All posts tagged: Georgia

BSA Top Stories 2017 – As Picked by You

BSA Top Stories 2017 – As Picked by You

December 14, 2017

Berlin, Kathmandu, Santa Fe, Brooklyn, Sweden, London, New York, the country of Georgia, Raleigh, North Carolina. The favorite stories of BSA readers spanned all of these places this year as we documented this global people’s art movement variously described as Street Art/ graffiti/ urban art. We put it out there daily and you react to it – sharing it on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram – starting conversations and creating connections.

The topics of these 15 favorite stories run the gamut as well; From Banksy and Brexit, Marxism and Urvanity to a bodega completely made of felt, your voracious appetite was wide ranging. From a well crafted graffiti writing exhibition at a white suburban Pennsylvania college where the tuition is 50K to an attempt to bring reassuring cultural heritage art to the streets of Kathmandu where the museum was destroyed by an earthquake – the extremes and ironies only peaked your interest.

You loved seeing and hearing Martha Cooper getting her first solo exhibition in New York and the mania that queued thousands to see the transformation of a 5 floor bank in Berlin by graffiti writers, Street Artists, installation artists and performers. You care about the earth and its people, like the story of ICY an SOT in the country of Georgia making human sculptures of trash as a critique of globalized waste, and the story of Chip Thomas using his Street Art to draw attention to a traditional Hopi farming technique called “dry farming”.

And in 2017 the resonance of ‘Resistance is Female’ catapulted our story of the illegal campaign of phone booth takeovers to the top 15, showing that a uniquely impactful high-jacking of the advertising streetscape is always going to win fans.

No matter where we went in 2017, BSA readers were always invited to go along with us and discover people and art on the street and in the gallery or the museum whether it was in Scotland, Hong Kong, Berlin, Sweden, Mexico or Tahiti. We captured what we could and interpreted it – and you told us what you liked by re-Tweeting and re-Gramming and re-Facebooking.

From 365 postings over the last year, here are the 15 you liked the most.

No. 15

Marx and Engels Statues Re-Skinned & Re-Located : Various & Gould

Various & Gould. Berlin, June 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“Why do you glorify and duplicate these two criminals?! They shouldn’t have a monument at all. Next you’re doing Hitler?”

Various and Gould try to paraphrase some of the comments they received from passersby in a park near the town-hall in centrally located Berlin-Mitte while working on their latest project with a statue of the creators of Marxist theory. Some imagined they were glorifying, others alleged defamation.

“It’s a shame how you treat Marx and Engels!”

Truthfully, this new project in public space that literally copies a monument and then transfers it to another location didn’t have much to do with the capitalist system that creates/allows very rich and very poor people, but it certainly adds stories to the overall experience of Various and Gould.

Various & Gould: Marx & Engels. Continue reading HERE

 

No. 14

“MADRID ME MATA”: Another Look at “Urvanity”

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

MADRID ME MATA…in a good sense,”

says Fernando Alcalá Losa, the avid Barcelona based photographer of street culture. He doesn’t literally mean that the Spanish capital is deadly, but rather speaks of his devotion to Madrids’ energy, its possibility, its history, its people, and to its art. The torrid affairs of the heart are invariably complicated, as is the evolution of graffiti and Street Art from their outlaw illegal roots to their flirtations and trysts with other forms and venues; murals, in-studio practice, gallery representation, institutional recognition, or commercial viability.

We are pleased that Mr. Alcalá Losa comes to talk to BSA readers today and takes us to Madrid for the new art fair called “Urvanity” to see what he discovers with you, courtesy his words and his lovers’ view behind the camera.

Madrid Me Mata…in a good sense. Continue reading HERE

 

No. 13

Lucy Sparrow Opens an All-Felt Bodega in NYC : “8 ‘Till Late”

Lucy Sparrow 8 ‘Till Late (photo © Jaime Rojo)

It’s 8 ‘Till Late, artist Lucy Sparrows first all-felt store in New York, and it’s literally just under the Standard Hotel in the Meat Packing district. She’s made 9,000 items over roughly 9 months out of this soft fabric-like craft material – and at first impression it sincerely looks like everything you would have found in a New York bodega in the 1990s aside from the hard liquor, which is actually illegal to sell outside a liquor store in NYC, but relax, its all heartfelt.

“We sell quite a lot of self-help books as well,” chimes in Clare Croome, a cashier.

“Yes! Self-help books! Have you seen them?” says Brooks “They’ve got nothing in them on the pages, they’re just blank.”

Lucy Sparrow 8 ‘Till Late. Continue reading HERE

 

No. 12

“All Big Letters” Opens, Curated by RJ Rushmore

Faust. All Big Letters curated by RJ Rushmore at Haverford College’s Cantor Fitzgerald Gallery. Philadephia, PA (photo © Lisa Boughter)

“I wanted to exhibit the mind of a graffiti writer in a gallery, and make that mindset understandable to your average gallery-goer,” he tells us. “To me, that means appreciating not just the finished piece, but how and why it came to be.”

By showing artists, works, photography, and tools that judiciously span the 50 or so years that mark the era of modern mark-making in the public sphere, Rushmore threads a story line that he hopes a visitor can gain an appreciation for in this art, sport, and quest for fame.

