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BSA Images Of The Week: 05.30.21

May 30, 2021 Artists, BSA Images Of The Week

New York is crushing it right now.

The volume of Street Art has picked up full steam with more graffiti on walls than many OG graff fans can remember were on the trains in the 80s. Competition for spots large and small is more fierce than a Saturday afternoon rush at the nail salon. The quantity of pieces and tags and stencils ebbs and flows, as does the quality and freshness. But looking at it as you walk makes you feel like New York street and cultural life is in full bloom. Large-scale and small, the works appear like mushrooms popping up in the urban forest after a late-spring rain storm.

In other news, we’re really digging the miniatures of New York life made by artist Danny Cortes, the 1980s NYC train writer Futura is evolving himself into light fixture design with new works in a Noguchi Museum show (plus new collaborations with Comme des Garçons and Uniqlo), and Tesla’s Elon Musk is looking for “awesome graffiti” to adorn his company’s new mega-factory in Berlin. Let’s see how many graffiti and street artists get trampled in the stampede to “sell out”! Go Bro! Go Sis! Just don’t lecture us on heavy topics like gentrification, or the sullying of “our culture” by arrivistes. Yawn.

Let’s take to the streets, no?

Here’s our weekly interview with the street, this week featuring Conse, D. Scribblings, Damien Mitchel, False, Fhake, Kest Gak, Lorenzo Masnah, Matt Siren, Menace Resa, Michael Zelehoski, Mint & Serf, Mort Art, Royce Bannon, Shiro, Smells, Swif, The Yit Foreward, Toxic, UFO 907, and Zexor.

“Miguelito” by Michael Zelehoski (photo © Jaime Rojo)

This wooden sculpture installed in McCarren Park in Williamsburg is made from recycled wood from boarded-up windows. It will remain in place until October 2021.

Act Like You Know by an unidentifed artist (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Royce Bannon. Matt Siren (photo © Jaime Rojo)

I Love You Always Too! (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“The Intimacy Project” Gets Close to the Artist with Fer Alcala

April 8, 2017 Artists

“…the real heroes are the people noticing things, paying attention.”

~ John Green, The Fault in Our Stars

Twee Muizen. Nau Bostik, Barcelona. (photo © Fer Alcalá. OlympusE510)

Somewhere between celebrity and anonymity sits the Street Artist, depending on their wishes and fortune. We always feel lucky to see the artwork first anonymously on the street, because it needs to stand for itself, free of the passerby’s association with their knowledge of its author. Later, when you are in the presence of the artist with their work, the relationship you have with it is permanently altered. If you have established some trust, you also can learn so much about an artists relationship with the physicality of their process of art-making; the posture, the breathing, the gesture, the distance.

Photographer Fernando Alcalá Losa has made it a focus of his own art practice to notice the small and the great aspects of the artist’s process and captures important details that allow the viewer to understand the dynamics and relationship between an artist and their creation. In December on BSA he wrote,

“It’s about being there, right there, feeling the energy of creation. It’s about intimacy, about detail, about the personal connection with the artist, because you were able to be that close. And not everyone can be that close, that’s for sure…

I’m grateful for having the chance of living these moments of proximity, knowing that those artists that you’re shooting at trust you and allow you to be there, right there.”

Ulises Mendicutty. Us Festival 2016. Barcelona. (photo © Fer Alcalá. OlympusE510)

Today on BSA we’re pleased to present a very rare collection of Fernando’s images that tell just these stories, these primary relationships that are in alignment with the life of a creator; a struggle, a dance, a wandering journey of discovery, a spirited production, an execution of plan. All of these aspects and more can be seen, and sometimes captured by the artist behind the lens.

“The Intimacy Project”

Fernando Alcalá Losa

Some weeks ago, I read a post from someone on Facebook saying that the figure of the artist wasn’t important, saying that the piece was the only relevant thing in fact.

It sounded funny to me because there’s no artwork without the artist, but I understand what was meant, although I disagree from a photographic point of view. “The Intimacy Project” is an idea that has been in my head for some time and it has been developing in parallel with my evolution as a Street Art photographer.

