (pictured above), identify all of the artists. If we don’t have a reader that identifies all of the artist the reader that correctly identifies most of them wins!!!
The Lucky Winner will be announced on Fun Friday Next Week 06.18.10, along with the answers.
Please email your answers to info @ brooklynstreetart.com with BSA GIVEAWAY in the subject.
Good Luck! Ready, GO!
No. 1
No. 2
No. 3
No. 4
No. 5
No. 6
No. 7
No. 8
(all photos © Jaime Rojo)
Don’t miss the opening and fundraiser tonight of Brooklyn’s newest gallery, called 99%. The silent auction will feature new prints by Swoon (left) and Gaia (right) as well as Bast, Chris Mendoza, Cycle, Dennis McNett, Doze Green, Ellis G, Eric White, Esao Andrews, EZO, Ian Kuali’I, Imminent Disaster, Jeremiah Ketner, Jose Parla, Kenji Hirata, Lady Pink, Martha Cooper, Martin Wittfooth, Maya Hayuk, Mel Kadel, Morning Breath, Nathan Lee Pickett, Orlando Reyes, Rage Johnson, Ricky Powell, Rostarr, Ryan Humphrey, Skewville, Tara McPherson, Tono Radvany, Voodo Fe, Xiaoqing Ding, Yuri Shimojo
See our interview with gallery owners Andrew Michael Ford and Mikal Hameed HERE.
For more info go to http://www.ninetyninegallery.com/
see the finished wall here:
http://cargocollective.com/crono
Os Gemeos blog:
http://osgemeos.com.br/
about Blu:
http://blublu.org
The Village Voice said it’s good and that’s all that matters. More info about the Guy Denning and David Walker show at Brooklynite here.
GUY DENNING • DAVID WALKER
June 12 – July 10
Musical Guest: DJ REKHA
The Figment Festival on Governor’s Island boasts so many live arts and activities for free this weekend that it is guaranteed to relax and exhaust you simultaneously. A number of street artists are going to be there performing live, as well as a number of interactive installations and performances to challenge and titillate.
Governors island continues to expand and grow, and FIGMENT this year is no exception. Check the ferry schedule (free). There are ferries from Brooklyn again this year. Visitors are encouraged to bring bikes and food.
Figment all Weekend http://figmentproject.org/2010/events/figment-nyc-2010-event-projects-artists/
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Chris Stain has been busy participating in shows in LA and Philadelphia and Queens, NY over the past couple of months – including this piece he did for the wall at Welling Court last month.
Now he’s releasing a new print based on the same image:
The artist talks about where the image comes from, “This print was inspired by the J.B.’s song of the same title. A lot of times growin’ up in inner city conditions children can get lost in the mix and their value of self worth has the potential to rapidly decline. What I wanted to show with this piece is that no matter where you are from you are important because you are alive and you have just as much importance as the next person.”
Anyone in New York will tell you that the adage holds true if you are trying to get your dream to happen in this city– a band, a restaurant, a store, a website, a clothing line. It could be a genius idea, but you’re going to have to work for it. Gallerist/curator Andrew Michael Ford and artist Mikal Hameed, both in the Brooklyn neighborhood of Williamsburg since 1999, have put in plenty of perspiration getting separate projects off the ground over the last decade in NYC. This spring as their shared dream of an art center and gallery in Billyburg gathered momentum, they redoubled their efforts and called every artist and source they knew. Tomorrow, their dream, called “99%”, will open with a community fundraiser auction of prints by those artists. Ford and Hameed are going to do the necessary perspiring to make it happen.
Common Dreams, Rooted In Respect
Together, the two partners (along with a silent 3rd ) have discussed this gallery and community art space for a year and a half. Studio talks about formal goals, bar-stool wisdom about esoteric ones, and serious footwork finally secured this location in a Brooklyn neighborhood considered a Street Art destination for artists and fans since the late 90’s. Formerly an artist enclave, the neighborhood is rapidly changing as rezoning from 2005 allowed gentrification to rapidly bland the bohemian vibe, even as the change was slowed by the speed-bump of a huge recession. Ironically, as the street art in the neighborhood is gradually disappearing, 99%, a gallery that celebrates it, opens it doors.