All Big Letters. Continue reading HERE

 

No. 11

Anonymouse: Miniature Vignettes on the Street for “No Limit” Festival in Boras, Sweden

Anonymouse. No Limit Boras 2017. Boras, Sweden. September 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Miniaturization on the street or in the museum (or in the street museum) causes you to focus on detail, draw closely, to recall your childhood ability to freely invoke a sense of fantasy.

“Since our visitors are mostly nocturnal, our opening hours are quite generous,” the artists known as Anonymous say in reference to their nighttime installations, sometimes glowing with electric light in the lee of a bridge column, or the shadow of a door. They reference the famous Swedish children’s book author Astrid Lindren in their work, and you can easily visualize a small mouse family or a business mouse or a house mouse or church mouse astutely moving through these vignettes, living their important lives.

Possibly one is currently occupied in a back room of one of these installations at the moment but they will be returning presently to greet their new visitor – you, with your big face. Don’t worry, they like you to get up close. They may even provide a magnifying glass for you to get a closer look.

Anonymouse. Minuature Vignettes. Continue reading HERE

 

No. 1o

Bunnies, Birds, Sexuality and VINZ Feel Free’s “Innocence” in Brooklyn

Vinz Feel Free. “Innocence” The Marcy Project. Williamsburg, Brooklyn. November 4th. 2017 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Birds are associated with freedom, fish remind him of mindless consumerism, and frogs convey authority. He reserves reptiles for soulless soldiers of capital and authoritarian types. And the sudden preponderance of rabbits? Why sexuality and innocence of course.

“Innocence” is the name of the exhibition here curated by BSA and DK Johnston, and Vinz Feel Free has been preparing these works for many months. A project that has included his study of innocence, the show is meant to demarcate such shadings of the concept as to appear only subtly different from one another. To wit:

1. The quality or state of being innocent; freedom from sin or moral wrong.
2. Freedom from legal or specific wrong; guiltlessness.

Vinz Feel Free. “Innocence”.  Continue reading HERE

 

No. 09

Julien De Casabianca, Angry Gods, and Hacking Disaster in Kathmandu

Julien De Casabianca. Outings Project. Kathmandu, Nepal. January, 2017 (photo © Karma Tshering Gurung & Sanam Tamang/ Artudio)

If you are not going into the museum to see art, Julien De Casabianca is happy to bring it out to the street for you. Additionally, if the museum has been closed by an earthquake, he’ll make sure the art gets a public viewing nonetheless.

In Kathmandu recently Street Artist Julien de Casabianca continued his Outings Project by bringing a centuries-old painting outside to the side of the Artudio building in Swoyambhu on Chhauni Hospital Road with the help of Matt Rockwell of the humanitarian hackers group called DisasterHack.

He tells us that the obstacles to getting this piece up seemed insurmountable at times due to the broken social and infrastructural systems in Nepal that still plague people even today, nearly two years since the catastrophic earthquake that killed nearly 9,000 and injured 22,000 more.

Julien De Casabianca/Outings Projects in Kathmandu. Continue reading HERE

No. 08

Rocking “THE HAUS” : A 5-Floor Berlin Bank is Transformed by Artists

Kaleido. The Haus. Berlin. March 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“Normally we paint advertising – hand-painted advertising, mostly with cans. So we work all over Germany, with a lot of crews, “ says Kimo, a bearded, bald energetic and sharp witted guy who is lighting up a cigarette in this tattered, beige ex-conference room.  That explanation doesn’t prepare you for what you will see in the rooms upstairs.

The floors are piled with unopened paint buckets and brushes and cans and the walls in this organizing office are covered with scotch-taped project timelines, to-do lists, and floor plans of the old bank. Each former office space is plainly labled with names of German Street Artists or graffiti  crews, some you recognize, others you don’t. More recent Street Art names are next to classic Graff heads, installation  artists mix freely with Optic Artists, photographers, sculptors, even a live moss installation.

Case Maclaim is right next door to Turbokultur with Stohead out in the hall on floor 1.  El Bocho and Emess are in small rooms to either side of 1UP on the 3rd. Herakut in a corner room numbered 506 is right next to Nick Platt and Paul Punk in 505.

Rocking The Haus. Continue reading HERE

 

No. 07

Working the Cornfields on a Santa Fe Facade with Jetsonorama

Chip Thomas. Santa Fe, New Mexico, Earth Day 2017. (photo © John Donalds)

18 year old Hawthorne Hill has learned the traditional Hopi farming technique called “dry farming” from his mom, according to Jetsonorama, and he places seeds in shallow holes, while his sister Metzli creates rows of wind blocks using nearby brush.

The photos are taken on Second Mesa on the Hopi nation, but the artist brings them here to Santa Fe as part of a project he’s doing with Biocultura Santa Fe.

A project originally conceived of as part of Earth Day, with a focus on where our food comes from and traditional farming methods, its good to think of who works to bring food to your table.

Working The Cornfields. Continue reading HERE

 

No. 06

“A Real Turning Point” : Sculptures on the Art Mile at Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art

Seth Globepainter. Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“I think it’s a real turning point as far as seeing three dimensional things,” says Street Artist and fine artist Ben Frost while hand painting text on the side of the large facsimiles of pharmaceutical boxes that he’s creating for the UN Art Mile. “I think sculptures and installations have been paving a way forward for Street Art.”