Yoshi Sislay. Us Festival 2016. Barcelona. (photo © Fer Alcalá. OlympusE510)

When I started to interact with artists, I was kind of obsessed about keeping the distance, physically speaking, and about not disturbing the artist. As time went by, I began getting closer to everything; not only to the wall, but also to the person who paints the wall. I became more confident, always trying to be respectful and operating from my best intentions – and I continue doing this today.

“The Intimacy Project” is about the person behind the artist, about the human side of the creative process and about what happens from a close up view while a piece of art is being produced.

It’s about gestures, expressions, obsessions and techniques. Because the artwork, the final result, is important, but the human being who creates it is also important for me…indeed…

“The Intimacy Project”

Took place over the course of one year
Three different tools used: Iphone, OlympusE510, FujifilmXT10
Scenarios: Openwalls Conference 2016, Ús Festival 2016, Contorno Urbano 2016 / 2017, La Arnau Gallery, Fem Rimes, Fem Graff 2016, Nau Bostik, Wallspot

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“…the real heroes are the people noticing things, paying attention.”

~ John Green, The Fault in Our Stars

Twee Muizen. Nau Bostik, Barcelona. (photo © Fer Alcalá. OlympusE510)

Ulises Mendicutty. Us Festival 2016. Barcelona. (photo © Fer Alcalá. OlympusE510)

Yoshi Sislay. Us Festival 2016. Barcelona. (photo © Fer Alcalá. OlympusE510)

Margalef. Us Festival 2016. Barcelona. (photo © Fer Alcalá. OlympusE510)

Irene Lopez. Us Festival 2016. Barcelona. (photo © Fer Alcalá. OlympusE510)

Nuno Gomes. Us Festival 2016. Barcelona. (photo © Fer Alcalá. OlympusE510)

Roc Blackblock. Madrid, 2017 (photo © Fer Alcalá, FujifilmXT10)

Conse. Barcelona, 2017 (photo © Fer Alcalá, FujifilmXT10)

Smates. Barcelona, 2017 (photo © Fer Alcalá, FujifilmXT10)

Roc Blackblock. Madrid, 2017 (photo © Fer Alcalá, FujifilmXT10)

Roc Blackblock. Madrid, 2017 (photo © Fer Alcalá, FujifilmXT10)

Smates. Barcelona, 2017 (photo © Fer Alcalá, FujifilmXT10)

Berol. Barcelona, 2017 (photo © Fer Alcalá, FujifilmXT10)

Berol. Barcelona, 2017 (photo © Fer Alcalá, FujifilmXT10)

SAV45. Lloret Del Mar, 2017 (photo © Fer Alcalá, FujifilmXT10)

Elbi Elem. Contorno Urbano 2017. L’Hospitalet De Llobregat (photo © Fer Alcalá, FujifilmXT10)

Elbi Elem. Contorno Urbano 2017. L’Hospitalet De Llobregat (photo © Fer Alcalá, FujifilmXT10)

Shana. ContornoUrbano 2017. L’Hospitalet De Llobregat (photo © Fer Alcalá, FujifilmXT10)

Shana. ContornoUrbano 2017. L’Hospitalet De Llobregat (photo © Fer Alcalá, FujifilmXT10)

Ivana Flores. Base Elements Gallery. Barcelona. (photo © Fer Alcalá OlympusE510)

Miss Van. Fem Rimes, Fem Graff-2016. Barcelona. (photo © Fer Alcalá iPhone 6)

Cinta Vidal. Contorno Urbano 2016. L’Hospitalet De Llobregat (photo © Fer Alcalá, OlympusE510)

Cinta Vidal. Contorno Urbano 2016. L’Hospitalet De Llobregat (photo © Fer Alcalá, OlympusE510)

Reskate Studio. Contorno Urbano 2016. L’Hospitalet De Llobregat (photo © Fer Alcalá, OlympusE510)

Fasim. Open Walls Conference 2016. Barcelona. (photo © Fer Alcalá OlympusE510)

She One. Open Walls Conference 2016. Barcelona. (photo © Fer Alcalá OlympusE510)

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