BEAM
DUMBO ARTS FEST 2012
Figment
Drawing inspiration from other community-based arts events, the development, production, and experience of FIGMENT are guided by these 11 principles:
PARTICIPATION
Transformative change, whether in the individual or in society, can occur only through deeply personal participation. We achieve being through doing. Everyone is invited to work. Everyone is invited to play.
DECOMMODIFICATION
FIGMENT seeks to create social environments that are unmediated by commercial sponsorships, transactions, or advertising. We will not substitute consumption for experience.
INCLUSION
Anyone may be a part of FIGMENT; no prerequisites exist for participation except willingness to work and play. We welcome and respect the stranger.
SELF-EXPRESSION
Each individual and collaborating group has unique qualities, and through self-expression can offer a gift to others. In this spirit, the giver should respect the rights and liberties of others.
SELF-RELIANCE
FIGMENT encourages the individual to discover, exercise and rely on his or her inner resources.
GIVING
FIGMENT is devoted to acts of gift giving and volunteering. FIGMENT itself is a gift from volunteer artists and event staff, who hope that each participant brings an attitude of giving. Giving does not imply a return or an exchange for something of equal value.
COMMUNAL EFFORT
We seek to create an environment ripe for each individual to achieve personal artistic transformation — but the creation of such an environment can be done only through creative cooperation and collaboration.
CIVIC RESPONSIBILITY
Each participant in FIGMENT is responsible for creating a civil environment for all other participants. We endeavor to produce this event in a way that fosters a civil society and that is socially responsible.
LEAVE NO TRACE
We are committed to leaving no physical trace of our activities wherever we gather. We clean up after ourselves to leave each place in a better state than we found it.
IMMEDIACY
Too often the limit for creative expression is the barrier between our inner selves and the selves that we present to the world. By breaking down that barrier, we can gain a profound appreciation for the opportunities that lie in each time and place.
GRATITUDE
We believe it is important to remind ourselves where we come from, and to appreciate what has been given to us to get us to where we are. We are not entitled to anything, and approach our relations to others from a place of gratitude for their efforts.
For more informati0n regarding Figment click here.
BOS
Arts in Bushwick is an all volunteer organization that serves and engages artists and other neighborhood residents through creative accessibility and community organizing. It is our goal to create an integrated and sustainable neighborhood, and to bring together all Bushwick residents and stakeholders to counter development-driven displacement.
Arts In Bushwick was founded in the fall of 2007, as a result of grassroots efforts to produce the 2007 Bushwick Open Studios festival. The organization was founded by a group of roughly fifteen local artists and community organizers, most of whom were involved in planning the 2007 Bushwick Open Studios, and has continued to operate on an all-volunteer, non-hierarchical, break-even basis to today, the fifth annual Bushwick Open Studios we have produced. Arts In Bushwick maintains a completely open structure, inviting all community members to bring their ideas and to participate in collaboratively producing the organization and its activities.
Arts In Bushwick has two core functions – producing neighborhood arts festivals, and facilitating community projects and dialogue. All of our activities are produced by volunteers and at no cost to the public. Learn more about our projects here.
Arts In Bushwick is an all-volunteer, non-hierarchical organization – we have a completely open structure, where anyone in the community who is willing to volunteer their time is welcome to join with us and take on a leadership role. Dozens of community members volunteer their time as organizers for each of our festivals and year-round, and many many more pitch in during our events. It would be impossible to list everyone we rely on to do what we do, but here are a few:
For more information visit BOS site:
A cobalt blue streak sweeps through a narrow street in Istanbul as Various and Gould don fluorescent orange work vests and push brooms with a purpose. The lunchtime crowd gathers a few steps back and to the sides to witness a remarkable cloud of ultra-marine pigment forming a wake behind the two German Street Artists as they perform their new installation focusing on work and workers.
Simply by changing the color of the dirt, the effect of an everyday act by municipal workers is effectively transformed, if not understood. 34 kilos of non-toxic blue pushed up a street with confidence and industry by two people wearing an official-looking logo on their uniforms does cause confusion. “What happened? Did someone die?” asks a spectator. No, they are assured, it is an art performance – an explanation that calms most but not all, including restaurant owners here in this eastside tourist district of “Beyoğlu” while their dining guests look curiously with mouths agape.
“Zu Gast Arbeit”, loosely translated as “guest work”, is the name of the piece by Various and Gould and like many of their wheat-pastes on streets in cities around the world, it is focused on the topic of “work”. In this part of Istanbul where they are participating in a group show called “Outside In” with eight other Street Artists, V&G talk about the significance of this public act of sweeping and the changing nature of work today, “Work nowadays is becoming increasingly invisible. It is getting harder to grasp and comprehend.” With a hint of the ridiculous their custom “uniform” logo shows their affinity for workers in their home and host city. “On the backs of our orange vests we stenciled the two city emblems merged into each other – on the bottom the shape of Berlin’s familiar television tower and on top the municipal logo of Istanbul. Together it can be read as the symbol for a utopian place called “Berlistanbul”.