In fact sculpture and all manner of three dimensional installations as Street Art have been a part of the current century for sure, from the variety of lego and yarn artists to the soldiered steel tags of REVS and eco-bird houses of XAM and small little men made of wood by Stikman – among many others.

For the opening of UN this weekend, the Urban Nation Museum of Urban Contemporary Art in Berlin this week, a curated selection of artists working in such dimensions were invited to create substantial pieces – including video installation, mobile, interactive, the purely static. Enjoy the variety of works by Street Artists who are working today.

Urban Nation Berlin. Art Mile. Continue reading HERE

No. 05

“Resistance is Female” Takes Over Phone Booths in New York

Gigi Chen for #resistanceisfemale (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The decentralized Resistance, as it turns out, is a majority of Americans.

And leading the charge are women and girls.

So it makes perfect sense that a new grassroots takeover of telephone booth advertising in New York is a campaign called, “Resistance is Female”. Organizers and artists say that the ad takeover project is putting out a message that corporate controlled media seems to be quelling: keep fighting, keep speaking up, persevere.

The artists have put up a couple of dozen or so new art pieces in places where typecast women typically sell shampoo or fashions: a high-jacking of the advertising streetscape which the French and the Situationists would have called détournement in earlier decades.

Resistance Is Female. Continue reading HERE

 

No. 04

Street Artist OLEK and Volunteers Create NINA SIMONE Tribute in Raleigh, NC

Olek. Nina Simone “Here Comes The Sun” Love Across The USA. Raleigh, North Carolina. October 2017. (photo © courtesy Olek)

Susan B. Anthony, Harriet Tubman, Nina Simone; Three of the women whom Street Artist Olek would like us to remember from U.S. history, and who have been recently featured in public crochet portraits. Her most recent portrait done with help from the community brings art made by the public to the public in a country-wide project called “Love Across the USA”.

Sparked a year ago leading up to the US national election where a woman was on the ballot, Olek says that despite the negativity that followed, “it inspired me to create a project that would celebrate the accomplishments of women, many of whom had been forgotten throughout U.S. history.”

Today we go to Raleigh, NC to see the most recent banner of Nina Simone crocheted by Olek and a small army of volunteers. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nina_Simone, the American singer, songwriter, pianist, arranger, and activist in the Civil Rights Movement.

Olek. Here Comes The Sun. Continue reading HERE

 

No. 03

Icy & Sot and a Man of Trash in Tbilisi, Georgia

Icy & Sot.  “Human reflection on nature”. Tbilisi, Georgia. May 2017. (photo © Icy & Sot)

15 centuries old, Tbilisi may not last as long as this garbage man sculpture by Street Artists Icy & Sot.

“It took us only 10 minutes to collect all this trash because there was so much of it – including American brands – in the river by this village,” says Icy as he tells us about the trip he and his brother Sot made last month. A gorgeous and historically diverse city of 1.5 million people, Tbilisi reflects art, architecture, trade and culture that have given the Georgian capital a reputation as a crossroads for Europe and Asia.

During their stay with the Art Villa Garikula, a self organized community contemporary art center begun Tbilisi born painter and educator, Karaman Kutateladze in 2000, Icy and Sot did two pieces and an ad takeover that reflect the global problems posed by a consumer culture sold by corporations with little concern for its impact long term.

Icy & Sot. Human reflections on nature. Continue reading HERE

 

No. 02

“Martha Cooper” Solo Exhibition Reveals Many Unseen “Action Shots”

Martha Cooper signing the print of Futura 2000 whole car “Break”,  Steven Kasher Gallery. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

An intrepid photographer who has launched a million dreams (and perhaps a few thousand careers) in graffiti and Street Art with her photography that captured crucial and seminal aspects of our culture that others overlooked.

That is just one way of seeing this brand new collection of images by Martha Cooper that is spread across one wall featuring artists at work, sometimes intimately. Here is where you see 102 individual shots of artists at work, a stunning testament to the range of art-making techniques that are practiced in the public realm, as well as a testament to the passion and curiosity of the woman behind the lens.

For Ms. Cooper’s first solo photography show in New York, Steven Kasher Gallery is featuring 30 new editions of her legendary street art photographs, the ones that have burned themselves into the collective memory of New York and of our streets in the 1970s and 1980s. While her photographs in the 1984 seminal “Subway Art” and her early Hip Hop street shots may be what she is most known for by artists and collectors and fans in cities around the world to which she travels, the new exhibit also contains more than a foreshadowing into the vast collection of important images she has not shown to us.

Martha Cooper Solo Show. Continue reading HERE

 

No. 01

Banksy Hits Brexit With New Piece, MaisMenos & BLU Used EU Flag Earlier

Banksy. Dover, England. Photo @banksy Instagram

The appearance of a new mural by Banksy in Dover, England caught the attention of many followers on his Instagram account and the mass media folks quickly reported on the new piece that comments on the current state of the EU.

10 months since the Brexit vote, the anonymous artist has created a thoughtful piece marking the crack in the European Union, depicting a white male worker on a ladder chipping away one of the stars on the EU flag, a fissure produced by the action reaching upwards and outwards toward the others.

Banksy Brexit. Continue reading HERE

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Icy & Sot and a Man of Trash in Tbilisi, Georgia

Icy & Sot and a Man of Trash in Tbilisi, Georgia

June 6, 2017

15 centuries old, Tbilisi may not last as long as this garbage man sculpture by Street Artists Icy & Sot.

