This week, St. Patrick’s Cathedral on Fifth Avenue was suddenly flooded with pealing bells and congregants. In a historic moment for the Catholic Church, Pope Leo XIV, born in Chicago, was chosen, following in the footsteps of his predecessor Francis and his namesake Leo XIII, who was widely admired for his steadfast advocacy for migrants and laborers at the turn of the 20th century. Many observers have noted that the selection of an American pope may reflect a conscious decision by the College of Cardinals to offer a moral counterbalance to the growing tide of authoritarianism and exclusionary politics seen in some of today’s global leadership. With roots in a city shaped by immigration, industry, and social struggle, Leo XIV arrives at a time when such grounding may prove especially relevant. Best wishes to all of us.
So here’s some of this week’s visual conversation from the street, including works from Homesick, Gabriel Specter, Clint Mario, Werds, IMK, EXR, Jorit, Wild West, JEMZ, Ribs, Diva, Ellena Lourens, APE, NOEVE, ENEKKO, Rene, Happy, Disoh, Peuf, and Off Key.
Street art, food, and antifascist activism collided on the walls of Verona – and we’re back for seconds. In Part I, we witnessed how local hero CIBO and a crew of international street artists turned hate-fueled graffiti into gourmet-inspired murals, reclaiming public space with humor and heart. Now, welcome to Part II of “Best Before. Street Art Against a Rancid Future,” where we dive even deeper into this unique festival of creative resistance. Here we have more exclusive Martha Cooper shots of the artists in action. Grab a slice of pizza and join us as we continue the tour of Verona’s transformed walls, proving that even the most bitter messages can be remixed into something surprisingly sweet.
Verona, Italy—known for Romeo and Juliet—is now also home to a very different kind of love story: one between food, public space, and antifascist resistance. At the center is CIBO, a street artist whose name literally means “food,” and who has made a career of turning hate speech into visual comfort food. His murals cover neo-fascist graffiti with pizza slices, cheesecakes, and bundles of asparagus, using humor and everyday symbols to defuse toxic ideology.
CIBO’s approach is clever—and disarmingly effective. Since he began his “recipe of resistance” over a decade ago, he’s been turning Verona’s walls into a living, evolving archive of antifascist art. Where others argue or censor, he paints tortellini. When fascist slogans reappear, he adds another layer—often building his murals like dishes, one ingredient at a time. It’s personal too, he will tell you: after neo-Nazis murdered a friend, CIBO says he doubled down, embracing public art as a peaceful yet persistent form of defiance.
This March, that individual mission became collective action. In an unsanctioned street art festival titled “Best Before. Street Art Against a Rancid Future,” CIBO invited 11 fellow artists—Claudiano.jpeg, Clet, Eron, Mantra, Millo, Ozmo, Pablos, Pao, Pixel Pancho, Plank, and Zed1—to collaborate on murals that replaced hate with imagination. The name? A cheeky reference to food expiration dates—reminding us that our tolerance for racism, nationalism, and repression should’ve expired long ago.
The result: a high-energy, low-profile intervention across San Giovanni Lupatoto and other Verona suburbs. These weren’t “art walks”—they were tactical takeovers. Artists painted four-handed pieces over vandalized walls: CIBO’s flying pizzas alongside Zed1’s surreal characters; asparagus stalks layered with Mantra’s naturalist flourishes. This wasn’t nostalgia—it was public protest, humor, and heart in action.
To ensure the work wouldn’t disappear unnoticed, Martha Cooper—the well-known NYC photographer who helped canonize graffiti with Subway Art—flew in to document it all. Her lens captured not just murals, but the camaraderie, tension, and resilience behind them. Now, over 50 of those photographs are on view at Forte Sofia, Verona, through June 29. Curated by Sara Maira—art strategist and activist—the exhibition is a powerful retelling of a grassroots moment turned collective memory.
We spoke with curator Sara Maira about the festival and the work of CIBO.
BSA: Please tell us about the name of the festival where CIBO collaborated with other artists in Verona?
Sara Maira: The festival and its current exhibition in Verona is called “BEST BEFORE. Street art against a rancid future.” It’s a call to action for the public—an act of artivism initiated by CIBO with the goal of inspiring people to stand up against closed-minded politics, nationalism, and obscurantism before it’s too late.
