All posts tagged: France

Points de Vue 2023 / Bayonne, France / Part I

November 2, 2023 Artists

From October 18 to 22, 2023, the Points de Vue Festival celebrated its seventh year in the realm of public art. This annual gathering brought together a group of nine artists, spanning local and international talents, to adorn the walls of Bayonne and the communes of the Northern Basque Country. Supported by a blend of private and municipal funding, the festival acts as a vibrant showcase for the diverse world of street art, skillfully blending pleasing imagery in murals across Bayonne, all while weaving a narrative that nods to the roots of street art and graffiti. Simultaneously, it seamlessly integrates the region’s rich cultural heritage, its inhabitants, and historical narratives.

Elisa Capdevila. Points de Vue 2023. Bayonne, France. October, 2023. (photo © Vincent Lanzolla)

Evolved in its presentation, the festival offers a comprehensive program encompassing exhibitions, concerts, and screenings, to cultivate an environment that encourages audiences to engage with artistic creation from multiple angles. Through interactive workshops, attendees have the chance to nurture their artistic potential, with encounters with artworks often igniting passions or fostering enduring curiosities. Since 2022, Points de Vue has also facilitated gatherings of visual arts professionals, openly addressing the ever-evolving dynamics of the sector with the public.

Today, the Points de Vue open-air gallery in Bayonne aims to transcend physical and intellectual confines, infusing streets, landscapes, and daily life with a unifying artistic essence. This year’s festival brought together artists from both international and local realms, showcasing a rich diversity inherent in their works. Whether through graffiti or contemporary art, these distinguished participants, drawn from various influences and backgrounds, leave their indelible creative mark on urban spaces, a trend increasingly witnessed at festivals of this nature.

Elisa Capdevila finds her muse in the ordinary occurrences of life, accentuating the lyricism of unassuming events in a life: a holiday, a familial repast, a stroll through the countryside… Her murals, dispersed across various European nations, make us envision and reflect.

Sophie Mess. Points de Vue 2023. Bayonne, France. October, 2023. (photo © Vincent Lanzolla)

After painting murals commercially for prominent brands, Sophie Mess heads on an artistic journey that she hopes will empower her to express her creative vision more freely. Now it looks like the world she conjures on urban canvases derives inspiration from the domain of botany. Infusing the urban landscape with vibrant hues amid its grey facades, Sophie Mess encourages onlookers to reflect upon the balance/imbalance of the natural world.

PichiAvo. Points de Vue 2023. Bayonne, France. October, 2023. (photo © Vincent Lanzolla)

Exploring the conventions of classical art and graffiti, the artistic partnership of PichiAvo forges an urban dialect at the intersection of creative movements, a style embraced by both critics and the wider audience. Their creations consistently captivate with their colossal presence, where contemporary and ancestral elements harmoniously coexist.

Jan Voorman. Points de Vue 2023. Bayonne, France. October, 2023. (photo © Vincent Lanzolla)

A Franco-German artist, residing between Berlin and Chile, Jan Vormann restores city walls by incorporating a Lego mosaic within their crevices, and has been doing this for many years. His artistic statement carries a playful and peacemaking essence, subverting the monotonous world of grown-ups while playfully acknowledging the inner child within us all.

Starting in 2021, Points de Vue has been extending its reach beyond the confines of Bayonne, encompassing the expanse of the Communauté d’Agglomération Pays Basque. This expansion offers invited artists the unique opportunity to engage in residencies within local communities, enabling them to draw inspiration from their host locations. Over several weeks, artists immerse themselves in the local environment, fostering dialogues with community members to craft new works that mirror the essence of their welcoming surroundings. These interactions cultivate authentic exchanges, bringing urban art into new, personal territories.

For this year’s edition, the French-German artist Jan Vormann undertook a creative endeavor at the Gribraltar stele in Uhart-Cize, a historical site at the crossroads of the Compostelle pilgrimage routes.