Icy & Sot.  “Human reflection on nature”. Tbilisi, Georgia. May 2017. (photo © Icy & Sot)

“It took us only 10 minutes to collect all this trash because there was so much of it – including American brands – in the river by this village,” says Icy as he tells us about the trip he and his brother Sot made last month. A gorgeous and historically diverse city of 1.5 million people, Tbilisi reflects art, architecture, trade and culture that have given the Georgian capital a reputation as a crossroads for Europe and Asia.

During their stay with the Art Villa Garikula, a self organized community contemporary art center begun Tbilisi born painter and educator, Karaman Kutateladze in 2000, Icy and Sot did two pieces and an ad takeover that reflect the global problems posed by a consumer culture sold by corporations with little concern for its impact long term.

Icy & Sot.  “Human reflection on nature”. Tbilisi, Georgia. May 2017. (photo © Icy & Sot)

Just last week BSA featured another Street Artist who is concerned about plastics floating around in the oceans, and here we have a sculpture of a human figure made entirely of plastic packaging.

The brothers were in town as guests of the Nova I Festival. “They were such a wonderful people,” says Icy, “and it was a magical place to work. They do art residencies and have held this festival every summer for the past 9 year where artists go to make installations, sculptures and paintings.” The Art Villa Garikula and its collaborative art community provide exhibition space and a museum facility with more than 300 artworks of contemporary art. They also offer unconventional educational programs based on experiential learning, an artist-in-residence program, and the annual festival.

Icy & Sot.  “Human reflection on nature”. Tbilisi, Georgia. May 2017. (photo © Icy & Sot)

Often more than a little ironic with their placement, this new sculptural figure is positioned in the midst of the rolling Georgian landscape, Sot says, “we loved the nature and the landscape – it was a perfect opportunity for us to make work about the nature and the environment.”

A second piece not shown here is a human shaped mirror buried in a grassy lot reflecting the sky – but that may appear in a future posting.

Icy & Sot. Ad takeover. Tbilisi, Georgia. May 2017. (photo © Icy & Sot)

Here also we see an ad takeover with the simplest imagery of a free-flying bird trapped beneath a clear plastic water bottle. According the the World Counts website, we only recycle 1 of every 5 water bottles. Guess where the rest goes?

“Its so sad to see how much plastic trash we produce,” continues Icy. “We all should try to use less and less plastic in our life. Every single piece of plastic that has ever been created since the 19th century its still somewhere in our planet.”

Sot adds “Plastic is killing the planet and our health.”

 

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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“AVATAR” of Ourselves by Karl Addison and Jarus in Atlanta

“AVATAR” of Ourselves by Karl Addison and Jarus in Atlanta

September 14, 2015

How much of you is here with me right now? Are you giving me 100% of you? 80%? 15? When we are texting and “liking” and “sharing” and posting we prefer to think that we are interacting with the world and our selected circles of friends through active and passive participation.

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Karl Addison . Jarus. “Avatar” Work in progress. Art On The Beltline Project.Atlanta. 2015 (photo © Karl Addison)

A new mural for Atlanta’s Art On The Beltline Project highlights the nature of the current vogue for digitally experiencing the world and a term loosely defined as “community”.

Artists Karl Addison and Jarus first collaborated on a wall together during Wall\Therapy in Rochester, New York in 2014 and then later on a project called “Glasshouse” in Berlin. For this one, “Avatar” they say their narrative is about our digital personality and identity. To depict the actual and virtual, they alter her physical features the further they are from the screen.

“The composition is a woman lying down using her phone,” says Addison as he describes her face bathed in the glow of the screen. “As the painting drifts back she becomes pixelated with color blocks and more abstract within the negative space.”  Enjoy this real painting from the perspective of your digital device.

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Karl Addison . Jarus. “Avatar” Work in progress. Art On The Beltline Project. Atlanta. 2015 (photo © Karl Addison)

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Karl Addison . Jarus. “Avatar”.  Art On The Beltline Project. Atlanta. 2015 (photo © Karl Addison)

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Karl Addison . Jarus. “Avatar”.  Detail. Art On The Beltline Project. Atlanta. 2015 (photo © Karl Addison)

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Karl Addison . Jarus. “Avatar”. Detail.  Art On The Beltline Project. Atlanta. 2015 (photo © Karl Addison)

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Karl Addison . Jarus. “Avatar”. CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE.  Art On The Beltline Project. Atlanta. 2015 (photo © Karl Addison)

 

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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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GAIA and #iftheygunnedmedown in Atlanta on MLK Jr. Day

GAIA and #iftheygunnedmedown in Atlanta on MLK Jr. Day

January 19, 2015

As the U.S. reflects on the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. today we also acknowledge that his work, and our work, is not done.

This past year has brought more people into the streets to demonstrate across America than in many years, and the signs and slogans can in many cases be interchanged for those used by civil rights marchers half a century earlier.

In multiple cities across the country thousands of citizens have demonstrated on streets, roads, avenues, highways, intersections. They have made signs and chanted and marched multiple days and nights against injustice and many more have tweeted, facebooked, tumbled and texted – originally it was related to police brutality specifically but more largely we have seen an overall critique of a system still corroded and undermined by our history and legacy of racism.