This is an artivist performance made possible through donations CIBO received over the years from patrons who supported his social commitment against fascism, racism, and hate.
BSA: What attracted CIBO to paint food on public walls? Why choose food as a subject instead of something else?
SM: “CIBO” in Italian is also a nickname for food, so it started as both a joke and a necessity. When he was young, he didn’t have much money to buy paint, so he used leftover colors that other artists didn’t want. Since food comes in almost every color, it became a practical solution. That’s how it began.
As he matured, so did his message. Food evolved into a metaphor—his way of talking about some of the most urgent problems we face today: the rise of neo-fascism and neo-Nazism, nationalism, discrimination, environmental collapse, short-sighted politics, and the widespread social regression we’re seeing worldwide.
He often uses this example: the Caprese salad has the colors of the Italian flag and is considered a traditional Italian dish. But if you examine the ingredients, none are originally Italian. Tomatoes come from Western South America and were first cultivated by the Aztecs. Spanish explorers brought them to Europe in the 1500s. Basil comes from India, and if you add olive oil—as Italians do—it’s originally from Syria. So what we now call “tradition” is actually a product of cultural exchange, migration, and cooperation. If we close our borders and minds, we risk losing that richness.
Every mural CIBO paints contains hidden messages like this. On the surface, it may look like a simple plate of food, but often it’s layered over a swastika or other hate symbol—visually erased but symbolically challenged. What looks colorful and inviting at first glance reveals itself to be part of a much deeper conversation.
BSA: What’s the significance of CIBO painting over hateful or racist messages on public walls?
SM: For him, it’s both an act of resistance and a form of public service. Covering up hate is just one part of his practice, but he sees it as one of the most essential—especially if you consider street art to be public art. This is where public art can make an immediate difference.
CIBO lives in Verona, a city in northern Italy that has long struggled with fascist ideology. That ideology never completely disappeared after WWII, and in recent years it has made a disturbing comeback—not just in Verona, but around the world. At first, CIBO simply responded to what he saw. He had spray cans in hand, he saw hateful messages on walls, and he began covering them up.
Then it became personal. Fifteen years ago, one of his friends was murdered by neo-Nazis. Since then, his work has become a mission—a colorful and peaceful revolution. It’s voluntary activism: an artist giving back to his community, trying to change the world one spray can at a time.
These people are violent; their language is violence. But CIBO’s language is beauty and art—and they’re not prepared for that. Usually, swastikas are covered with opposing political symbols, and the fascists are ready for that. They expect confrontation. But when they’re met with a painted piece of cheese or a slice of pizza, they don’t know how to react. They still come back and vandalize the murals, but CIBO has learned to use their hate as part of his art. He now plans his murals like recipes—every time they come back, he adds an ingredient. Over time, his walls become layered “recipes of resistance,” evolving performances in public space.
In the beginning, people walking by didn’t even notice the hidden messages—there was a sort of visual blindness. But after a few years, people caught on. They realized there was a problem and started sending him photos, asking him to restore or repaint walls. Eventually, some of them started taking action themselves.
BSA: Does CIBO get threatened by the people whose graffiti he covers with food murals?
SM: Yes, he receives threats often. People have sent him death messages. Once, a small bomb was placed on his car. He’s found swastikas painted on his door, and he’s no longer able to move around freely. That’s why he chooses to paint during the day, in public, with people around him. Visibility is his protection. Showing his face is part of his defense strategy.
BSA: Has CIBO gotten into trouble with the police for painting on illegal walls?
SM: Yes, that’s why he works with a lawyer. He’s been reported many times by politicians and law enforcement. But because he’s a recognized artist—and because he’s covering hate symbols—he has never been arrested or convicted.
While going through your CIBO/Verona photos, we noticed that the police showed up a couple of times while he was painting with Mantra, and again while he was painting with Clet. Were the police officers hostile to him? Did the officers show up as a routine or were they responding to a complaint from a citizen?
