Famed graffiti and street art photographers Martha Cooper and Nika Kramer took to Jacó, Costa Rica, during the winter holidays in December, proving that they knew where to go when the weather up North is turning inclement and wintry. Naturally, they located some great walls to shoot as well.
A tourist destination since at least the 1920s, Jacó really took off in the 1970s when the first hotel opened here and, during the remainder of the century, transformed into a destination for vacation-residential development like the renowned Punta Leona just north.
Upscale accommodations, bachelor parties, party boats, and ex-pats in high supply, the town still retains connections to local culture thanks to its overwhelming natural beauty, hiking, surfing, and the mural program called Artify Jacó. Launched in 2016, its co-creator, Steward Invierno, also has owned a gallery/gift shop for the last decade that offers more traditional art-making workshops and sells canvasses by local and international artists.
Gravitating to broad themes relating to nature, love, community, and hope, the annual festival has been transforming the city with art and in some cases, has been likened to the neighborhood of Wynwood in Miami. Having spent a lot of time in that town as well during Art Basel, both Martha and Nika felt quite at home shooting the murals here at Artify Jacó.
Our weekly focus on the moving image and art in the streets. And other oddities.
Now screening: 1. Marina Capdevila. Los Pajaritos. Granada, Spain 2. Marina Capdevila. Shine Festival. St. Petersburg, Florida 3. Marina Capdevila. Curitiba, Brazil 4. Marina Capdevila. The Raw Project. Art Basel Miami 2019
BSA Special Feature: Marina Capdevila
Like many of her peers in the street art world, the Spanish muralist now likes to be considered a contemporary painter – it has so much more cachet. She traveled a lot this year in Spain, according to a year-end newsletter we received- Valencia, Granada, and Barcelona for example. She also was in Florida and Manhattan for her projects, which included murals, prints, and commercial gigs with brands. We’ve always appreciated her artistry, sociological approach to her characters and figures, and her sense of humor. May she never lose it.
This week we feature a handful of more recent projects by Marina Capdevila.
Marina Capdevila. Los Pajaritos. Granada, Spain.
Marina Capdevila. Shine Festival. St. Petersburg, Florida
Marina Capdevila. Curitiba, Brazil.
Marina Capdevila. The Raw Project. Art Basel Miami 2019
Street artist Sticker Maul doesn’t need a large canvas to create art that makes an impact on the street. A recent piece we found in the Lower East Side of Manhattan keeps us thinking…
War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning, is a book by Chris Hedges, where he argues that war seduces society and creates the fiction needed to gain its support.
“In the beginning, war looks and feels like love. But unlike love, it gives nothing in return but an ever-deepening dependence, like all narcotics, on the road to self-destruction. It does not affirm but places upon us greater and greater demands. It destroys the outside world until it is hard to live outside war’s grip. It takes a higher and higher dose to achieve any thrill. Finally, one ingests war only to remain numb.”
― Chris Hedges
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“I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones.” ― Albert Einstein
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According to The Watson Institute at Brown University, which conducted a project to determine the costs of war post 9/11 called Costs of War Project:
At least 929,000 people have died due to direct war violence, including armed forces on all sides of the conflicts, contractors, civilians, journalists, and humanitarian workers.
Many times more have died indirectly in these wars, due to ripple effects like malnutrition, damaged infrastructure, and environmental degradation.
Over 387,000 civilians have been killed in direct violence by all parties to these conflicts.
The cost of the post-9/11 wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Syria, and elsewhere totals about $8 trillion. This does not include future interest costs on borrowing for the wars.
The traditional architecture in the Medina Atiga may be what attracts you initially, but it is the 150 street artists who will keep you wandering through the maze of tiny streets. The outdoor curation of Djerba by Mehdi Ben Cheikh, a bi-national with a gallery in Paris, happened over the last decade among the sun-blasted domes, arches, and towers here.
Djerbahood 2. Albin Michel – Galerie Itinerrance
“Djerba was exceptionally well placed for an operation with worldwide impact.” says the visionary Cheihk in the newly released Part 2 of Djerbahood, “On this, the southernmost island of the Mediterranean, the climate is pleasant and temperate for more than half the year.”
In this village of Erriadh on the Tunisian island of Djerba, you are twenty-five kilometers from the airport, adjacent to a long shoreline of fine white sand, and officially walking inside a UNESCO World Heritage site. It also helps that here you’ll find palm trees, olive trees, figs, pomegranate, carob, apple, and apricot trees, crystal clear water, and a fairly mild climate.
Djerbahood 2. Albin Michel – Galerie Itinerrance
“From my very first contact with the village and its inhabitants, I was persuaded that I was in the ideal place to launch an operation of this kind,” he says. “…The Djerbahood adventure had just begun.”