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Gaia at work on his new mural for the Center for Civil and Human Rights. Atlanta, Georgia. (photo © Brandon English)

From our jails to our boardrooms to our schools and universities to our media outlets to our halls of government, a system of inequality continues, supported by our own ignorance and our failure to learn and heal that legacy of racism. Every day we see a black president thwarted and insulted and disrespected – not for political motivations simply, but so obviously just because of his race. The level of disrespect for the highest office in government has been unprecendented, debasing us all, even though a majority elected and re-elected President Obama.

But just last week the Miami police department was revealed to be using actual photographs of black men for sniper training practice. A blind spot in our own consciousness that is obvious when revealed, but it’s more often a case of a thousand tiny little cuts that keeps a people down, or at least permanently on the defensive. Of course we can do better.

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Gaia at work on his new mural for the Center for Civil and Human Rights. Atlanta, Georgia. (photo © Brandon English)

When it comes to media depictions of people and races, it’s these subtleties that might not be quickly evident until someone culls together many examples so you can see a pattern. In a recent and effective hashtag project that spurred a website by the same name #iftheygunnedmedown questions and examines the bias of new outlets that convict  or exonerate a person by the selective use of images alone.  If it’s a white guy, then it’s his high school graduation day pic. If it’s a black guy, the photo is from the drunken crazy party afterward.

Street Artist and contemporary muralist Gaia picked up the thread of that discussion and created this new mural from photos posted by people on social media for #iftheygunnedmedown. Each of the dual natures presented give cues that are picked up on by a viewer and used to interpret physical and character traits and a variety of assumptions about the person. Gaia points to the project’s founder, CJ Lawrence, as the original inspiration for the project and quotes him saying, “… I set out to indict the media for its role in how we, as Black people, are portrayed after we are killed”.

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Gaia at work on his new mural for the Center for Civil and Human Rights. Atlanta, Georgia. (photo © Brandon English)

The newly completed mural is at the Center for Human Rights in Atlanta and it uses images of Instagrammers whose handles are @bbuckson93 , @cruelyear , @qdotjones and @fullblowndork. As you scan across the handpainted reproductions of personal and family images, obseerve your own perceptions about the person in the frame.

The portraits rise above and are demarcated by symbols and metaphors of the ruins of Persepolis. Of the relevance of the ruins to the project Gaia explains, “The centerpiece is the Cylinder of Cyrus, which is considered by some as the first universal charter on human rights.” The cuneiform inscribed clay cylinder from 6th century BC may not have the impact that an Instragram re-painting does to the average visitor, but it does ground the message in the realization that the march toward rights for all has been very long and there has been much progress – and that there is a long way to go yet.

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Gaia at work on his new mural for the Center for Civil and Human Rights. Atlanta, Georgia. (photo © Marcus Lamar)

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Gaia at work on his new mural for the Center for Civil and Human Rights. Atlanta, Georgia. (photo © Marcus Lamar)

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Young visitors show up to give Gaia props on his new mural for the Center for Civil and Human Rights. Atlanta, Georgia. (photo © Marcus Lamar)

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Gaia. Center for Civil and Human Rights. Atlanta, Georgia. (photo © Gaia)

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Gaia. Center for Civil and Human Rights. Atlanta, Georgia. (photo © Gaia)

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Gaia. Center for Civil and Human Rights. Atlanta, Georgia. (photo © Gaia)

 

For more information please follow CJ Lawrence @cj_musick_lawya and Gaia @gaiastreetart

 

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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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GAIA : New Mural Work in Greenville, Atlanta, Detroit

GAIA : New Mural Work in Greenville, Atlanta, Detroit

June 30, 2014

The traveling Street Artist and historian / student / observer / critic of urban planning, anthropology, people’s movements who goes by the moniker GAIA shares with us today some of the back stories for recent  murals he has authored.

When he posts on his Facebook page that he is looking for recommendations for reading about a certain city or culture where he will be soon visiting, you can have a degree of certainty that GAIA will soon be depicting what he learns with portraiture and dioramic imagery that illustrates what he has found. This fascination for self-education and public education through public artworks has roots in mural history that has persisted for decades in cities and neighborhoods around the world.

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Gaia “City of Altruism”. Detail. Greenville, NC. June, 2014. (photo © Gaia)

Typically public murals are stories told from a formal city or town historical perspective or come about from the distilled sentiment of a community to address or commemorate pivotal people and events that formed and molded the direction or DNA of a population.  With Gaia’s personal study, criterion for selection, and style of storytelling one wonders if there is not a GAIA school of mural making that has been evolving over these last five years – one that already appears to have adherents and enthusiastic co-creators – and which reflects his focus on social movements, political machinations, industry, economic drivers, and anthropology.

Here are recent examples of work by Gaia and collaborators in three American cities (although his work is not limited to just this continent) along with some explanatory text from the artist to help contextualize the stories and players evoked within them.

“City of Altruism” – Greenville, North Carolina

Part of #yearofaltruism, the mural features the warped images of four mills that have been repurposed or are slated for renovation and that flow through the Reedy River falls. Previously sites of industry and working class employment that are now used for shopping, upper-income lofts, and entertainment culture, these mills are part of a local heritage that GAIA wanted to preserve.