The Village. Points de Vue 2023. Bayonne, France. October, 2023. (photo © Vincent Lanzolla)

NeSpoon and the Cross of Toulouse in Blagnac, France

June 13, 2023 Artists

We again join the world of street artist Nespoon, this time nestled in the enchanting town of Blagnac, in the picturesque region of Occitania, which serves as the backdrop for her latest artistic endeavor. Blagnac (pop. 23,759), a serene residential suburb of Toulouse in the south of France, is not only known for its tranquility but also for being home to the illustrious headquarters of Airbus, the largest aerospace corporation in the world.

Invited by the curator, Maud O’Jeanson, Nespoon embarked on a journey that would culminate in a solo exhibition of her paintings and sculpture at the esteemed Odyssud Cultural Center from May 12th to July 5th, 2023. As is her custom, she was also commissioned to create new work for the walls of the city hall.

NeSpoon. City Hall. Blagnac, France. (photo courtesy of the artist)

The city authorities proposed a project that paid homage to the ancient symbol of the region, the Cross of Occitania. This revered emblem, also known as the Cross of Toulouse or, albeit inaccurately, the Cross of the Cathars, has held profound significance for over a millennium. In the medieval era, it adorned the coat of arms of the St-Gilles family, the Counts of Toulouse. Today, this emblem can be found on official symbols of local government bodies, fluttering on flags, etched into house walls, wrought in iron on bridge balustrades, and even imprinted on postcards. Its ubiquity extends to the local subway, where it marks its presence, and it is cherished as jewelry, sought-after souvenirs, and even as graffiti on urban walls. Some believe that the origins of the Toulouse cross predate Christianity, possibly once representing a radiant sun wheel with its twelve rays. Traditionally, the numbers 3, 4, and 12 were intricately incorporated into this symbol.

In a Nespoonian twist, the artist chose to disrupt this rhythmic pattern and embark on a deconstruction journey of the symbol. Adding new elements and forging novel divisions and symmetries, she breathed new life into this timeless icon. The numerical essence of her project can be described by the numbers 4, 5, 8, and 20, intricately interwoven into her mesmerizing creations.

Inspired by the intricate artistry of lace, Nespoon derived her pattern for the mural from a delicate technique called tatting. Every stroke and design element bore her mark, infusing the cross with her own artistic language. Despite the challenges posed by the surprisingly cool and rainy May weather in this region, Nespoon devoted ten days to her work transforming the city hall’s façade.

Nespoon extends her heartfelt gratitude to the city of Blagnac, the team at Odyssud, and especially Maud O’Jeanson for their unwavering support in making this extraordinary project a reality.

NeSpoon. Odyssud Cultural Center. Blagnac, France. (photo courtesy of the artist)

NeSpoon’s Dentelle de rue at the Odyssud Cultural Center runs until July 05, 2023. Click HERE for more details.

Henry Hang – Le Degas De La Street Dance

December 1, 2022 Artists

Bringing two of the elements of Hip Hop together on his latest mural, painter and photographer (and occasional professor) Henry Hang shows his enthusiasm here in his native Paris with an aerosol can and brush with equal passion.

Henry Hang – Le Degas De La Street Dance. Elise Herszkowicz | Art Azoï. Centre Ken Saro-Wiwa. Paris, France. (photo © Henry Hang)

A former graffiti tagger with ALB in the early 1990s, Mr. Hang also practiced dance as a bboy – saying that he is bringing it all together on canvas and walls with the energy of graffiti. Last year he was teaching students at the Figaro fair about all of the plastic and performative arts that contribute to the “aestheticization of hip-hop culture.” This new wall with Art Azoi combines his appreciation for all of it.

The figures are lifted and turned with a certain elegance: always in motion and gravitating above the ground with a resolute honesty found in street performance sometimes. Not that he is trying to be too literal; his appreciation for impressionism is evidenced by the title he has given himself, “Le Degas De La Street Dance.” Seeing his enthusiasm and his expression of it is inspiring in itself.

Henry Hang – Le Degas De La Street Dance. Elise Herszkowicz | Art Azoï. Centre Ken Saro-Wiwa. Paris, France. (photo courtesy of Art Azoï)

Medianeras Nestled in the French Alps for “Eternelles Crapulles”

October 10, 2022 Artists

Not that you can ever hope to compete with the Alps…

When you live in such a picturesque town like Briançon, France, your daily existence includes its grandeur. Perhaps that is why Medianeras chose to paint an equally grand Generation Z subject who fairly demands your attention as well.