MC: Not sure if the cops showed up because of a complaint or if they were passing by or what. They questioned the artists but allowed them to continue. They weren’t particularly hostile but not exactly friendly. I tried not to let them see I was taking their picture because I wasn’t sure if I was allowed. Cibo is well-known in Verona but he is mostly painting illegally. As I remember, only one of the walls was a permission wall but I don’t remember which one. Almost all of the walls were ones that Cibo had previously painted which had been gone over. One wall says something like “Thank you Fascists” painted by Cibo but I’ve forgotten what the story was. Sometimes the fascists leave Cibo notes. Attached are photos of him peeling off a note which reads “Tu aisegni noi roviniamo!” which, according to Google Translate means “You draw, we ruin”.
Spring is in full swing, and so are the artists. We’re expecting a few international names to pass through New York this week, including Saype, who’s creating something extraordinary at the UN.
It’s also New York Art Week — a citywide celebration of contemporary art that brings together fairs, gallery openings, and museum shows across all five boroughs. Among the marquee events are Frieze New York at The Shed, Independent at Spring Studios, and NADA at the Starrett-Lehigh Building.
In fact, this week New York hosts Frieze New York, Independent Art Fair, The Other Art Fair Brooklyn, NADA New York, TEFAF New York, SPRING/BREAK Art Show, Future Fair, 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair, The American Art Fair, and Clio Art Fair.
With so much happening against the backdrop of a turbulent political and economic climate, we’ll be keeping our eyes open for artists and artworks that speak with clarity, urgency, and heart.
So here’s some of this week’s visual conversation from the street, including works from City Kitty, Degrupo, Qzar, Ollin, Stu, Smile, Erotica, Son, H Kubed, VEW X, The Splasher, Never Satisfied, Salem, 1992 Crew, Brady Scott, Chris Bohlin, Frozen Feathers, and Monk.
“People have the Power” from musician and poet Patti Smith.
“Where there were deserts I saw fountains like cream the waters rise and we strolled there together with none to laugh or criticize and the leopard and the lamb lay together truly bound I was hoping in my hoping to recall what I had found I was dreaming in my dreaming God knows a purer view as I surrender to my sleeping I commit my dream to you
The people have the power The people have the power The people have the power The people have the power”
On Rue Faidherbe, where stately Haussmannian façades frame your vision and the Opéra de Lille crowns the view like a civic tiara, something entirely unorthodox has landed. Fourteen vertical golden shipping containers now tower above the heads of pedestrians in the heart of Lille’s historic center, forming a gauntlet of steel and symbolism. This is Golden Monoliths, the latest urban incursion by Spanish artist SpY, known globally for his sly, subversive interventions that remix public space. Commissioned for the city’s ongoing Lille3000 cultural program, the work slices sharply through the architectural elegance of the boulevard with industrial mass and caution-yellow swagger.
There’s a deliberate clash at play—between past and present, elegance and utility, ornament and object. Lille’s 19th-century architecture whispers of empire and ambition; SpY’s monoliths shout in the blunt language of global logistics. These gleaming and gilded containers aren’t just visual anomalies—they’re conceptual ones too. Just weeks after a new international trade war flared and ports across continents ground into chaos, SpY stands these literal vessels of commerce in plain view, forcing us to consider what we consume and how it gets to us. The message lands as clearly as a dockworker’s shout: the street one walks is connected to the shipping yards and supply chains that shape daily life.
In true SpY fashion, the work uses humor and visual dissonance as a gateway to more profound critique. Gold plating usually signals prestige or wealth. Still, here it’s layered over the most utilitarian of forms—metal boxes that have crisscrossed oceans carrying everything from bananas to bootlegged electronics. The result is both ceremonial and absurd, a temple to trade erected in a city square. Locals and tourists stroll past, barely glancing up from shop windows, seemingly unaware they’re moving through a procession of global consequence disguised as a public art installation.
SpY, whose interventions have included everything from giant mirrors to hypnotic geometric murals to currency-based graffiti, continues his legacy of turning the urban stage into a site of playful reckoning. Golden Monoliths doesn’t just interrupt the flow of Lille’s polished city center—it transforms it into a corridor of contemplation. And as with all good street art, it may ask, preach, or implicate, leaving just enough room for you to laugh as you become part of the piece.
