September 2011

Fun Friday 09.30.11

September 30, 2011 Art Fair, Artists, Brooklyn, California, Events, L.A., Los Angeles, Manhattan, Norway, Nuart, NYC, On the Street, Opening, Performance, Queens, Stavanger

1. Fountain LA This Weekend
2. NUART 2011 – Stavanger, Norway
3. “Bring to Light” in Greenpoint Brooklyn for the 2nd Year – Saturday Night!
3. “Rituals” on 14th Street, Art in Odd Places
4. Pantheon Projects at THE NEW YORK ART BOOK FAIR AT MoMA PS1
5. Art Platform Los Angeles
6. RETNA at Art Platform (LA)
7. Brian Adam Douglas at Art Platform (LA)

Fountain LA This Weekend

New York’s own specially warped outsiders are in LA this weekend, and BSA is happy to sport support for whatever madness they can stir up, including the Murder Lounge, which Dave Ill says will be in full effect. (Murder- .slang. To defeat decisively). When you are milling around the big LA shows this weekend make sure you stop by Fountain and say hello to Señor Kesting and check out the Street Art contingent doing their thing on the Left Coast ya’ll.

(Image Shark Toof © Jaime Rojo)

Fountain Art Fair includes a Street Art outdoor exhibition with: GILF!, Eddie Colla, Tiki Jay One, Shark Toof, Chor Boogie, Hugh Leeman, Billi Kid & CIG, Ian Ross, and Cryptik getting up in the courtyard.

For more information regarding location, time and schedule of events please click on the link below:

http://www.brooklynstreetart.com/theblog/?p=24957

NUART 2011 – Stavanger, Norway

Dan Witz “King Baby” (photo courtesy of NUART © Dan Witz)

NUART 2011 has arrived and the streets and buildings of Stavanger are a heating up with all the artists getting up and doing what they know what to do best: Paint. Brooklyn’s own Dan Witz already hit the streets with his “King Baby” street installations on faux city street signage. Tonight (Friday) their is a panel debate with artists, Carlo McCormick and Juxtapoz Magazine that we wouldn’t miss.

Artists include DAN WITZ (US), DAVID CHOE & DVS1 (US), VHILS (PO), HERBERT BAGLIONE (BR), DOLK (NO), LUCY McCLAUCHLAN (UK), HERAKUT (DE), TELLAS (IT), ESCIF (ES), HYURO (ES), PHLEGM (UK)

For a complete listing of events and schedules please visit the NUART site:

http://www.nuart.no/

“Bring to Light” in Greenpoint Brooklyn for the 2nd Year – Saturday Night!

“All manner of projectors blasted on the walls with myriad images, forms, and shapes, some breathtakingly beautiful. Other artists created sculptures and installations that worked as light vessels and amorphous creatures while collaborative dancers entertained groupings of appreciative observers.” from BSA’s review on Huffington Post

Bring to Light Nuit Blanche New York 2010 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

OCTOBER 1ST, 2011, Greenpoint, Brooklyn New York. 6:00 pm to Midnight.

Bring to Light is a free nighttime public festival of art in New York City that takes place simultaneously with “nuit blanche” events in cities around the world. Inviting emerging and established artists to make site-specific installations of light, sound, performance and projection art, the event creates an immersive spectacle for thousands of visitors to re-imagine public space and civic life. Bring to Light will transform streets, parks and the industrial waterfront of Greenpoint, Brooklyn set against dramatic views of the Manhattan skyline.

Nuit Blanche (French for “white night” or “all-nighter”) is a global network of locally-organized nighttime contemporary art events. Originating in Paris in 2001, the nuit blanche concept now involves millions of people in cities around the world.

One performance we will NOT miss will be Chris Jordan and Josh Goldberg, who have serious chops in public projection work, presenting CHRONO GIANTS.

Still from the work in progress for this year’s NY Nuit Blanche from artists Chris Jordan and Josh Golberg. (photo © Chris Jordan)

Also included will be Chris’s timelapse of Hurricane Irene – Projected inside a Giant CLOUD:

For further information, schedule, directions and full details visit Bring to Light site:

http://www.bringtolightnyc.org/

“Rituals” on 14th Street, Art in Odd Places

Art in Odd Places 2011: RITUAL features a wide variety of actions, participatory performances, theatrical presentations, public installations, and small and large-scale interventions all of which revolve around the concept of ritual.

Alejandro Guzman “El Guaraguao in the Barrio”, 2011 (photo courtesy © Alejandro Guzman)

Art in Odd Places (AiOP) presents visual and performance art in public spaces with an annual festival each October along 14th Street in Manhattan, NYC from Avenue C to the Hudson River.