“Global competition restructures the lives of working class and white collar communities as the South meets the 21st century,” he explains as he describes the new piece. “The calla lilies are a nod to the Bible-minded nature of Greenville; the flowers represent purity yet are also poisonous. These are paired with the tumbling red brick of change and destruction. A single story brick duplex emerges out of the top left of the composition with the phrases “Webster Street” and “Phillis Wheatley” as a memorial to the African American neighborhood that has been erased from this area.”

Gaia would like to thank The Year Of Altruism Foundation for including him in their programming and for inviting him to Greenville, with special thanks to Steve Cohen and Don Kliburg for orchestrating the project. 

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Gaia “City of Altruism” Greenville, NC. June, 2014. (photo © Gaia)

“Boundary” – Atlanta, Georgia

GAIA in collaboration with artists Nanook, Ozmo and Matt Cogdil created these three warped Bierstadt paintings that fade into images of Mayor Hartsfield and of H. Rap Brown in the bottom corner. The project was completed for Living Walls, the City Speaks in the city’s West End, which GAIA describes as “an industrial neighborhood that is used as a buffer with the construction of Interstate 20 to prevent Mechanicsville and Pittsburgh from encroaching further north into the downtown and the Mosley Park areas.”

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Gaia, Nanook, Ozmo and Matt Cogdil collaboration. “Boundary”. Process shot. Atlanta, Georgia. Living Walls Atlanta 2014 (photo © Gaia)

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Gaia, Nanook, Ozmo and Matt Cogdil collaboration. “Boundary”. Detail. Atlanta, Georgia. Living Walls Atlanta 2014 (photo © Gaia)

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Gaia, Nanook, Ozmo and Matt Cogdil collaboration. “Boundary”. Detail. Atlanta, Georgia. Living Walls Atlanta 2014 (photo © Gaia)

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Gaia, Nanook, Ozmo and Matt Cogdil collaboration. “Boundary”. Atlanta, Georgia. Living Walls Atlanta 2014 (photo © Gaia)

The Murder of Vincent Chin in Detroit, Michigan

The primary focus of the elongated piece is a memorial to #VincentChin who, observes GAIA, “passed in 1982 in an altercation that possessed attributes of a hate crime and whose perpetrators who were given lenient sentencing in a plea bargain.”

With that image as the central one, GAIA combines images of leaders whose careers directly or indirectly could be tied to that event, he says.  He describes the mural like this: “Painting post war economic miracles as a portrait of global competition that led to layoffs in Detroit and fueled the frustration and xenophobia behind Vincent Chin’s murder”.

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Gaia. Memorial to Vincent Chin. Process shot. Detroit. June, 2014. (photo © Gaia)

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Gaia. Memorial to Vincent Chin. Process shot. Detroit. June, 2014. (photo © Gaia)

Here are the other players in the mural, as described by GAIA;

“Wirtschaftswunder” Ludwig Erhard was a German politician notable for his role in Germany’s robust post war recovery.

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Gaia. Memorial to Vincent Chin. Process shot. Detroit. June, 2014. (photo © Gaia)

Sun Yun-suan (Chinese: 孫運璿; pinyin: Sūn Yùnxuán; November 11, 1913 – February 15, 2006) was a Chinese engineer and politician. As minister of economic affairs from 1969 to 1978 and Premier of the Republic of China from 1978 to 1984, he was credited for overseeing the transformation of Taiwan from being a mainly agricultural economy to an export powerhouse.

Hayato Ikeda (池田 勇人 Ikeda Hayato?, 3 December 1899 – 13 August 1965) was a Japanese politician and the 58th, 59th and 60th Prime Minister of Japan from 19 July 1960 to 9 November 1964. Takafusa Nakamura, a leading economic historian, described Ikeda as “the single most important figure in Japan’s rapid growth. He should long be remembered as the man who pulled together a national consensus for economic growth.”

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Gaia. Memorial to Vincent Chin. Detroit. June, 2014. (photo © Gaia)

 

 

 

 

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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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Living Walls 2013 ALIVE in Atlanta

August 15, 2013

The artists are having breakfast at the Goat Farm, and Georgie is yelping in his cage. The year old beagle wants to get out and jump on everybody’s lap and help clean off their plates with his pink tongue and but for right now Emily is looking at the weather channel on her laptop and transfixed by the forecasted rain that could hit tonight’s block party in Edgewood and Know Hope is debating a second helping of scrambled eggs. Somebody plows through the screened door with fresh copies of the local arts newspaper that features JR on the front and the Living Walls 2013 official map inside, and assorted bearded bros are pawing through their iPhones to answer emails and catch Instagram shots of the walls that have gone up so far here in Atlanta.

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Mr. Chicken feeling it at The Goat Farm. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The Goat Farm is the central meeting spot for the 20 or so artists in this, the 4th Living Walls festival, and you are free to wander the grounds of this 19th-century complex of industrial buildings that made cotton machinery and munitions during two of its previous iterations. Now it has a few hundred artists studios, performance spaces, and cool little places to hang out and talk about the new walls by artists like 2501, Inti, Agostino Iacurci, and many others in neighborhoods like Summer Hill and Edgewood. Naturally, you can also hang out with the goats in their penned off area or be entertained by the personality-plus chickens that walk freely around the sprawling grounds.