People have tried to make a case for blatant sexism in the percentage of women represented in street art. The argument of discrimination can only go so far, usually because the practice is largely anonymous and viewers are drawn to what they like, a selection process that has little to do with curation and mostly to do with showing up.
That was not the main concern of the Guerrilla Girls—they had already been accepted at and attended art school and expected the same opportunities as their male counterparts. The issue was gallery and museum representation, and the topic of privilege came into focus. They took it to the streets since arguing with well-financed art galleries and institutions requires thinking outside the box, if you will.
Guerrilla Girls. “Bodies of Knowledge“. Image still from the video. Art21
In general, the Guerrilla Girls didn’t come from the streets. They came from art schools and MFA programs, opening nights of student group shows, and long conversations about history and theory. Post-college and competing for the attention of gallery owners and museum curators, they became aware of the limitations of a privilege that appeared to extend primarily to males. According to their genesis story, a 1985 exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art galvanized growing feelings of activism: its so-called “International Survey of Recent Painting and Sculpture” of 169 artists contained about a dozen women and few people of color. It wasn’t a mistake—it was a message.
The newly forming Guerrilla Girls read it loud and clear: you’re invited, but primarily as decoration.
Gorilla masks on, dead women’s names adopted, and fists full of stats. If the art world wanted them silent, invisible, and grateful, the Guerrilla Girls made themselves unavoidable.
Guerrilla Girls. “Bodies of Knowledge“. Image still from the video. Art21
They took the fight to the street. Not with spray cans or stencils, but with wheat-pasted posters and billboard hijacks. They weren’t painting trains or tagging rooftops, but instead bases of light posts and SoHo walls and East Village gallery windows, blasting hard truths in bold type and asking questions the so-called art world didn’t want to hear: “Do women have to be naked to get into the Met?” The public space was their gallery, the street their showroom. Like the best street artists, they sidestepped permission and gatekeepers, relying on timing, location, and gut-punch wit to spark conversation and outrage.
Guerrilla Girls. “Bodies of Knowledge“. Image still from the video. Art21
Their background gave them access that others didn’t have. These were not outsiders trying to break in—they were insiders who got fed up and decided to cause dialogue and self-examination. It’s fair to ask why it took the exclusion of these particular women—many white, mostly well-educated—to spark such a visible rebellion. Black artists, Indigenous artists, and lower working-class artists had been sidelined for generations with far less ability to fight back. But the Guerrilla Girls, to their credit, did not pretend to have invented the problem. They made it their job to expose it. And they got people talking.
Their materials were simple: cheap black-and-white posters, loud fonts, unflinching numbers. It was lo-fi, hard-hitting, and anti-precious. In this way, their work mirrored the ethos of street art—accessible, immediate, and meant to be seen by everyday people, not just gallery-goers. While they didn’t use spray paint or wheat-paste murals in the traditional sense, their tactics aligned with the subversion lineage we see from billboard hijackers, adbusting collectives, and the Situationists’ “détournement.”
Guerrilla Girls. “Bodies of Knowledge“. Image still from the video. Art21
Like early graffiti crews, the Guerrilla Girls thrived on anonymity and collective identity. Their names were borrowed from forgotten or ignored women artists, their faces hidden by gorilla masks. The point wasn’t fame (well, not individual fame), it was force. By stripping away their identities, they pushed the message forward, not the messenger—a move that runs counter to the signature-heavy culture of graffiti writers, contemporary art, and celebrity-driven activism.
In the Art21 video featured here, one founding member recalls the moment things changed: “We were marching in a picket line in front of the Museum of Modern Art, and we realized not one person going into the museum cared.” That moment of invisibility led to a radical change in strategy—from polite protest to sharp, street-level provocation. Another member puts it even more plainly: “The more we looked at the numbers, we realized that there was a systematic elimination of women and artists of color from the so-called mainstream of the art world.”
Guerrilla Girls. “Bodies of Knowledge“. Image still from the video. Art21
Their critique wasn’t just about representation; it was about the money behind it, the power that shapes it, and the silence that protects it. From museum trustees to art collectors, from critics to curators, no one was safe from their data-driven, sarcastic broadsides. And as the video reminds us, they struck a nerve: “It wasn’t somebody else’s problem. It was my problem.”