Opening Reception for Art In Odd Places Festival 2011

Friday, September 30, 6-9pm

Theaterlab
137 West 14th Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues

New York, NY

For a complete listing of artists and a full schedule of events and locations visit Art In Odd Places site:

http://www.artinoddplaces.org/index.php

THE NEW YORK ART BOOK FAIR AT MoMA PS1

This art book fair always rewards you – just walking around the floorplan of MoMA PS1 is a trip and the books are tripped out. This year we are in a new one – The Pantheon Catalog from Joyce Manalo and Daniel Feral;

“The street has always been the thumping beat that pumps the pulsing lifeblood through creative New York. Yes, there is a lot of action behind the walls in the offices and galleries and studios and stages and clubs and boardrooms, but everyone knows it is the kinetic electricity of life on the street that inspires New Yorkers to dig deeper and dream bigger and play hard.”

~ from the essay Street Art New York, The 2000s, Steven P. Harrington and Jaime Rojo of Brooklyn Street Art.

If that is not enough to make you absolutely plow down crowds to get there, consider the real talents who are going to be there to SIGN YOUR COPY:

***Catalog Signing on Sunday, October 2nd, 3-3:45 PM featuring***

Charlie Ahearn, Chris Pape aka Freedom, KET1 RIS and Toofly

Joyce will be waiting for you!

Join Pantheon Projects at The NY Art Book Fair
September 30-October 2, 2011, 11AM-7PM, at PS1/MoMA, Free Admission
Hours: Friday–Sunday, 11AM-7PM

THE NY ART BOOK FAIR
September 30–October 2, 2011
MoMA PS1

MoMA PS1
22-25 Jackson Avenue at 46th Avenue
Long Island City, NY (map)

Art Platform Los Angeles

From their press release; Art Platform – Los Angeles will demonstrate the rich and vibrant cultural landscape of Southern California and underscore Los Angeles’ influential position within the contemporary art world. MMPI is one of the largest show producers in the world, including a growing portfolio of premium art shows. We have assured the continued development and enhancement of the Art Show division by bringing together some of the top minds in art fairs under one partnership”

For more information, location and a complete list of exhibitors please visit Art Platform at:

http://www.artplatform-losangeles.com/

RETNA at Art Platform (LA)

If you can’t wait to see the Retna spread as shot by David LaChapelle in October’s Vanity Fair you can check out these new pieces at Art Platform and see BSA’s photos from his New York show this spring.

Retna in NYC (photo © Jaime Rojo)

New Image Art Gallery will be exhibiting at Art Platfrom Los Angeles Featuring new large-scale paintings on canvas and paper by RETNA Visit them at booth #108

Brian Adam Douglas at Art Platform (LA)

Andrew Edlin Gallery will exhibit Brooklyn Fine and Street Artist Brian Adam Douglas along with Henry Darger, Thornton Dial and Jeremy Everett. Visit them at booth 814.

Brian Adam Douglas

The Center Cannot Hold, 2011

cut paper on birch panel with UVA varnish

6 foot diamater

Anthony Lister Talks to BSA : Analysis and Constant Consideration

September 29, 2011 Artists, Brooklyn, California, Features, Florida, Interview, Los Angeles, Manhattan, Miami, NYC, On the Street, San Francisco, Street Talker Interview, Venice Beach

“I’m like a hairdresser I guess.”

Painter Anthony Lister is also a Street Artist. His surreal pop and celebrity culture-infused abstractions are candy encrusted apples which may have something sharp inside. Many are figurative studies and wire frames bending wildly into characters who cavort and mock with blunt swipes of color, overlaid by costumed sexual role play… or is that a personal projection? Did I mention elegance, defiance, wit? Wait, there is so much here! Truth is, his work can be a cock-eyed psychological tempest, jarring to the head, strangely sweet.

Anthony Lister in Brooklyn (photo © Jaime Rojo)

A decade of discovery under his superhero belt, Mr. Lister continues to analyze and build his creative practice and it always includes work inside the gallery and outside on the street. He’s currently preparing for his solo show in Sydney called “Bogan Paradise” at Gallery A.S. At the same time he’s part of a group show with a gaggle of his Aussie expats on view at 941 Geary in San Francisco for “Young and Free”, including Kid Zoom, Dabs & Myla, Dmote, New2, Ben Frost, Meggs, Ha-Ha, Reka, Rone, Sofles and Vexta. Not to mention his participation in our show last month in Los Angeles at C.A.V.E. with Thinkspace, “Street Art Saved My Life : 39 New York Stories“.

The artist took some time recently to talk to Brooklyn Street Art about his practice;

Brooklyn Street Art: How much of one of your painted portraits is autobiographical? In other words, what portion of Mr. Lister is super hero, super model, furtive schoolboy, or Homer Simpson?
Anthony Lister: I don’t really think about myself when I paint. My figurative works are more like reflections of characteristics I absorb from real life day to day.

Brooklyn Street Art: If you were to wear colored glasses, which color do you think you would most likely screen the world through?
Anthony Lister: Pink, like John Lennon.

Anthony Lister in Brooklyn (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Brooklyn Street Art: Francis Bacon said, “The creative process is a cocktail of instinct, skill, culture and a highly creative feverishness.” Would you drink that cocktail?
Anthony Lister: Nice words. I agree.