So how did this performance go? And why is the topic of work so important to the duo? Various and Gould talked with Brooklyn Street Art to give us a better understanding of “Zu Gast Arbeit”.
Brooklyn Street Art: Your Street Art work often focuses on themes related to work and workers. While technological changes have caused many jobs to evaporate, the streets don’t clean themselves, do they? The world still depends on workers, right?
Various and Gould: Yes, of course the world depends on workers. In many areas migrants do mainly these physically exhausting and badly paid jobs. Physical labor isn’t very well respected and although this work is important, we hardly say “Thank You”! Also there ARE machines that clean the streets and replace the jobs of a lot of people.
Brooklyn Street Art: Are you drawing attention to the act of physical labor, or to the life of the worker?
Various and Gould:It has a lot to do with the physical labor of a worker and also with the role of a worker. The monotonous repetition of the sweeping movement is somehow neutral and peaceful. The street cleaner is a familiar image to the residents and is normally not much noticed. He is somewhat official, as he is hired and paid by the city, but he is also perceived as low-grade.
It’s just the little shift of a color in the performance that adds a different meaning to the act of sweeping and draws attention to it. The combination of “cleaning” (but actually doing the opposite of it) brought in a breeze of absurdity and senselessness. Art is irrational. And when an idea comes up, it comes from the guts and isn’t much explainable at first.
In the book Momo, by Michael Ende, there is a beautiful scene, where Beppo, the street cleaner, tells Momo that it is important not to look for the end of the long street and the long distance you still have to go, but rather to put your concentration in every step and sweep and breath. Then it is fun and you do your work well and suddenly you reach the end of the street.
Brooklyn Street Art: While this blue streak through town is visual, would you say the project is more conceptual in nature?
Various and Gould: Actually it isn’t very different from what we’ve done before: bringing some color to the street … but yes, it is a conceptual work. We chose the medium of a performance very carefully. We knew that every detail matters and each has a certain meaning, so we tried to reduced the elements of the performance and simplify it. It is about a seeing something in a new way and the context plays a big role this performance. If it were performed this way in Berlin it wouldn’t have the same meaning. (But since the element of chance is also part of a performance the perception of your work is unpredictable anyway.)
Brooklyn Street Art: What role does a public performance like this play in a community?
Various and Gould:This is hard to say, as we aren’t part of any community in Istanbul! We were guests and tourists. We were a bit afraid of coming to Istanbul with this performance, not knowing the community so well and all the customs – there is always a risk of being called an “Orientalist” – meaning a person who goes somewhere with a Western behavior of superiority.
And as the Turkish-German guest worker issue is as quite delicate, we didn’t know how our performance would be understood and perceived. But we had the feeling the spectators were quite open. Although the performance was meant as a dialogue and contribution it clearly holds the potential of (cultural) misunderstanding and incomprehension.
Brooklyn Street Art: Your logo merges the cultures of Berlin and Istanbul. Can you talk about the significance of these two cities to each other and their relationship to work?
Various and Gould: There are quite a few parallels. It seems that Berlin and Istanbul both are very popular as cultural hot spots at the moment. Many young creatives from all over the world are moving there and this is also accompanied by a higher tolerance for differences. For us these two cities are like a gate to a German-Turkish cultural exchange. In light of the history of Turkish guest workers coming, living and staying in Germany it is time for a merging movement toward each other from both sides.
“Zu Gast Arbeit” – A performance by Various & Gould
In Istanbul, Turkey on the 5th of April, 2012.
Photos by and copyright of Gülbin Eriş.
With support from: Sinejan Kılıç and Önder Duman
Curator: Sinejan Kılıç
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Please note: All content including images and text are © BrooklynStreetArt.com, unless otherwise noted. We like sharing BSA content for non-commercial purposes as long as you credit the photographer(s) and BSA, include a link to the original article URL and do not remove the photographer’s name from the .jpg file. Otherwise, please refrain from re-posting. Thanks!
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First as D.I.Y. experimenters and visionaries, then leaders in a nearly empty field, then as inspiring catalysts for man-machine marriage, Kraftwerk paved the way for millions of musicians, programmers, DJs, rappers, and fans to integrate a mechanized electronic precision into the modern musical oeuvre. At a time when the youth movement was peacing out and getting high with arena rock and disco, Kraftwerk was turning itself into robots and its vinyl platters were getting play in New York house parties as an ideal futuristic soundtrack to integrate with lyrics, riffs and samples. With New Wave, House, and Techno music all spawned with those same programmed beats, voices, and influences, now in the 2010s we acknowledge that a wide spectrum of musical categories, recordings, and performances contain a significant part of Kraftwerk’s digital DNA.