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Axel Void. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Inti. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Inti. Detail. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

 

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Last night was the kick off Movie Night party at Callenwolde Arts Center and BSA gave the room of 200+ guests an entertaining tour of about 15 Street Art videos from around the world called “Street Art in Motion”. After giving a bit of history about BSA and our involvement with the arts in general and Street Art in particular we introduced three categories that we think represent Street Art in video right now – “Explorers, Experimenters, and Anti-heroes”. Drawn from the archives of BSA Film Friday we looked at works from a group in Tel Aviv, Vhils in Brazil, Vexta in India, Conor Harrington in Norway, Creepy in the Australian outback, MOMO in Jamaica, Various and Gould in Instanbul, and Jay Shells in Brooklyn, among others.

It was great to invite special guest RJ Rushmore from Vandalog introduce a video from Evan Roth and we ended the hour and half presentation with the most popular video of the year so far, “Infinite” featuring Sofles slaying wall after wall in a mammoth abandoned building – a perfect combining of stop action editing and low-tech special effects that pulls together all three of our themes of exploration, experimentation, and a bit of the badass anti-hero stance. By the time the drums and bass stopped pounding on the speakers we were ready for a visit to the bar and some excited talking about music, spraycans, and the city’s longest continually operating strip club, the Clermont Lounge.

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3TTMAN at work on his wall. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Living Walls 2013 typifies the rolling feast of Street Artists, neighborhood and volunteering that can put together like-minded creators and fans in a harmonious collaborative way. With so many energetic and organized volunteers, its just a good vibe, and the work on the walls reflect a quality and a developed sense of concept that sets up Living Walls Atlanta as a standard of sorts that you may want to study. Even when your car battery goes dead and you need to find a new one to continue touring, its great to see that there is a genuine sense of that thing called southern hospitality here in the city, and we have already met some great neighbors on the street who are happy with the artists and the walls, some even honking and giving the “thumbs up” from their passing cars.

Here’s our first group from Living Walls Atlanta this year. Hope you dig.

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Alex’s car having an emergency boost to send us on our way. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Freddy Sam at work on his wall. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Agostino Iacurci. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Know Hope. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Gyun Hur at work at her first wall ever with her assistant Yoon.  Yoon, as it turns out, is a huge fan of Judith Supine. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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JR. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Elian with Howdy Neighbor. 3TTMAN wall in progress on the left. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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2501. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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2501. Detail. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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JAZ. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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JAZ. Detail. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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JAZ. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Brandon English of the media team setting up a shot. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Matt Haffner and Laura Bell. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Pastel at work on his wall. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Nanook at work on his wall. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Trek Matthews at work on his wall. Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Know Hope and 2501 working on their collaboration on a sculptural installation for Saturday’s Main Event Exhibition at The Goat Farm . Living Walls Atlanta 2013. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

 

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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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Living Walls Atlanta 2012 Begins, 26 Artists Converge!

August 15, 2012 , , , ,

 It’s Time for the Women to Represent as LW ATL Breaks New Ground Again

Sarah Emerson at work (photo © Dustin Chambers)

For the last two years at Living Walls Atlanta it’s been like graffiti summer camp; bodies and pillows and aerosol cans intermingled and stacked indiscriminately across the living room floors of friends apartments.  Sketchbooks. Pizza boxes. Condoms. Campfire songs.

The third installment of the conference for Living Walls, The City Speaks, starting today and running through the 19th, will build on the comaraderie established since then and on the lessons learned by those organizers who dared to mount this huge Street Art event on a shoe string budget and a dream. The number one change this year is that there is a bit of funding. Thanks to diligent fundraising and the donations of generous people like BSA readers who clicked a banner and gave, the Street Artists and other participants this year are actually staying in hotel rooms and everyone has a bed.

“All of the out of town artists are here, Hyuro just got in last night,” excitedly reports Living Walls organizer and BSA contributor Alexandra Parrish. So everybody is rested and ready to go.

The second important change this year is that it is all about the women.

In a completely unheard of and shocking move, the organizers/curators have invited only female Street Artists to participate this time, making this the World’s First All Female Paint Fest!  It’s a remarkable achievement in a scene that has been dominated by the male of the species, almost by definition, since the graffiti scene began in US cities about a half century ago. In most people’s opinion, it’s about time too. Speculation abounds about how the atmosphere and the output will be affected. For one thing, there will probably be fewer toilet seats thoughtlessly left up.  Also, better hair care products (no offense Gaia).

Sheryo at work (photo © Dustin Chambers)

“Over the past two years, 50 artists have participated – only two were female, and neither of them had a chance to paint a wall,” remarks Parrish as she illustrates the imbalance.

Of course there are already new pieces up to greet the participants that were done since March leading up to today’s opening that were not done expressly by females. Readers of BSA have seen an array of international artists from all over the world that came to paint big murals every month since including Gaia, Nanook, La Pandilla, Trek Matthews, Interesni Kazki, Evereman and Neuzz.

BSA has brought you full detail coverage of all those walls going up and now we’re gonna shout it from the roof tops as all this female power is loosed on the streets of Atlanta. And what an amazing lineup it is! The list includes: Indigo (Canada), Fefe (Brazil), TIKA (Switzerland), EME (Spain), Hyuro (Argentina), Martina Merlini (Italy), Miso (Australia), Cake (New York), Swoon (New York), Martha Cooper (New York), Sheryo (New York), White Cocoa (New York), Jessie Unterhalter and Katie Truhn (Baltimore), Molly Rose Freeman (Memphis), Teen Witch (San Francisco), olive47 (Atlanta), Paper Twins (Atlanta), Sarah Emerson (Atlanta), Sheila Pree Bright (Atlanta), Marcy Starz (Atlanta), Sten and Lex (Italy), Karen Tauches (Atlanta), Knitterati (Atlanta), Plastic Aztecs (Atlanta), Nikita Gale (Atlanta), Patricia Lacrete (Atlanta), Mon Ellis (Atlanta), and Andrzej Blazej Urbanski (Poland).