Brooklyn Street Art: What role does analysis play in your creative process when bringing a painting to fruition?
Anthony Lister: Analysis is the outcome of considered processing. Constant consideration is crucial.

Anthony Lister in Brooklyn (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Brooklyn Street Art: A big piece you did on Metropolitan in Brooklyn – you reworked that face a couple of times over a period of months, producing what appeared as a slowly morphing image. Were you covering up tags, or were you unhappy with the original, or maybe combating the effects of age with a little nip and tuck?
Anthony Lister: When I re-work street paintings I think of it like I am a hairdresser. When something is in the public it has a different existence to something living privately in a residence. I’m like a hairdresser I guess.

Brooklyn Street Art: You have spoken about your work as reality, or a reaction to realities. What realities are you depicting these days?
Anthony Lister: I just finished a body of work for a solo show in Sydney. This next body of work is about contemporary Australian culture. The exhibition is titled “Bogan Paradise.”

Anthony Lister in Brooklyn (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Brooklyn Street Art: When you consider the Street Art scene that evolved around Melbourne, how would you characterize its nature in a way that differentiates it from the work in other cities around the world?
Anthony Lister: No different. This whole street art thing has sprung up post the turn of the digital revolution so it is on the Internet quick and the artists who inspire others and the ones who are easily inspired are constantly swimming in the same aesthetic pools of consciousness. Not to mention that most of the prominent artists travel lots so it is easy to see work of the same artist in multiple cities around the world at the same time.

Anthony Lister in Brooklyn (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Brooklyn Street Art: The titles you give your gallery pieces are entertaining, instructive, illustrative. Do you ever want to place a placard near a piece you’ve done on the street – just to make sure the message gets across?
Anthony Lister: No. My street practice is less thoughtful and therefore needs less commentary.

Brooklyn Street Art: When is a painting complete?
Anthony Lister: When it tells me so.

Anthony Lister in Brooklyn (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anthony Lister in Manhattan (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anthony Lister in Miami for Primary Flight. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anthony Lister in Los Angeles. LA FreeWalls (photo © Todd Mazer)

Anthony Lister in Los Angeles LA FreeWalls (photo © Todd Mazer)

Cry me a rainbow, Anthony Lister in Los Angeles. LA FreeWalls (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anthony Lister in Venice Beach CA. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anthony Lister in San Francisco for Young and Free at 941 Geary (photo © Andrius Lypia)

Want to see more work? Just “Lister” it.

www.anthonylister.com

West One Presents: “Freedom Suite” At Environment (Los Angeles, CA)

September 28, 2011 Artists, California, Events, Gallery, Los Angeles, Opening

West One

WEST ONE “Freedom Suite” At Environment 8126 Beverly Boulevard Los Angeles, CA 90048   September 30, 2011 – December 30, 2011 Opening Reception September 30, 2011 7-10pm

WEST, the renowned graffiti artist-turned-abstract painter, has joined forces with furniture company Environment for a public mural and solo show titled “Freedom Suite” that will be unveiled at a kick-off event September 30, 2011. WEST will exhibit new paintings inside the showroom and will paint a large-scale mural on the exterior of Environment’s Beverly Boulevard, Los Angeles location creating community through shared ideas, knowledge, culture and art. Some proceeds will be donated to the charity Jamaican Kids <http://www.jamaicankids.org/Jamaican_Kids/Our_mission.html> .  “We live in a vast city where everything’s at right angles,” WEST said. “My work is movement and energy. It’s organic. The viewer will see different things – maybe themselves, maybe the city. Maybe the broader environment. I hope to make us look at our space, our environment, a little differently.”

Open to the public starting September 30, 2011, the WEST exhibition will be on display at the Environment Furniture Showroom, 8126 Beverly Boulevard in Los Angeles through December 31, 2011.

ABOUT WEST:

http://www.westonefc.com/

Recognized as one of the most prolific artists in the New York Graffiti scene throughout the 1980’s and 90’s, West has been painting publicly since 1984. Born and raised in New York City, the great grandson of Russian-Jewish immigrants, West began painting on the number 1 Broadway local subway. Throughout the mid to late 80’s West became known for his clean letters, and as one of the last of a handful of artists who was actively painting just before the demise of subway Graffiti in New York. Throughout the 1990’s, West, along with his crew Fame City, was a major influence in the New York City graffiti movement by spearheading concept-driven, thematic productions which are now standard in large scale graffiti mural painting.  Since 2001 West has taken a radical departure from the uniform structure of traditional graffiti letters and technique. In his current work he has pushed into the realms of abstraction and stripped the art form of all of its traditional trappings of color, medium, and process. As a result a new and unique language has emerged in his work.  West first exhibited in 1985 with Librizzi Gallery’s ‘Graffiti & East Village Artists’ show, and has since exhibited in numerous solo and group shows in New York, and internationally.