A teenager in the early 80s listening to Man Machine and Computer World would have thought that Kraftwerk were geekily impressing each other with their sweeping vision of a future daily existence where people and robots interact via smart electronic devices and programs. Not only did each year afterward bring us many steps further into their outlandish computerized vision, it may be that they partially ushered it in with their undulating funky precision and robotic wit. And so it is in New York now that “Kraftwerk Week” is blowing away a roomful of people who are holding up their personal glowing rectangles toward the stage at the Museum of Modern Art. Over the course of 8 consecutive nights they appear as slightly human robots to perform one of their albums in it’s entirety, followed by a very satisfying collection of favorites.
The retrospective Kraftwerk 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 brings a vision of the current band members poised before their master controls while 3-D visuals crisply fly into your face with elements of aerospace, rail travel, and the pumping machinations of human propelled progress. Swelling pulsating vistas are punctuated by text and funnily low-tech robotic movements – all infused with a sense of classical European styling. As pure and total fans we were extremely lucky to have attended one of the performances and we felt like witnesses to an historic event that testified to the influence of 4 decades of experimentation but also displayed a delightfully stellar quality of skill and performance.
Naturally, these photos were shot on our personal hand-held computers.
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Please note: All content including images and text are © BrooklynStreetArt.com, unless otherwise noted. We like sharing BSA content for non-commercial purposes as long as you credit the photographer(s) and BSA, include a link to the original article URL and do not remove the photographer’s name from the .jpg file. Otherwise, please refrain from re-posting. Thanks!
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There would be no above ground scene in New York without the abiding underground scene. Furtive, secretive, accessible by invitation or last minute word of mouth, art parties and performance have always supplied a forum for expression, inspiration, and a release of raw energy. Without idealizing too much, these are frequently places where the petri dishes for future movements are mixed, or at least experimented with. Not exactly galleries or performance venues, these spaces converted for one-night-only can be a great place to party, see something new, and let your mind loose with friends.
Artist and party planner Andrew H. Shirley threw a sort of impromptu bash a week ago to celebrate the occasion of February 29th, and he invited some artists/graff heads to hit up the space like Smells, Cash4, UFO, Gen2, R2, and Fade. The abandoned warehouse feeling was juxtaposed by some rather ornate furniture, and eventually everything got tagged – since the scheduled installations included a surprise visit from Net, Krt and Serch. “Kind of a random perfect line up,” reports Shirley of the artists, “It ended up being really proper.”
Once the visual aesthetics were laid the performances were clear to go for the small enthusiastic collection of fans that braved the cold night and they were rewarded with an eclectic mix of energetic shows by Beef, Jogyo, Fake Hooker, Japanther, and Ninjasonik. Shirley was really happy with the turnout – “A great crowd of heads braved the sh*ttiest night of the winter to be part of the Leap Year Party,” he says.
BSA: What was the party all about?
Andrew H. Shirley: I’ve had a telepathic calling to throwing a leap year party for a few years, and one day while hanging with Robbie from Fake Hooker, we talked about leap year, and how we couldn’t remember anything fun ever happening on that day .I took it upon myself to try and make a holiday out of this. Evolving out of the ideas we came up with, Beef and Fake Hooker planned a tour which began at Death by Audio in brooklyn and ended on leap year at the El Dorado.
BSA: Who did you hook up the venue and the painting part of the show?
Andrew H. Shirley: Party professional SPAM was stoked that February had an extra day to party this year and pointed our idea in the direction of the El Dorado space. The el dorado is an amazing space; it’s totally reminiscent of the type of space you’d find in the Lower East Side, like the Lounge on 11th and Avenue A circa 1995. It’s totally grilled out in scrawls and tags, really grimey, old New York. It’s a free for all. The dude who runs El Dorado is actually not into graffiti at all – he hates it. Because the place was pretty grilled, I asked if I could have some heads come and do some walls and he was cool with it.
In addition to the artists and performers, shout outs go to Laura Kaplan for Japanther’s costumes and Devi Mambouka for Jogyo’s makeup and costumes. The Superior Bugout did promotion and thanks to photographer Tod Seelie for sharing his images.
Star Wars
Door Work
DOOR WORK
October 22-November 5, 2011
/opening Oct 22 – performance begins at 8pm/
English Kills Art Gallery
English Kills Art Gallery presents DOOR WORK, the first full solo exhibition of Rob Andrews’ work after a decade of rigorous investigation into the nature of myth, ritual, and the role of the storyteller.