Medianeras. In collaboration with Eternelles Crapulles. Briançon, France. October 2022. (photo © Medianeras)

“We decided to open this wall to show an empowered and defiant youth,’ said the artist duo of Analí Chanquia and Vanesa Galdeano. With the intention, they say, of presenting a “more equal and fair society in this windy place with violet horizons that disappear in the clouds,” the artists painted for this festival that began in 2018 here called “Eternelles Crapulles”.

Bifido in Lozzi, Emotions on Display in Corsica

July 19, 2022 Artists

Sometimes it just hits you, a joke. You bend back and lift your chin and belt out a joyful laugh.In the pantheon of positive health behaviors, this unbridled outburst must be one of those actions recommended regularly – sure to keep your life lighter and longer.

“The fact is always obvious much too late, but the most singular difference between happiness and joy is that happiness is a solid and joy a liquid.”
J.D. Salinger

Bifido. Popularte Festival. Lozzi, Corsica. France. (photo courtesy of the artist)

Italian street artist, photographer, sociologist, and philosopher Bifido shows us this newest diptych of two girls expressing simple emotions in the smallest town we can imagine. Not far from the laughing girl is the shy one, hiding behind her hands, unsure if that will be enough to comfort herself.

“Lozzi is in the Niolu region, about 80 people live there, there is no commercial activity, no bar, no market, no school, nothing,” Bifido says, which makes you consider the impact of these powerful large-scale images before an audience not accustomed to the visual litter of the big city.

We are always intrigued by such small towns across Europe inhabited by a handful of individuals. We asked Bifido about the town and he told us that “I believe that such a village can make you fall in love. Totally surrounded by nature, a precious silence and all noises are children of nature.
The gentleman who organizes the festival is a math teacher at the university, when he has to go to work he takes 1 hour by car which I imagine is nothing for you, but for a European, especially one who lives in such a place it is a long way.

He organizes the festival himself and does it for the local children. In fact, he has a beautiful spirit. He likes to invite artists who involve local children, and even sometimes with the artists themselves, the children destroy the works after a few days as an act of participation”.

Even in these photographs, disconnected from logos or brands or campaign messages, an observer is pushed to calculate the scale of a photorealistic image in relation to these settings. It is unclear if the images respond directly to the town, or if they presents new spirits in their midst.

For a town that is barely so, one considers the life here, where “there are only scattered huts, mountains, rivers, lakes, cows and other animals that roam undisturbed through the alleys.” Bifido adds to the public space with these images. Each is in a way similarly isolated – as are the residents of this place that was once full of the everday hallmarks of a healthy society.

In both portraits Bifido creates a poignant distillation of a moment – for anyone to discover and interpret on their way through Lozzi.

YZ’s Women of “Empress” and Immigrant Communities in Roubaix, France

April 2, 2022 Artists

Located in one of France’s youngest and poorest regions, the city of Roubaix also is called home by a mix of immigrant populations from the global south who integrated into a vastly different culture than the one from which they came. Street Artist YZ has made women from these cultures the center stage of her large wheat-pasted portraits for about a decade, and we have published her campaigns of solid pillars of their communities several times.

YZ. *Urbain.Es*. La Condition Publique. Roubaix, France (photo courtesy of the artist)

In recognition of her participation in the women-centered exhibition URBAIN.ES here, curated by Magda Danysz, YZ says she conducted interviews of her subjects from Kabul, Vietnam, Tunisia, Cameron, and the Ivory Coast before creating their large-scale portraits. She says she considers her work as that of a documentarian. She says it’s a complex mix of conforming to the new culture and desiring to honor the traditions and habits of the old one. What has she learned, aside from the immigrant stereotypes of Roubaix that outsiders sometimes have about them?

“This is of particular importance when questioning identity issues in a country where the insistence on integration often prioritizes the cultural ‘smoothing’ over cultural identity,” she says.

Here are a few selections from YZ’s installations from her ongoing project “Empress,” which “explores the cultural diversity of different communities throughout the world, questioning ideas of consumerism and conformity.”