New from Specter: “The first piece of street art in Tajikistan”

September 28, 2011 Dushanbe, On the Street, Tajikistan

Dobroye ytro !

Brooklyn based Street Artist and Fine Artist Specter was in Dushanbe, Tajikistan for two weeks where he gave a few lectures and conducted workshops about street art and public art and his experiences as a Street Artist in the last few years.

Specter. Dushanbe, Tajikistan (photo © Specter)

“While I was there I also had a chance to put up what I would call the first piece of street art in Tajikistan,” says Specter, and we have no reason to doubt it. The hand painted wheat-pasted pieces Specter has been doing featuring sober, no-nonsense portraits swathed in woven fabric that wraps or floats loosely around the head or torso. As is his practice, the neighborhood, history, and people play into his selections of model and materials.

An assistant stands aside the new Specter piece in Dushanbe, Tajikistan (photo © Specter)

Okay, everybody look this way. Ready? Smile! A new Specter piece in Dushanbe, Tajikistan (photo © Specter)

Specter. Dushanbe, Tajikistan. Specter at work with local artists during a week of workshops at the Bactria Cultural Center. (photo © Specter)

Specter. Dushanbe, Tajikistan (photo © Specter)

Central Asian Graffiti king, Evgenii Makshakov AKA Chervi, also taught workshops and gave lectures for art students at Bactria.

Chervi. Dushanbe, Tajikistan (photo © Specter)

The Lectures and workshops took place at the Bactria Cultural Center in Dushambe.

This project was made possible by CEC ArtsLink and The Department of State.

For more images of Chervi’s work visit his Flickr page:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/chervi/

See more Specter work at www.specterart.com

Fountain Art Fair Expands to Los Angeles for Art Platform and Pacific Standard Time (Los Angeles, CA)

September 27, 2011 Art Fair, California, Los Angeles

Fountain Art Fair

Los Angeles get ready – Fountain Art Fair has officially landed on the west coast, prepared to bring you a weekend packed full of art, music and more. Fountain kicks off with Flavorpill Friday, sponsored of course by Flavorpill, the coolest culture gurus around. Along with our exceptional platform featuring the edgy galleries, independent artist projects curated by Ever Gold Gallery, and collectives, as well as local DJs to get you grooving, Fountain’s Flavorpill Giveaway is sure to be a highlight of your weekend. Be sure to visit Flavorpill’s media booth for the chance to win unique prizes including original works by Fountain returnees Brian Leo and Danni Rash from Christina Ray Gallery, a special edition Fountain surf board created by Lindsay Carron and Courtney Branch of Board Well, your very own retro Lomography camera and more.

Fountain’s presenting sponsor LA Weekly is taking charge of Saturday night, along with culture industry insider and online magazine Newestra. Get your photo snapped at Newestra’s funky photo booth while listening to the easy beats of Los Angeles DJs La Muerte, Antidote, P-Dot, Dances with Wolves, and the perfectly sweet and viscious Bullet & SnowFox. Stop by Yelp’s table to pick up some swag and head to the courtyard to check out our massive installation of the wickedest street art around. Co-curated by Fountain veteran Carly Ivan Garcia, this slew of artists is ready to bust out the aerosol in Fountain tradition of bringing the street to you. Artists include: GILF!, Eddie Colla, Tiki Jay One, Shark Toof, Chor Boogie, Hugh Leeman, Billi Kid & CIG, Ian Ross, and Cryptik.

Fountain Exhibitors: CHALK, Los Angeles * Ever Gold, San Francisco * HungryMan , San Francisco * Murder Lounge, New York * Cheap & Plastique, Brooklyn * Christina Ray Gallery, New York * Tinca Art, New York * Blythe Projects, Los Angeles

Independent Artist Projects: Ryan Cronin, New York * The Mechanism, Los Angeles * Carly Ivan Garcia, San Francisco * GILF !, Brooklyn * Greg Haberny, New York * Brian Leo, New York * Evo Love, Miami * Danni Rash, New York * Aleve Mei Loh, Los Angeles

About Fountain Art Fair

Fountain is an exhibition of avant garde artwork in New York during Armory week, Miami during Art Basel Miami Beach and Los Angeles during Pacific Standard Time weekend.

Location:

Lot 613
(613 Imperial Street LA, CA 90021)

September 30 – October 2, 2011
General Public Hours:
12pm – 7pm, every day

Special Events:
Friday, September 30, 7pm – 12am – Opening Night Reception
Musical Performances: TBA (21 & over)
Saturday, October 1, 7pm – 12am – LA Weekly Presents Musical Performances: TBA (21 & over)

For complete details and schedule of events please visit Fountain’s site:

http://fountainartfair.com/

First Look at “King Baby” in Norway With Dan Witz

September 27, 2011 Artists

Even in the pristine and civil streets of Stavanger, Norway you may come across the creepy surprise of the “King Baby”, the new powder white bald man character popping out of traffic signs by Street Artist Dan Witz. The peerless Nuart 2011 is underway now with 12 artists from 9 countries arriving in the last week to see what kind of trouble they can get into at this curated out of doors festival. For now, this is what Mr. Witz has come up with, but he’s just touched down so the King of WTF is merely getting started.