Mikal (known professionally as M11X), an innovative ingenious creator of art merging furniture and stereos, came from a graff background on the west coast writing as SMUGE with the WCA crew as a youth.
“So I was a writer, then I was an MC, a break dancer, whatever – all 5 elements. I started to gradually change and become well connected with people who are part of the street art scene,” says Mikal as he recounts his path to this place. He recalls how he ran a gallery called Headquarters in San Francisco and Oakland before coming to New York and running MJH’s gallery in Williamsburg.
“This is just part of my whole evolution. It’s been building up inside of me for so long. “
As he speaks about his goals for 99% he talks about the life of an artist. You can tell that he sincerely wants to bring a greater command of the craft to the newer graff and street artists out today – people he refers to often as “The Kids” .
Ford, a gallerist best known for his work as gallery director at both the pivotal Street Art gallery Ad Hoc Gallery in Bushwick and for the Dark Pop and Pop Surrealists at Last Rites Gallery in Chelsea, hopes to merge his affinities for any number of current art movements, most considered “outside” or lo-brow by the established gallery scene.
“Yeah, I think it’s more about ‘the work’, the skill levels, and the imagination. The artist may also put up work in the street or do comic books for a profession or they are a professional illustrator but they have such a desire to do personal work. A lot of galleries will look at them as simply an illustrator and not an artist, and I think those kinds of distinctions are ridiculous. An artist is an artist and they want to express themselves creatively and they want to have a place where they can do that. ”
Me and my shadow. Andrew Michael Ford stands by a much loved wall in the studio and a view of his portrait by Street Artist Ellis G. on the door
Street Art, comic books, illustration, pin-up, animation, new media, graffiti, tattoos, folk art, – these terms pepper-spray through the conversation as Andrew, an enthusiastic conveyor of ideas about the current state of art and the gallery scene, barely keeps up with his own ideas. Clearly he hopes to create a gallery where unsung and marginalized art forms are given the respect he thinks they’ve missed. Street Art may be hot at the moment, but labels are not going to be the determining factor for whether 99% Gallery works with an artist or not.
BSA: Are we going to retire the term “Street Art” at any time in the near future?
Andrew: That obviously is a public debate, and obviously that is something that everyone should be involved with as far as what’s going to happen with these other terms like “low brow”, “pop surrealism”, “street art” and similar terms.
Mikal: They asked the same question about graffiti in the late 80s and I don’t think we were ever able to retire it.
BSA: So is there such a thing as “Street Art: Phase 2”?
Mikal: I think we are at Phase 3 or Phase 4 at this point.
But it’s not just going to be a gallery. The guys want to create an art space that serves and educates, along with showing cutting edge art.
Sketching out their plans for the near future, Andrew explains, “We’re not talking about traditional education here – we’re talking about re-examining how the work is presented to people. I would say first phase is about lectures and talks, and we can work our way into workshops and classes down the road.” The ideas for educational topics run the gamut, but they often touch on the basics that both partners feel have been missed by many of today’s artists.
“Yeah, kids need to learn how to do their own framing, make their own stretchers”, says Mikal, “I wish somebody taught me how to do that.”
Sounding like he is creating a new class on-the-fly, Andrew jumps in, “I do have a traditional art education background, — it was so much conceptual stuff, so much theory. There wasn’t a whole lot of practical stuff. It was amazing that I could have this degree and yet it was after school that I had to learn a lot of stuff on my own. It seems like a simple thing but I have this conversation with people all the time; What is the difference between a Giclée print, a hand silkscreened print, and what is a serigraph?”
A grassroots, populist philosophy enters the conversation again and again, and it becomes evident that the focus will be on the person, their approach, and the talent –rather than the formal educational background or pedigree of an artist.
“Yeah we want to create an equal playing field for a lot of artists,” stresses Mikal.