Today, they are canonized in some museums that they once dragged through the mud. Their posters hang in frames. Their critiques have become part of the official curriculum. But their relevance hasn’t dimmed. If anything, the Guerrilla Girls remind us that the art world’s old power structures are more adaptive than we think. They know how to absorb critique and turn it into branding. And yet, the Guerrilla Girls remain difficult to digest completely—still masked, funny, and sharp. And still making trouble.
Guerrilla Girls. “Bodies of Knowledge“. Image still from the video. Art21Guerrilla Girls. “Bodies of Knowledge“. Image still from the video. Art21
You can trace the national/international headlines like veins across the map—the courts, the economy, the ports, the rising trade in arms internationally, the hollowing shelves, the smiling wolf-like threats to Medicaid that serves seniors and the poor and disabled, the silent waves of layoffs, the escalating prices and shrinking dollar, the protests, the bristling anger expressed at podiums and on TV screens toward citizens and people just trying to make a living. To people on the street these can feel like signs of a careful dismantling of a century of progress and rumblings of worse to come. The writing is on the wall, and a quiet unease drifts through the days.
Also on the wall today, our top image: a mural in Little Italy, New York, of Pope Francis, whose funeral was yesterday in Rome. A champion of the forgotten, a diplomat of peace, a voice for those left in the margins. More than 400,000 mourners filled the streets — world leaders and ordinary souls alike. Honoring his commitment to marginalized communities, approximately 40 individuals—including transgender people, prisoners, migrants, the homeless, and victims of human trafficking—were invited to be the final group to pay their respects before his burial at the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome. Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re called him “a pope among the people,” remembered not for the weight of his office, but for the lightness of his compassion.
With these news cycles to contemplate, many may be asking if we will rise to meet the moment. Certainly it looks like street artists continue to enter the fray of politics, human rights, technology, pop art, the environment… You never know what you will find in these confused days.
So here’s some of this week’s visual conversation from the street, including works from Banksy, Homesick, Jorit, Great Boxers, Ottograph, Skitl, Delphinoto, Oink Oink, and Cure.
BANKSY created Battle to Survive a Broken Heart during his New York City residency, Better Out Than In, in October 2013, unveiling a new piece each day for the entire month that had fans and collectors racing to new locations around the city to see his newest installation. He painted this stencil in Red Hook, Brooklyn, on the wall of a warehouse owned by Vassilios Georgiadis. After it was promptly vandalized, Banksy returned to restore it. The piece is now on display in the Winter Garden at Brookfield Place in Manhattan, ahead of its auction by Guernsey’s on May 21.
Okay, it was a sphere. Shepard Fairey’s Sphere. At least for a month.
Yes, it was street art… on a whole new level. We’ve been questioned endlessly over the last two decades about the true nature of art in the public sphere—pulling apart and examining the progenitors, the aspirations, the elements that comprise street art, graffiti, public art, and advertising—mainly because we wanted to understand the genesis of this story. Today we find that sometimes it all merges into one.
The opportunity to get your work up there, animated, glowing across 1.23 million puck-shaped LEDs, is awe-inspiring, no matter what you utter. This Exosphere swells the art and the message—Fairey’s familiar visual nomenclature—upward and spinning into the night sky, at once familiar and universal, activist and entertaining, reassuring and unsettling. Yes, it’s like getting up on a wall, except this one powers its content with 150 NVIDIA RTX A6000 GPUs, each packing 10,752 cores and 48 GB of memory, ensuring smooth high-res rendering.
Created for Earth Month 2025 as part of the Sphere’s XO/Art program, Earth Power Globe is a 90-second animated mandala that merges Fairey’s bold graphic language with environmental themes and symbols. It pulses with life—air, water, and vegetation coursing through his palette—reminding us of both the earth’s fragility and the unfathomable force that nature can be. Nested within the rotating layers are references to ecological threats and utopian ideals, brought together in a style that is distinctly Fairey: floral, political, defiant, hopeful.
Shepard wasn’t alone in making it happen, and he always gives credit. The animation was brought to life with the help of The Mayda Creative Co. and MA+Group, whose teams helped translate his flat graphics into a fully immersive, kinetic experience—one that plays nightly on this, the largest LED screen on earth. For an artist whose career began with wheatpasted André the Giant posters, the moment may feel cosmic.