Dan will be leading the first childrens program ever for Nuart on Saturday, but hopefully he won’t be showing the tykes any of these cranky King Babies – a perfect mix of red eyed immaturity and egocentricity ready to jump out and pinch their noses. Actually this guy could calm some of these aggressive drivers in Brooklyn who we’re always dodging, now that we think of it.

Lookin’ good, Baby King! All photos © Dan Witz

<<<>>>><<<>><><>>>>><<>>>>

Read about Nuart 2011 Here

Nuart 2011 includes DAN WITZ (US), DAVID CHOE & DVS1 (US), VHILS (PO), HERBERT BAGLIONE (BR), DOLK (NO), LUCY McCLAUCHLAN (UK), HERAKUT (DE), TELLAS (IT), ESCIF (ES), HYURO (ES), PHLEGM (UK)

Street Artist Gaia Creates a Memorial Unexpectedly

September 27, 2011 Florida, Miami

Street Artist Gaia just had an unexpected encounter with grief and memory after putting up one of his carrier pigeons on a fire damaged house. He was in Miami to paint a collaborative mural with 131 Projects honoring outsider artist Purvis Young at the Bakehouse studio complex.

While painting his mural he broke away to adorn the entrance of the house with a wheat-paste of his bird-in-hand, a linotype print that has appeared in neglected areas a number of times. The image, out of place and temporary, can suddenly bring a neglected place alive. Maybe it’s the juxtaposition of the elements, the symbolism of this hand made bird traditionally trained to carry and deliver messages.

The following day while he continued working on his mural, he looked across the street to see someone on the property gazing at the bird quietly, then raising her arms to take a photo. His curiosity was peaked. Later, the story took a little turn.

“While painting in the evening I was approached by two women looking for who was responsible for the new piece on the house. After admitting culpability, they divulged to me that their brother had burned to death on the premises, and that they thought the carrier pigeon in the hand was a sign of his passing,” Gaia says as he talks with some wonder about this sudden interaction with people whose lives are so connected to the building.

On the one hand, it is amazing that someone is so affected by the appearance of something we recognize as a simple piece of street art. But when you think about our sense of place, the history and memories associated with it can be powerful. Sometimes when you are in so much grief and you are crying out for solace, you look for something, anything to comfort yourself. To see this image on such a scale, on the front of a burned house where your loved one died must have seemed like a sign from God. And truthfully, who is to say that it was not a sign from God, with artist as messenger?

“Their gratitude was something unexpected,” Gaia says as relates the story with a little shock, and possibly re-consideration of the impact his work can have. Upon reflection, the Street Artist says he is satisfied with the experience meeting the two new friends and his practice of placing his temporary works in places like this, concluding that the story is “a small, but powerful case for street art.”

(original images courtesy and © of the artist)

Art In Odd Places 2011 Presents: “Rituals on 14 Street” (Manhattan, NY)

September 26, 2011 Artists, Events, Manhattan, NYC, On the Street, Opening

Art in Odd Places

Marissa Mickelberg – Goat Walk (photo © Courtesy of the Artist)

Opening Reception: Friday, September 30, 6-9pm at Theaterlab, 137 W 14th Street.

Rituals on 14th Street

A ritual is generally defined as a series of established actions that are carried out in private or public spaces, by individuals or by groups, for their spiritual, social, or political significance. Tapping into the everyday significance of these habits, the artists in AiOP 2011: RITUAL continuously integrate these practices in their work to explore a broad range of issues in contemporary life such as politics, culture, religious beliefs, notions of individuality and community, the endurance of the body and the fragility of life, the relationship with nature, among many others.

The collective character of the public setting offered by one of the busiest New York City arteries as the context for the festival has opened up the possibilities for the ritualistic interactions between artists, objects and people along 14th Street. The street’s daily environment will be transformed by secular and sacred activities and the relationship and reaction of the people attracted by the festival’s ephemeral events. A new sense of place and time, inherent to the concept of ritual, will confront passersby as they flow through the sidewalks, subway stations and storefronts during their everyday commutes or their spontaneous visits to the neighborhood.

The work will be performed and made available along the east-west corridor of 14th Street. The projects may be different each time as they are informed by the varying interpretations of the spectators and their nomadic qualities as they travel through the street. Artists creating pilgrimages will bring new importance to particular places, shrines will be created as sites of worship, and the public will witness miracles. Reenactments of past events based on the collections of oral history, the use of symbols, the exploration of traditions and myths, and the use of magic and astrology are key to some of the artists’ work. Another group of artists create impermanent situations that are reminiscent of childhood and familiar events; worldly rituals that refer to identity politics, queer culture, dominance and submission, are experienced as organic and transcendental happenings.

