Hush “Twin” Opening Tonight at New Image Gallery (Barring Rapture)

May 21, 2011 Artists

“That’s Great, It Starts With An Earthquake”

Well folks it’s the End of the World, as we know it. How’re you feeling? Actually, according to a certain sect of clairvoyant Christians today is Judgement Day, and the end of the world is not until October, so you should still forget about that Christmas Layaway Plan you have at Walmart.

New York subways and buses have been pummeled for weeks with pulp novel style posters impugning the good name of the Devil and overweight puff pastry people from the Midwest have been milling around Times Square in sensible shoes telling us that repenting from our sins is pretty much going to be the only way out of the Late Great Planet Earth. As usual, these wild eyed tourists never make it out to Brooklyn, so our borough is going now to Hell – which will be big news to the Hasidic population.

HUSH (photo © Todd Mazer)

For those of you unwashed who are still here after the 6 o’clock earthquakes roll through each time zone across God damned America we bring you the gloriously sanctified beauty of “Twin”, the new HUSH show at that den of iniquity called New Image Gallery in God forsaken West Hollywood.

HUSH (photo © Todd Mazer)

“Tagging, Graf, Street Art and art; each is always a choice, an action,” HUSH told us a couple of years ago when discussing his work, and his open approach to borrowing from comic books, graffiti, and traditional Japanese iconography is what makes his work modern.

Internalizing and interpreting the energy from Krazy LA has been a dream for a free expressionist like HUSH, who likes to throw everything at the wall – tagging, painting, collage, – deconstructing and reconstructing until it achieves balance. “I’m big on progression and I’m always looking at how to take my work forward, pushing it while still retaining pointers back to previous works,” says the artist. With a number of shows and countries and street pieces under his belt, the British native is also quietly achieving a mastery of his technique, as urban turns urbane in the finely sprayed misty glow surrounding these peaceful idyllic visages, rising from the blue cacophony.

HUSH (photo © Todd Mazer)

Marsea Goldberg, a wild and fine former Brooklyn gal, has been looking out for and championing the new talent on the graffiti/Street Art/fine art scene at New Image since the mid nineties, including artists like Bäst, Cleon Peterson, Clare Rojas, Date Farmers, Ed Templeton, Jo Jackson, Neck Face, Os Gemeos, and Retna, so she knows what she is looking for and knows how to create a charged environment for artists to stretch in.

“Hush is a fantastic artist and he has a down to earth, hard working vibrant spirit,” Marsea explains, “I’ve liked his work for a long time – The first time I saw his work was at the “Cans Festival” which Banksy put on in London 4 years ago. When I saw his colorful, ornate murals in the long tunnel I was beyond impressed. The interesting thing about Hush’s art is the combination of influences.”

HUSH (photo © Todd Mazer)

For his part, HUSH is taking the opportunity seriously, “It’s great to be at New Image because of its history… I’ve always admired the rawness and energy of the place and Marsea’s commitment to whatever this art movement is.”

As his work mutates and configures across mediums, one might wonder how much of this has meaning to him and whether it is an involuntary stream of favorite symbols and techniques combined and recombined. “I feel like my works have matured and I’m creating my own visual language, even though it’s probably only me who understands it,” he says smiling.

HUSH (photo © Todd Mazer)

“It’s funny – I’ve had this work in my head for the last few years but it’s just fitting into the story now. I think I’ve got until the year 2014 in paintings now but I’ll have to take you through it in real time… I’m looking forward to showing how it all pans out in the future though.” We would love to stick around here on Earth to see how his work turns out in ’14, but there is someone knocking on the door…

HUSH (photo © Todd Mazer)

Photographer Todd Mazer captured the artist working outside this week on the “Barracuda” wall where Saber and Shepard Fairey did their near iconic flag interpretations. And through Todd’s lense we get to see Hush tagging the gallery walls and the installation underway.