But Fairey’s presence in Las Vegas this month wasn’t limited to the Sphere. He also served as a guest judge for the XO Student Design Challenge, where students from the Las Vegas area submitted Earth Day-inspired designs for a chance to see their work projected onto the same Exosphere. It’s the kind of crossover between professional artist and next-gen creator that feels right—especially here, where public visibility, bold ideas, and a serious dedication to playfulness come together.
A la Fairey, the project blends art, message, and technology into something more than the sum of its parts. It’s street art, sure—but turned inside out, lit up, and rotating.
With heavy hearts, we say goodbye to the brilliant Don’t Fret.
Cooper, the Chicago street artist known as “Don’t Fret,” was born and raised in the Wicker Park neighborhood—a community that shaped his perspective and featured prominently in his work. A few days ago he passed away at the age of 36 after a long illness, as confirmed by his family. Deeply connected to Chicago’s working-class spirit and changing urban landscape, Cooper created street art that reflected a genuine affection for the people, culture, history, and places around him.
The news of Cooper’s passing is deeply saddening. His work as “Don’t Fret” brought both humor and sharp insight to the streets of Chicago and beyond. He had a distinct ability to capture the quirks and contradictions of daily life in ways that resonated widely, and his absence will be felt across the street art community. He was prolific in a number of cities, including in Brooklyn, where we first grew to appreciate his humor and his insight into the human condition.
We once wrote, “Don’t Fret… knows how to depict us in all our eclectic and imperfect wonder without passing judgment but causing a cryptic cackle of recognition when you run into him.” His observations were pointed without being cruel, and his portraits often walked the line between satire and affection. May his legacy inform and inspire both artists and those who encountered his work in public spaces.
Following is a collection of Don’t Fret pieces as shot by photographer Jaime Rojo.
Welcome to BSA Images of the Week. Happy Easter, bunny.
Great stuff is out on the streets today, whether you are wandering aimlessly through the city or touring with a sense of purpose. Street art continues to evolve, even as it repeats. Can anyone doubt that there is a more relevant artform that can be instantly responsive to current events and take the longer view?
The city’s buzzing with art this spring—start with these must-sees, in addition to hitting the Botanical Gardens in Brooklyn and the Bronx and the local park and your neighbor’s tulip bed: At White Columns, Gordon Matta-Clark: NYC Graffiti Archive 1972/3 offers a rare look at early graffiti culture through the artist’s archival photographs (whitecolumns.org). Over in Industry City, Brooklyn native Michael “Kaves” McLeer presents Brooklyn Pop – A Brooklyn Dream, an immersive homage to the borough’s style and swagger, complete with full-scale subway replicas and vintage ephemera (brooklynbuzz.com). At the Whitney, Amy Sherald’s American Sublime brings together nearly 50 of her portraits in a commanding solo show that focuses on Black life with quiet power and elegance (whitney.org). Meanwhile, the Guggenheim hosts Rashid Johnson: A Poem for Deep Thinkers, filling the iconic rotunda with more than 90 works exploring Black identity, masculinity, and emotional depth (guggenheim.org). And at the Brooklyn Museum, Breaking the Mold: Brooklyn Museum at 200 celebrates the institution’s bicentennial with a wide-ranging exhibition that reflects its rich, complex legacy and commitment to representation (brooklynmuseum.org).
We continue with our interviews with the street, this week including Citty Kitty, Homesick, JerkFace, Eternal Possessions, Chupa, Android Oi, Staino, Masnah, Jaek El Diablo, Jay Diggz, Washington Walls, BC NBA, Busy, and Pytho.
Jordan Nickel, better known as POSE, is a Chicago-born graffiti artist whose work fuses street culture, pop art, and comic book aesthetics into a bold, layered style. With a bright palette and complex collage style, he often hides messages and abstract forms that reward a closer look. A standout example is his 85-foot mural he painted last summer beneath the Purple Line in Evanston, Illinois—a city just north of Chicago—a pop kaleidoscope of memories and associations with his youth there.