The use of the body is central to artists that touch upon life and death, real and spiritual borders, love affairs, human relationships and the connection to nature. Through music and dance, walks, palm reading and the use of masks, wigs, and spraying perfumes and scattering ashes, some artists evoke mundane obsessions, venerate popular icons and reject and criticize certain aspects of today’s social values.

From kissing trees to making wishes, from healing souls to dreaming in a park, from washing feet to praying to the sky, the artists transcend the borders of the everyday space. By ritualizing actions and highlighting the different realities that coexist, the projects of AiOP 2011: RITUAL manipulate impressions, satisfy emotions, create effects, and most importantly transform – not only the surroundings in which they position their work, but also the audiences they engage, and who will become fundamental to the ritual itself.

– Kalia Brooks & Trinidad Fombella, Guest Curators

For a full schedule of events, artists projects and venues please visit AiOP site below:

http://www.artinoddplaces.org/

London West Bank Gallery Presents: K-GUY Solo Show “Iconinc Irrigation” (London, UK)

September 26, 2011 Artists, Events, Gallery, London, Opening, U.K.

K-GUY

Private View is on Thursday 10/11/11 6:30pm-10pm and is by invitation only. Please RSVP to guestlist@londonwestbank.com

Overunder Completes Astounding Tiled Piece : “Living Walls: Albany” Update

September 26, 2011 Albany, Artists, new york, On the Street

Overunder stays after class at “Living Walls” and gets extra credit

Street Artist Overunder just completed his astounding tiled installation this weekend in Albany on the wall of L’esperance Tile Works, a local tile maker with a special 1920s “dust press” that the artist also worked into the piece. For an artist with such a fluid and freewheeling figurative style with a spray can, it is surprising to see it interpreted with such permanence and cogitative consideration. As part of “Living Walls : Albany”, Overunder had already smashed a few walls around the city in the weeks leading up to this opportunity, but after touring the small tile press facility with co-owner Donald Shore, he fell in love with the idea of tiles as medium. “A lot of these tiles were in the backyard up north at our other facility – he and White Cocoa were standing in the pouring rain digging through these boxes of discards and overruns and he brought these back with him,” explains Shore.

“I think collaboration is a huge part of being an artist. That being said, I was excited when I learned I was doing a mural on a tile manufacturers building. I had never used tile for a mural let alone doing a full out mosaic but now the opportunity was right in front of me. Don was more than willing to teach me as I went and I was more than willing to experiment with this crazy, new medium, ” says Overunder.

“I particularly like the way he’s marking the tiles with his spray can for us to cut,” says Shore, who owns the business with his wife and founder, Linda Ellett.

With assistance from a number of young helpers who live in the neighborhood, the project took a little more than a week to complete, and the results take his stuff to a new level. With a patterned face like an Alexander McQueen model, the figure’s limbs get added dimension with Overunder’s mastery of the can. Small details let you know you shouldn’t be too serious about this, like the painted toenails. As the materials are all discards and overruns from other projects, it’s interesting to note that a number of these same tiles are actually in buildings right now, including the Kol Isreal Synagogue designed by Robert Stern in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, the Lt. Governors building in Albany, and even the home of Bill Gates.

The pool of defective and unused tiles that Don showed Overunder made him weak in the knees. The selection process begins. (photo © Overunder)

“The patterned tiles are created using the encaustic method – an inlaid clay where you take a plaster impression using clay and it leaves a reservoir that you fill with different colors and you plain it smooth and it gives you a very nice two dimensional image — that’s a technique we believe was developed in the medieval period and it was reindustrialized in the 1860’s,” explained the enthusiastic as he gave us a tour of the mural while Overunder and his assistants Roberto and Messiah worked.

It’s not often that Street Art has this heft, and certainly it’s pretty rare to take this much time to complete a piece and manage to include the participation of the community at this level. In fact, certain arts critics and public arts academics might want to reclassify this work as something other than Street Art, but we grant wide berth to the term. One thing is for sure, the resulting piece is no less than a tribute to everyone involved and as a business owner in Albany during the first year of Living Walls, Mr. Shore is sold, “I totally support this thing”

Images of the Week 09.25.11

September 25, 2011 Artists, Brooklyn, NYC, On the Street

Here’s our weekly interview with the streets, this week featuring: XAM, JR, El Sol 25, NohJColey, Mint & Serf, PEZ, Leo Kuelbs, Michael Mut, MTM, DGa, SX2BU, G2R, JOX, ONU.

Street Artist XAM is participating in this year’s DUMBO Art Festival taking place this weekend in the Brooklyn riverfront neighborhood called DUMBO. The annual art festival champions a huge public art element, with installations and projections in the street, in tunnels, on bridges, – and always contains a mix of sanctioned and unsanctioned art that blur the distinct lines of your position as a spectator or participant. With or without an official map to guide your feet, pedestrians can freely explore and stumble upon small thoughtful pieces and huge mind-bending light projections, conceptual mind candy, social commentary, and political screeds. Together with Art In Odd Places and Bring to Light Nuit Blanche NYC 2011 next weekend, it looks like New York is actively courting art in the streets this Fall – not to mention the street theater and artful costumes and signage playing out live in the “Occupy Wall Street”demonstrations. The DUMBO festival will run until today, Sunday September 25.