DOOR WORK hews at the genesis and location(s) of private moments of spiritual transformation, the intersection of the spiritual and profane, the role of ritual in our social landscape, and the boundaries we accept and those we will ourselves to cross.
DOOR WORK bridges the psychic and material distance between performance and the static art object.
Rob will open the show on October 22nd @ 8pm: with his performance Ant–Bird 2, it is a ritual designed to open a spiritual and metaphysical door using the power of blood, sweat, spit, and the vocal power of a human chorus.
n 2003, Rob cleaned the floor of the gallery Exit Art for three months. Roberta Smith of the New York Times wrote, “In a piece that suggests interior reconstruction Rob Andrews has been and will continue cleaning the gallery’s entire floor with a toothbrush, a few square feet each day. His air of meditative concentration contrasts noticeably and nicely with the prevailing sense of bustle and bulk.” DOOR WORK balances performance and the object towards speaking to interior reconstruction: destroying old doors, and opening new ones.
Rob is proud to officially join English Kills Art Gallery. He has shown work at the Museum of Modern Art, Exit Art, Grace Exhibition Space, and travels to Bitola, Macedonia in early November to take part in Exchange Radical Moments, a Pan-European live art festival that takes place in 11 European cities on 11.11.11
Tonight opens the 2nd Annual New York “Nuit Blanche” in Brooklyn’s Greenpoint neighborhood. As we did during it’s inauguration last year (when we were also participants) BSA proudly supports this public show of light by some of today’s more talented conceptual and technical artists in the street. With more than 60 separate installations and performances all over the place, it is an event open to the public and it claims public space as our space for creativity, interactivity, and community. Despite threats of spotty rain, we expect the crowd to pour in and have a blast tonight.
“We want things to be visually arresting, some things that people stay and linger at, while other people look for a moment and move on,” declares Ethan Vogt, as he lead a bunch of us around some of the sites last night to preview.
Roland and Andrea, of “The Company” will be running their indoor space installation of lights that will react to frequencies emmitted by live performance and recorded industry. Says Andrea, “We developed a custom software that triggers the lights as they are being affected by the sound. We are going to have a lot of performers as well as found industrial sounds – each light lantern is connected to one specific frequency.
BSA will bring you images of the event but if you are in the neighborhood, take your own and send them to us! It’s always great to see what you are up to.
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)
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.
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 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)
“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
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.
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/
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.
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.
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
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)
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/
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.
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
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.
John Ahearn (photo © Jaime Rojo)Ad Hoc Art “brought it” for the second year to Queens and at Welling Court with a collection of Street Artists and local families hanging out and painting the neighborhood. The tireless Alison and Garrison Buxton invited 40 or 50 of their closest friends with aerosol to take part over a two day period to transform the atmosphere in this neighborhood which doesn’t get much attention. The lineup includes artists who are pioneers in the graffiti and Street Art game who create alongside emerging talent. The styles vary, but the sentiments of connectedness and community are consistent throughout.
In this extensive collection of photos BSA gives you artists hard at work and hard at play with a little help from their friends. A traditional community mural format where everyone has their own slab to cover in their own style, Welling Court also engages the kids in the neighborhood, who frequently get to try their hand at painting or otherwise assisting the artists.
The day’s proceedings are part plastic art and part performance art as the artists often stop painting to interact with fans, inquisitors, Street Art aficionados and their fellow artists. Its part summer camp and part family reunion with the neighbors getting out the BBQ grill and setting up tables in the street while artists from around the globe are reconnecting and telling long tales and kids on scooters and skateboards weave in and out of the clusters of cans everywhere. With the abundance of homemade food and a variety of music playing at high volume the streets are alive and there’s nothing else you’d want to do on day like this.
John Ahearn is a pioneer in the area of public art known for making sculptures with local people posing as models. His technique of live casting requires the model to sit while John creates a cast of them in plaster. As far back as the mid 1970s Mr. Ahearn’s tributes to his neighbors have been seen affixed to many walls throughout the Bronx. Sited as an important part of the development of the Street Art scene Ahearn’s work has also traveled to private collections of prominent and noted art collectors and art institutions.
Brooklyn Street Art spoke with Mr. Ahearn and asked him about participating in this open venue and how he felt doing his live casting in Queens. He responded with excitement about the word “live”.
“You used the word very properly. I feel alive today. I feel alive and I just turned 60 two weeks ago and I feel this is where my roots are. Right in the sidewalk, doing casting, particularly aimed at little children. We are going to do a piece that involves a child. She is a friend of mine from way back and we are expecting to have a crowd of kids here and it is going to be fun,” said Ahearn.
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