But aside from the hundreds of artworks in this outdoor museum, the new faces coming here also have infused the traditional community, businesses, and small industries. Mr. Cheihk spends some time detailing a tile business that has recreated itself with interesting new patterns and motifs and speaks of the newly engaged folks from the neighborhood who are proud of the artworks and ask for more when the originals have deteriorated.
It is an unusual project bringing street artists and muralists from 30 countries around the world, and the results have been enriching in culture and relationships. The unique atmosphere encourages unconventional artistic experiences, he says, stretching and blending new influences with the traditions of the area. It has become a laboratory of sorts where international meets contemporary.
Add Fuel. Djerbahood 2. Albin Michel – Galerie ItinerranceArdif. Djerbahood 2. Albin Michel – Galerie ItinerranceArdif. Djerbahood 2. Albin Michel – Galerie ItinerranceBToy. Djerbahood 2. Albin Michel – Galerie ItinerranceCryptik. Djerbahood 2. Albin Michel – Galerie ItinerranceDavid De La Mano. Djerbahood 2. Albin Michel – Galerie ItinerranceInvader. Djerbahood 2. Albin Michel – Galerie ItinerranceM-City. Djerbahood 2. Albin Michel – Galerie ItinerranceMohaned L’Gacham. Djerbahood 2. Albin Michel – Galerie ItinerranceTeuthis. Djerbahood 2. Albin Michel – Galerie ItinerranceShepard Fairey. Djerbahood 2. Albin Michel – Galerie Itinerrance
A bit of sérendipité, really, to be tooling around Wynwood in a holiday mindset and a rental car at the end of the year, and to look up to see Mantra on a cherry picker. We had just seen him in Brooklyn the month before and here he was again, painting freehand, as he does, with such precision and commitment, which he also does.
The painting is thoughtful, as you may expect, with each of the collection a butterfly that can be found in Miami, he tells us. Next month he will be in Mexico in the middle of millions of – you know what.
Keep going strong, Mantra.
Binomial name, from left to right, top to bottom :
1A Eurema d. daira ♂ 1B Eunica Tatila ♀ 1C Zerene Cesonia ♀ 1D Phoebis Philea ♀ 1E Limenitis arthemis astyanax ♀ 2A Papilio P. Palames ♂ 2B Hypolimnas Misippus ♂ 2C Siproeta Stelenes ♂ 3A Eurema d. daira ♀ 3B Eunica Tatila ♂ 3C Zerene Cesonia ♂ 3D Phoebis Sennae ♀ 3E Eumaeus Atala ♂
We take this day to reflect upon how far we have come and how very far we have to go to achieve parity. Our systemic racism and broken minds enable inequality to exist, and persist. Thanks to street artist Dragon 76 for reminding us that it’s in our hands.
“Now don’t go jumping to conclusions”, your 5th grade English teacher Mrs. Muckaraka would tell you, and you thought she sounded like a prehistoric relic, a walking anachronism.
Apply that proverb to the cycle of news propaganda parried at us on a daily basis, one wonders if we are always being led to the slaughter – or just every other day. With great regularity, we are encouraged to jump to conclusions without reasoned examination.
Thinking is being erased. When watching cable news or listening to the corporate radio that blankets rural America, one sees that we are being pummeled by a logic that is beyond tortured, in much the same way Orwell warned. As you know, the repetition of the lie is what eventually makes it true.
“War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.”
But now, don’t jump to conclusions. That doesn’t necessarily mean that we are going to repeat history. Our behavior is not being manipulated in an organized programmatic manner.
Right?
Our thanks to street artist Sara Lynne Leo for sparking this particularly side-winded Saturday diatribe.
Our weekly focus on the moving image and art in the streets. And other oddities.
Now screening: 1. Nick Cave: Forothemore via Guggenheim Museum 2. Reckoning with Grief at the Water Park / Black Slide / A short animated film by Uri Lotan 3. BEATLES, AUTOMATA by Daniel Bennan
BSA Special Feature: Nick Cave: Forothemore via Guggenheim Museum
Home of HOUSE; young, queer, black folks made the nights come alive and stay pumping all night long in Chicago when Nick Cave was coming up. Style was everything, performance, and happenings with all the trappings – a place to let it all blast outward in search of form. Whatever is holding us down on this earth, Nick Cave provides a portal into how we may supercede it all.
Nick Cave: Forothemore via Guggenheim Museum
Reckoning with Grief at the Water Park / Black Slide / A short animated film by Uri Lotan via The New Yorker.
Grief hits you in the strangest places, including in water parks. When it does, you better just go with the flow, baby.
BEATLES, AUTOMATA by Daniel Bennan
Eventually everything becomes folk art, no matter how revolutionary you initially perceived it to be. Here artist Daniel Bennan carves these mop headed earthshakers into a Beatrola.
“A splash of color” is how many local news programs nationally brightened people’s day at the end of an episode with a local art segment in the last decade. More often than not, they were talking about new murals going up around town, or more specifically, in a moribund business district that needed some foot traffic. The camera pans to catch massive murals of bright posies and a closeup of a paint-splattered ponytailed Picasso in overalls perched high atop a cherry picker.