We’ve been tracking XAM’s work for quite a while now, and for those still not familiar with XAM’s work he custom designs and builds eco friendly birds houses that he calls CSD Dwelling and Feeding Units. He places the custom architecture units on signage high were birds can take shelter, careful not to damage property and yet provide a very stylish resting place. Stay tuned for an upcoming studio visit and interview with XAM. (photo above © Jaime Rojo)

French Street Artist and Ted Prize winner JR continues his “Inside Out Project” where ordinary citizens in neighborhoods all around the world submit photographs to the artist which his team then prints and send back for the people to install them themselves. Here is the installation in DUMBO. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Click HERE for our Bronx Inside Out Project.

Leo Kuelbs Collections: “Immersive Surfaces” projections on the Manhattan Bridge Anchorage and Archway. DUMBO (photo © Jaime Rojo)

MTM, DG6, SX2BU, G2R, JOX, ONU DUMBO installation. A commentary on the mortgage and financial crisis in the USA, the message is a corollary to those of marches going on just across the river in Lower Manhattan. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

MTM, DG6, SX2BU, G2R, JOX, ONU DUMBO installation. A commentary on the mortgage and financial crisis in the USA. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Click on the link below for a complete sechedule of events and locations for the DUMBO Arts Festival:

http://dumboartsfestival.com/

Click on the link below for more information regarding “Still Counting”:

http://www.stillcounting.net/

Occupy Wall Street: Handmade Signs and #Hashtags

September 24, 2011 Artists

“New York is the concentrate of art and commerce and sport and religion and entertainment and finance, bringing to a single compact arena the gladiator, the evangelist, the promoter, the actor, the trader and the merchant” E.B. White

And to the above list we might like to add the very, very rich.

“Occupy Wall Street” is the command of a loosely knit congregation of primarily young people who have set up a small colony in downtown since the 17th and, despite the armature of a police state surrounding them, these Millenials are questioning the economic structure of this millenium. Using D.I.Y signage, social media savy, and a fair amount of street theater, their message has been making it’s way far beyond the cavernous streets of the best know banking district in the country. Fortified with a heavy contingency of uniformed and plain clothesed officers with cameras and weapons at the ready, Wall Street became an iron clad citadel 10 years ago, an impenetrable marble and concrete castle to capital where tourists waddle and traders race daily past the steps on which George Washington took his oath of office. The stock market is here, the Federal Reserve, and so are all the banks.

It’s understandable that a generation with bad prospects of finding work, saddled with high debt for their education and living with parents who are at their wits-end because of underwater mortgages, loss of health insurance and disappearing retirements would now fix their gaze upon the root causes of this permanent insecurity. In many people’s minds the class warfare has been in full effect for a while and these folks are now wondering about those basic tenets of free speech and right to assemble that Americans of previous generations fought to maintain, guaranteed by the constitution. As corporations continue to gain rights and citizens continue to cede them, these demonstrators say they feel like they have nothing to lose, except their entire country.

Their camp is a nerve center of hi/low tech creativity where handmade signs on cardboard are painted with sharp slogans and laptops and handhelds are regularly updated with hashtags and twitpics. In the center of the camp a makeshift digital press office is ringed with faces glowing in the cool blue hue as communication with the rest of the world is continued under the watchful gaze of a ring of blue officers and street cameras. There is also joyful music performed live, with folks sharing food, books, blankets and stories.

Here are some images from the streets of Wall this week – with tourists alternately perturbed and pleased, police polite and alert, and demonstrators all over the place with messages and chants forced into a cyclical narrow path in the public space by temporary steel structures. 2011 has brought an Arab Spring where people have taken back the discourse from ever more entrenched power holders, and this spontaneous discontent appears to be encircling the globe as the shiny finish on corporate globalism seems to lose it’s luster. It makes perfect sense that these demonstrators are in this symbolic and actual nerve center of capitalism in such a public way, using public space to public issues.

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Fountain LA This Weekend

(Image Shark Toof © Jaime Rojo)

NUART 2011 – Stavanger, Norway

Dan Witz “King Baby” (photo courtesy of NUART © Dan Witz)

For a complete listing of events and schedules please visit the NUART site:

“Bring to Light” in Greenpoint Brooklyn for the 2nd Year – Saturday Night!