Click HERE to read our previous article about this exhibition.

YZ and Her ‘Amazone’ Warrior Women On Senegalese Walls – Harrington and Rojo on Huffington Post

YZ Yseult “Empress” Brings More Strong Female Images to the Street

URBAIN.ES

Exposition collective sous le commissariat de Magda Danysz
Group Show curated by Magda Danysz

Du 31 mars au 24 Juillet 2022
From March 31st to July 24th, 2022

Click HERE for more information and a complete preview of the artworks.

La Condition Publique, Roubaix, France

More about Roubaix: The Banlieue Project

BSA Film Friday: 10.01.21

October 1, 2021 Artists, BSA Film Friday

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Our weekly focus on the moving image and art in the streets. And other oddities.

Now screening:
1. Nathan Paulin on a High Wire Between Tour Eiffel & Theatre National
2. Man on Wire. Twin Towers with Philippe Petit
3. Pejac: Apnea

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BSA Special Feature: Nathan Paulin on a High Wire Between Tour Eiffel & Theatre National

After gawking at the Arc de Triomphe here last week we wandered into one of our favorite outdoor arts – the tight wire walker, specifically Nathan Paulin, who walked above the crowds at the Eiffel Tower September 18th. A precursor perhaps to Parkour and more likely progeny of the circus, the art of walking high above the ground and risking life and limb and managing poetry at the same time is outrageous to some, sublime to others.

Nathan Paulin entre la Tour Eiffel and the Theatre National de Chaillot in Paris

Man on Wire. Twin Towers with Philippe Petit

In 1974, Philippe Petit, a 24 years old artist from France, performed what to this date we consider to be the most extraordinary unauthorized street art act ever pulled off in the world. On the morning of August 7, Mr. Petit walked across the Twin Towers on a high-wire without any safety precautions. No net, no harness. Just his mind, his balancing pole, and his body.

Mr. Petit’s meticulously planned stunt involved illegally rigging a 440-pound cable between the towers with the help of a small crew. He performed for 45 minutes at 1,312 ft (400 meters) walking 8 times back and forth along the wire, sitting, looking down, and waving to the stunned crowd below. Nobody will ever do that again. The Twin Towers are gone but Mr. Petit is still here, with us in NYC.

The Spanish street artist Pejac debuts a 45 piece collection of artworks for his show called APNEA in Berlin at the end of this month, his largest show to date.

“Most of the works were conceived while the world was holding its breath. APNEA for me means breathing again’’, Pejac comments in reference to both the pandemic and the title of his show. ‘‘During a time of lockdown, painting within the four walls of my studio felt like a liberation and a lifeline. APNEA represents this contradiction.’’

Pejac: Apnea

NeSpoon Interprets 19th Century French Needle Lace from the Musée des Beaux-arts

June 9, 2021 Artists

Polish artist Nespoon has revived a cottage industry of appreciation for the historical art of lace design, steeping her practice in a sincere study to preserve the work of generations, towns, and regions. For her first mural of the year she borrows a 19^th Century French needle lace from the Musée des Beaux-arts et de la Dentelle in Alençon.

NeSpoon. *CIté* – *Festival écologique d’Arts Urbains*. Callac, France. (photo © NeSpoon)

Deftly interpreted here, Nespoon’s new work frames a corner building in the city of Callac in French Brittany. Exquisite, not only in the rendering and design of the lace patterning itself, but in the project’s ability to bring the past forward in a newly relevant and even contemporary manner.

The project is part of the Festival écologique d’Arts Urbains.

Zosen & Mina Hamada Overlapping in Paris for Les Plateaux Sauvages

February 13, 2021 Artists

“This mural contains the shapes of each one overlapped in layers and erasing lines to emphasize color, our great passion,” says Zosen of his new collaboration with artist Mina Hamada. The two have created many color-blocked organic and chaotic visual feasts on walls around the world over the last few years, and this one puts an optimistic face on the new year in Paris.

Zosen & Mina Hamada in collaboration with Art Azoï. Paris, France. (Photo courtesy of Art Azoï)

In fact, the painting pair haven’t been able to do a large scale mural like this since late 2019 in Japan, where Mina hails from. “After more than a year, pandemic and confinement in between, we wanted to do something different and fresh to have fun.”