This week, POSE brought that energy to a new kind of canvas: a full-sized, hand-painted carousel installed in the garden at Ian Schrager’s Public Hotel in New York City. Produced by longtime collaborator and street art curator Roger Gastman, the project was painted over two intensive weeks in a Connecticut studio. POSE applied multiple layers—sometimes two or three coats deep—to achieve his envisioned spirit and aesthetic. Reflecting on the project, he expressed honor in contributing to Schrager’s legacy of collaborating with street artists, which includes past projects with notables like Jean-Michel Basquiat and Keith Haring during the era of the Palladium nightclub in the 1980s.
A short walk from this new installation, back in June 2013, POSE teamed up with fellow MSK crew member Revok to transform the iconic Houston/Bowery Wall in New York City—a site previously adorned by many street artists and graffiti writers, including Haring, Os Gemeos, and Shepard Fairey. Their collaborative piece was a riot of color, texture, and tribute, blending graffiti, pop art, and street culture into a cohesive whole.
If you’ve ever been stopped in your tracks by a cryptic phrase pasted on a lamppost or beamed onto a building, there’s a good chance you’ve crossed paths, at least spiritually, with Jenny Holzer. Before text-based street art became a global, sometimes cerebral, genre, Holzer treated the city as her canvas, her publishing platform, injecting unsettling truths and poetic jabs into public space. Her work speaks, it interrupts, cutting through the usual noise of ads and slogans with smartly honed phrases like “Abuse of power comes as no surprise” and “Protect me from what I want.” For those familiar with the language of the street, her words hit like a well-placed burner on a clean wall—brief, bold, impossible to ignore.
Jenny Holzer. “Protest“. Image still from the video. Art21
This Art21 segment from the Protest episode (2007) dives into the heart of Holzer’s practice, showing how she weaponizes language to question authority, mourn the dead, and spark outrage. Part of the footage is filmed in New York, where Holzer made an early and iconic mark through Messages to the Public, a series initiated in 1982 on the Spectacolor board in Times Square. The project was originally conceived by artist Jane Dickson, who worked as a designer and programmer for the board and collaborated with the Public Art Fund to transform this site of commercial messaging into a rotating space for artist interventions. Early electronic billboard hacking, if you will.
Jenny Holzer. “Protest“. Image still from the video. Art21
Holzer’s contribution—concise, confrontational phrases pulsing above the chaos of the city—stood out as an early example of using language in public space to disrupt and provoke. Her practice, from wheatpasted posters to LED projections and carved stone, has always operated like guerrilla commentary embedded in the infrastructure of a city. Whether on the street or in the museum, the language can be a scalpel—and in Holzer’s hands, it cuts deep.
Jenny Holzer. “Protest“. Image still from the video. Art21
Holzer’s latest return to the Guggenheim Museum with Light Line (2024) shows just how far she’s stretched the possibilities of text in space. Expanding on her original 1989 LED spiral, the new version snakes up all six floors of the museum’s rotunda—an electric river of thought running through a sacred temple of art. She’s also dropped pieces in unexpected places throughout the building, echoing her roots in the streets. In one of the rawest gestures, graffiti legend Lee Quiñones tags over Holzer’s Inflammatory Essays posters in the High Gallery—bringing two generations of text-based provocateurs into direct conversation. It’s a perfect reminder that the best street pieces don’t just decorate; they challenge.
Jenny Holzer. “Protest“. Image still from the video. Art21
Holzer’s connection to the street art world is deeper than just aesthetic overlap. Her interventions predate the global explosion of text-based street work, sometimes they were in concert with the early graffiti writers. They resonate with the same urgency and intent as some. Like the best writers-on-the-wall, she’s continuously operated on the edge of visibility—sometimes sanctioned, often not—placing language in places where people live and look. Whether she’s carving into granite, projecting declassified torture documents onto civic buildings, or flooding a wall with fluorescent truths, Holzer’s work is a reminder that words in the street aren’t just decoration. They’re weapons, warnings, and sometimes, prayers.
Jenny Holzer. “Protest“. Image still from the video. Art21Jenny Holzer. “Protest“. Image still from the video. Art21
BROOKLYN STREET ART LOVES YOU MORE EVERY DAY