Bring to Light Nuit Blanche New York 2010 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Still from the work in progress for this year’s NY Nuit Blanche from artists Chris Jordan and Josh Golberg. (photo © Chris Jordan)

“Rituals” on 14th Street, Art in Odd Places

Alejandro Guzman “El Guaraguao in the Barrio”, 2011 (photo courtesy © Alejandro Guzman)

THE NEW YORK ART BOOK FAIR AT MoMA PS1

Art Platform Los Angeles

RETNA at Art Platform (LA)

Retna in NYC (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Brian Adam Douglas at Art Platform (LA)

“I’m like a hairdresser I guess.”

Anthony Lister in Brooklyn (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anthony Lister in Brooklyn (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anthony Lister in Brooklyn (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anthony Lister in Brooklyn (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anthony Lister in Brooklyn (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anthony Lister in Brooklyn (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anthony Lister in Manhattan (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anthony Lister in Miami for Primary Flight. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anthony Lister in Los Angeles. LA FreeWalls (photo © Todd Mazer)

Anthony Lister in Los Angeles LA FreeWalls (photo © Todd Mazer)

Cry me a rainbow, Anthony Lister in Los Angeles. LA FreeWalls (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anthony Lister in Venice Beach CA. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anthony Lister in San Francisco for Young and Free at 941 Geary (photo © Andrius Lypia)

WEST ONE “Freedom Suite” At Environment 8126 Beverly Boulevard Los Angeles, CA 90048 September 30, 2011 – December 30, 2011 Opening Reception September 30, 2011 7-10pm

Dobroye ytro !

Specter. Dushanbe, Tajikistan (photo © Specter)

An assistant stands aside the new Specter piece in Dushanbe, Tajikistan (photo © Specter)

Okay, everybody look this way. Ready? Smile! A new Specter piece in Dushanbe, Tajikistan (photo © Specter)

Specter. Dushanbe, Tajikistan. Specter at work with local artists during a week of workshops at the Bactria Cultural Center. (photo © Specter)

Specter. Dushanbe, Tajikistan (photo © Specter)

Specter. Dushanbe, Tajikistan (photo © Specter)

Chervi. Dushanbe, Tajikistan (photo © Specter)

Chervi. Dushanbe, Tajikistan (photo © Specter)

About Fountain Art Fair

Location:

Lookin’ good, Baby King! All photos © Dan Witz

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Marissa Mickelberg – Goat Walk (photo © Courtesy of the Artist)

Rituals on 14th Street

Private View is on Thursday 10/11/11 6:30pm-10pm and is by invitation only. Please RSVP to guestlist@londonwestbank.com

Overunder stays after class at “Living Walls” and gets extra credit

Overunder’s initial sketches in his sketch book. (photo © Overunder)

The chosen piece is sketched on the actual wall to plan for how the tiles will be cut to fit. (photo © Overunder)

The pool of defective and unused tiles that Don showed Overunder made him weak in the knees. The selection process begins. (photo © Overunder)

Overunder, Roberto and Messiah collaborating. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Overunder confers with Roberto. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Messiah plays paparazzi. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The Completed Piece (photo © Overunder)

Overunder. Detail. (photo © Overunder)

Overunder. Detail. (photo © Overunder)

XAM (photo © Jaime Rojo)

XAM (photo © Jaime Rojo)

XAM (photo © Jaime Rojo)

XAM (photo © Jaime Rojo)

XAM (photo © Jaime Rojo)

XAM (photo © Jaime Rojo)

XAM paired a Feeding Unit with one of his “Your Ad Here” miniature billboards. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jaye Moon. Lego Tree House in DUMBO (photo © Jaime Rojo)

JR Inside Out Project. DUMBO (photo © Jaime Rojo)

JR Inside Out Project. DUMBO (photo © Jaime Rojo)

JR Inside Out Project. DUMBO (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Leo Kuelbs Collections: “Immersive Surfaces” projections on the Manhattan Bridge Anchorage and Archway. DUMBO (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Michael Mut “Murdered #216” from his 9/11 installations “Still Counting”. DUMBO (photo © Jaime Rojo)

MTM, DG6, SX2BU, G2R, JOX, ONU DUMBO installation. A commentary on the mortgage and financial crisis in the USA, the message is a corollary to those of marches going on just across the river in Lower Manhattan. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

MTM, DG6, SX2BU, G2R, JOX, ONU DUMBO installation. A commentary on the mortgage and financial crisis in the USA. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

MTM, DG6, SX2BU, G2R, JOX, ONU DUMBO installation. Jeez, these emoticon fellas sure look happy. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

MTM, DG6, SX2BU, G2R, JOX, ONU DUMBO installation. A commentary on the mortgage and financial crisis in the USA. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mint and Serf Love You. DUMBO installation. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

NohJColey in Williamsburg. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

NohJColey in Williamsburg. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

NohJColey in Williamsburg. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Swemz. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

El Sol 25 in Williamsburg. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Untitled. Brooklyn Bridge. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

WEST ONE “Freedom Suite” At Environment 8126 Beverly Boulevard Los Angeles, CA 90048   September 30, 2011 – December 30, 2011 Opening Reception September 30, 2011 7-10pm