In coordination with L’association Art Azoï and Les Plateaux Sauvages in the 20^th arrondissement, the Barcelona-based pair were bundled up and on cherry pickers in the early January cold weather, tracing out their long-pole lines over the top of one another. “For this mural, we prepared two different designs,” says Mina. “Then we mixed over the lines to make the mural.”

Ahlam Jarban is Not Forbidden in Paris

February 10, 2021 Artists

Imagine being forbidden, proscribed by religious law. Haram.

Yemeni artist Ahlam Jarban says that she felt that her very existence as a girl and a woman growing up in her country was forbidden. Now imagine being a female graffiti writer in that war-torn country, eager for your work and your ideas to be seen and considered.

“To be a woman in Yemen is forbidden (haram),” she says. “Street art was my way in Yemen to say ‘I’m not haram; I’m proud of being a woman.’ ”

The Haram wall: Ahlam Jarban in collaboration with Art Azoï. Paris, France. (Photo courtesy of Art Azoï)

Her new mural was created in collaboration with the Agency of Artists in Exile (Atelier des Artistes en Exil), where she is an artist in residence. Using aerosol and stencils, she draws attention to this denial of personal agency in the world through patterned calligraphy of “Haram” interrupted by the occasional pair of photorealistic eyes, always watching.

Ahlam Jarban in collaboration with Art Azoï. Paris, France. (Photo courtesy of Art Azoï)

Part of an exhibition along a 50-meter long wall at the Pavillon Carré de Baudouin in the 20th arrondissement of Paris, the artist is actively assessing and critiquing the patriarchal behaviors she witnessed during her youth before arriving here in 2018. She is also making connections between the two cultures.

Getting up in earlier days. Ahlam Jarban (courtesy Agency of Artists in Exile – Atelier des Artistes en Exil)

“I painted eyes because I think that was the only thing that was free on a woman’s body,” she says as she describes the various emotions and intentions that are communicated by people purely with their eyes. Immediately she pivots to the correlation to life in her new European home where everyone is encouraged to wear a mask during the Covid-19 pandemic, and people are learning to rely more on communicating with their eyes, perhaps more than ever before.

“I think this mural can be very interesting for the Arabic French people and for the French people to know more about how it can be to be a female in Yemen,” she says in the video below.

Spider Tag: Neon Mural #10 for Peinture Fraiche in Lyon.

October 17, 2020 Artists

Saturday is a great day to spend indoors at a video arcade, right?

If arcades had interactive installations like this new one from SpiderTag, it would be packed. Unfortunately Covid-19, people can’t get packed into the Peinture Fraiche Festival in Lyon, France.

Spider Tag. *Interactive Neon Mural #10*. Peinture Fraiche Festival, Lyon, France. (photo © Spider Tag)

The festival features 50 French and international artists at La Halle Debourg operating loosely under the theme of innovation in urban art as a concept. Here we see the Spidertags new installation while he continues his explorations with Neon, transforming and mediating the thick dark night. He calls this his Interactive Neon Mural #10.

Gilbert Petit in Wonderland (Moissy-Cramayel, France)

October 1, 2020 Artists

Feel like you are living on the other side of the looking glass? Yes, that is because your society is in the final collapse of this controlled demolition. No need to worry, though, Gilbert Petit has created an Alice in Wonderland theme for his newest mural to brighten your day.

Gilbert Petit. Wall Street Art of Grand Paris Sud 2020. Moissy-Cramayel, France. (photo © Galerie Mathgoth)

The Parisian artist brought his illustration style 2-D interpretation to Moissy-Cramayel just as summers’ warm rays still had their full strength, the evening begins to cool. With his own interpretation of the children’s tale by Lewis Carroll and published in 1865, you may even find it tempting to step through the glass, but you may likely fall down through a rabbit hole of nonsense and hysteria.

“Curiouser and curiouser!”

The mural is part of this autumn’s 2020 Wall Street Art festival and we thank Galerie Mathgoth for sharing these photos with BSA readers.

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