Here in Wynwood Walls the crowds were coursing in the midst of the splash between Christmas and New Years Day, an outdoor art gallery exhibit that allows a family to enjoy the mural movement with confined fences and personal tour guides. Free of politics essentially and pumped full of visual stimulation, the side-by-side murals from an international roster prove excellent backdrops for selfies and safe enjoyment by everyone from the stroller set to blue-haired family royalty. This is more than just a splash of color; this is a specifically focused kaleidoscope of images that give one view of the current scene away from the wild untamed streets, created for guests to have an entertaining afternoon and possibly see a street art hero.
While you are here, check out the current exhibit in the gallery with Hebru Brantley, or a collection of unrelated canvasses in the Goldman Global Arts store. Naturally, you’ll want to exit through the gift shop.
Prats de Lluçanès, Manlleu, Sant Julià de Vilatorta, Sant Bartomeu del Grau, and Alpens
Here we have more examples of city meeting rural, traditional meeting Stylez, countryside meeting contemporary, local pride meeting international flavor. In part II of our report from October/November’s Osona Artimur Festival, photographer and street art/mural art expert Fer Alcalá observes that putting together a wide-spread event like this is complicated and rewarding, somewhat like managing the United Nations General Assembly every September.
“The fact is that looking for walls outside the big cities can be an alternative solution for artists and cultural managers due to the difficulties that can be found downtown Barcelona,” says Alcalá and colleague Laura Colomé in their description of the massive event. “The rules about architectural aesthetics, the shortage of legal walls and the strong rivalry make managing big events of this nature a very hard task to do.”
Nonetheless, the community spirit and lust for communicating through art-in-the-streets show in the quality and range of works. The modern world may be awash with a sense of chaos, wonder, and mystery in ways we didn’t imagine; it’s precisely why we need to be outside talking about art with each other to contemplate and process the changes in the context of our collective history.
“Rural contexts become new places for researching, innovation, and promoting art,” they tell us. “It’s fair to say that Osona Artimur festival brings new horizons to art in the countryside of Catalunya and these five pioneer villages.”
Invited artists: Zoer, Ana Barriga, Satone, Nano4814, Luogo Comune, Isaac Cordal, Rosh, Alberto Montes, Jan Vallverdú, Marta Lapeña, Eloise Gillow Artists selected by open call: Twee Muizen, Sergi Bastida, Wedo Goas Artists working on participatory processes: Daniel Muñoz, Chu Doma, Alessia Innocenti, Mateu Targa, Zosen
A 5-village mural program will be surely eclectic, to say the least. The first Osona Artimur Festival produced 19 of them, murals that is, and each speaks to the sensitivities of the modern era, an awareness of local history, and the unarticulated sensibilities of a multi-headed program here in the countryside just to the north of Barcelona. Curated by members and organizers at a pioneering urban art center called B-Murals, the quality of work and diversity of styles represent a fair survey of the international scene at the moment, with a decidedly local sabor.
With B-Murals bringing the community and educational roots to the project, the complex execution during this autumn was coordinated with the Department of Tourism of Osona and the Catalan company Transit Projects. Working closely with the five villages, they served as intermediaries between locals and the international artists who came to paint there from France, Germany, Argentina, Ireland, Italy, Chile,… and closer to home.
The towns of Prats de Lluçanès, Manlleu, Sant Julià de Vilatorta, Sant Bartomeu del Grau, and Alpens welcomed the artists. All participants were supported by an extensive production team, including assistants, runners, photographers, and film archivists. Here is our first of two postings from this part of Spain that features rivers, mountains, and beautiful landscapes.
Our special thanks to Fer Acala for sharing his images and observations about the event with us and BSA readers.
Invited artists: Zoer, Ana Barriga, Satone, Nano4814, Luogo Comune, Isaac Cordal, Rosh, Alberto Montes, Jan Vallverdú, Marta Lapeña, Eloise Gillow Artists selected by open call: Twee Muizen, Sergi Bastida, Wedo Goas Artists working on participatory processes: Daniel Muñoz, Chu Doma, Alessia Innocenti, Mateu Targa, Zosen
Post-Graffiti? Surreal-Primitive? Flat-Channel Brute? This stuff is hard to categorize sometimes as the roots are in graffiti and advertising and illustration and communications and all art history- but for sure a lot of this fresh paint looks fresh indeed in Barcelona.
BSA contributor and photographer Lluis Olive-Bulbena hit a graffiti jam with some notable names on the streets, including two of Barcelona’s most notorious; Aryz and Sixe Paredes. ¡Qué guay!
Elfo is a graffiti writer and social commentator whose work intentionally sidesteps traditional notions of style or technical lettering. This …Read More »
BROOKLYN STREET ART LOVES YOU MORE EVERY DAY