What playing field are they trying to equal out? Mikal responds, “Sometimes it just comes down to skills and imagination. You may not have the proper education but you have your passion and your motivation about this whole movement – you should be recognized as well. Your sh*t should be up right next to the other stuff because your education could have come from somewhere else beside school.”
How often do you see this? Doze Green and Martha Cooper catching a tag on the wall of the new gallery.
So the men have a lot in store, and they have what can only be described as a healthy dose of mutual respect.
Andrew praises Mikal’s talents and explains what he brings to the partnership, “One of the most important things is that Mikal is a very vibrant active artist who is doing shows regularly and has a different relationship with people than me because he is a working artist. It is really important to me to have Mikal because we are really good sounding boards for each other. I might be thinking a little more about the business side of things and how we are going to present it and he is thinking more about the specific piece of art and where the artist is coming from. He could say to me, ‘You may want to consider this because this is how the artist is going to feel’. I think it is a really really good match”
For his part, Mikal sounds solid in his dedication, “The people that work with Andrew just have straight up respect for him and they know that he’s the main guy in this business right now but he just needed his own platform to show everybody what’s up.”
Is this place big enough for all their dreams?
“No, but it’s a start. There is no place like that,” says Mikal.
Andrew agrees, “I’m really grateful for the fact that it is a tremendous starting point and an incredible location. I think it is going to benefit everybody that we work with”.
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images of Andrew Michael Ford and Mikaal Hameed © Steven P. Harrington
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99% Gallery and Art Center
99 North 10th (between Berry and Wythe), Brooklyn, NY 11211
OPENING RECEPTION: JUNE 11TH, 7-11PM
FUNDRAISER PRINT GROUP SHOW SILENT AUCTION to benefit 99% and the artists.
$5 COVER
Participating artists for the print show include:
Bast,Chris Mendoza,Cycle,Dennis McNett,Doze Green,Ellis G,Eric White,Esao Andrews,EZO,Gaia,Ian Kuali’I,Imminent Disaster,Jeremiah Ketner,Jose Parla,Kenji Hirata,Lady Pink,Martha Cooper,Martin Wittfooth,Maya Hayuk,Mel Kadel,Morning Breath,Nathan Lee Pickett,Orlando Reyes,Rage Johnson,Ricky Powell,Rostarr,Ryan Humphrey,Skewville,Swoon,Tara McPherson,Tono Radvany,Voodo Fe,Xiaoqing Ding,Yuri Shimojo
For more information about the auction
CONTACT:info@ninetyninegallery.com
WEBSITE: www.ninetyninegallery.com
Unfortunately the only flesh that could be hunted was one of the Lehman Brothers hiding in a cave in the Brambles since the crash and a couple of lost social x-rays looking for the old Tavern on the Green. More plastic than meat.
In fact New York has it’s share of wildlife, and I don’t just mean the Annual Zombie Crawl or Amanda LaPore, or even Macy’s One Day Sale. Since the early 2000’s the D.I.Y. kids fascination with putting lifelike animals on every available surface has continued unabated, and street artists have similarly loosed plenty of birds, frogs, cats, snakes, rabbits, wolves, squirrels, bees and multiple other species onto our streets. The occurrence of lifelike and fictional animals has been frightening, adorable, educational, and enjoyable.
One theory for the reappearance of the natural world in such numbers on our street walls (yes, there are theories) is rooted in native people prophecies that the animals are spirits coming to reclaim what once was theirs. Looking at how humans are rapaciously mucking up the natural world, I don’t know why they haven’t started diving at our necks already.
So, perhaps all of these street art animals are here to remind us how vital it is for us to to re-connect with them and live in harmony with each other. For instance, I give the squirrels and pigeons of our city much credit for making it here; Tough, resilient, and cranky, they may be the original New Yorkers. I’ve learned so much from them. When a pigeon refuses to move from the spot on the sidewalk where she is waddling I smile and walk around. New York is hers as much as it is mine, dammit.
The images below, some previously published on BSA and some brand new, are a tribute to both the artists and their subjects.
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BROOKLYN STREET ART LOVES YOU MORE EVERY DAY