Here’s a Teaser for DAY 1

 

For a full list of events, schedules maps and other details click here:

TONIGHT:

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 15TH
Vandalog Movie Night
Wren’s Nest in West End
9:00pm-11:00pm
RJ Rushmore from Vandalog will present a series of street art and graffiti short movies.

See the BSA posts this year for all of the installations leading up to this day:

“The Sunrise of Edgewood”, GAIA & Nanook open Living Walls Atlanta 2012

La Pandilla and Trek Matthews in Cabbagetown for Living Walls Atlanta

Interesni Kazki at Living Walls Atlanta

Priceless Culture: Mexican Artist Neuzz in Atlanta For Living Walls 2012

 

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Priceless Culture: Mexican Artist Neuzz in Atlanta For Living Walls 2012

June 11, 2012

Starting off the week we check in with Living Walls Atlanta for our fourth installment of 2012 and an inspirational installation by a Street Artist and painter from Mexico City named Neuzz.

Neuzz. Living Walls Atlanta 2012. (photo © Dustin Chambers)

NEUZZ

Text by Alexandra Parrish
Photos by Dustin Chambers and Wil Hughes
Video by Dustin Chambers and Wil Hughes, edited by Dustin Chambers 

Like species, neighborhoods are named endangered. Places lose their value, their splendor and charm over time as shoddy development moves in. Sweet Auburn District, which was once a lively area decades ago, was recently named one of United States’ most endangered places.

The neighborhood that holds Sweet Auburn District, the Old Fourth Ward, has experienced a similar decline. Namely, Edgewood Ave, which is littered with empty buildings and Styrofoam trash. It’s easy to overlook the historic value of the district upon first glance, yet many have measured the significance of O4W in other ways.

Neuzz, aka Miguel Mejía, came to Atlanta to experience the city of grit that reminds him much of his own, Mexico City. The historical determination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. initially attracted Neuzz to Atlanta, where he would complete a wall located in King’s district. His four week stint allowed him to develop a richer understanding of the area; the social and economic congruence to his home city in Mexico inspired him to transform the “sad wall” into art through his rich, vibrant colors.

Neuzz. Living Walls Atlanta 2012. (photo © Wil Hughes)

His assistant, Keif Schliefer, guided him through the process of completing his largest mural as of yet. The subject matter and motif of the wall comes from his heritage; his style and methodology is derived from his modern understanding. The composition and coloring was entirely influenced by the community – any kind of trash he found, he used as a stencil. His sketch likened a traditional costume-dance to celebrate rain and agriculture (the very rain that prevented work for five days) and incorporated the bees he handled at Keif’s house. Aside from being an artist, architect, civil rights activist and a former firefighter, Keif is also Living Walls Projects’ Chief Engineer and Logistics Director.

Some people grid out their walls while others project, but Neuzz simply laid out a solid base. His work is very symmetrical, yet he entirely relies on his paintbrush and his own hands to serve as his unit of measurement. While he went back and forth on the lift often to ensure proportions, the reward was sweeter in the end – Keif and Miguel developed new techniques, new approaches, that he will take with himself beyond Atlanta.

Neuzz. Living Walls Atlanta 2012. (photo © Dustin Chambers)

While Neuzz incorporated elements into his wall, the community became stakeholders in the mural. Keif would invite people up onto the lift, where they’d take photos of the wall, the skyline, themselves. While working he’d talk to people, entertain them, learn their stories. Everyone had his or her own experience. Neuzz has the invaluable knack of building relationships despite cultural differences.

One woman told me as she walked by that the wall offered the area “priceless culture.” As artists like Neuzz continue to donate their time enhancing this endangered area, revitalization will take a new meaning.

Neuzz. Living Walls Atlanta 2012. (photo © Wil Hughes)

Neuzz. Living Walls Atlanta 2012. (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Neuzz. Living Walls Atlanta 2012. (photo © Wil Hughes)

Neuzz. Living Walls Atlanta 2012. (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Neuzz. Living Walls Atlanta 2012. (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Neuzz. Living Walls Atlanta 2012. (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Neuzz. Living Walls Atlanta 2012. (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Neuzz. Living Walls Atlanta 2012. (photo © Wil Hughes)

To learn more about Living Walls Altanta: The City Speaks and to make a donation to help this year’s conference click here. BSA thanks you for supporting this good work.

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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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Interesni Kazki at Living Walls Atlanta

May 3, 2012 , , , ,

For our third installment in our series for Living Walls Atlanta: The City Speaks 2012 we are proud to present the Ukranian team of AEC and WAONE most commonly known as Interesni Kazki. The guys as usual are praised for their excellent craftsmanship and work ethic and, may we add, discipline. It must be hard to stay out of the bars when your spot is in the night-time entertainment district but then again maybe Interesni Kazki are of the abstemious sort. Whatever the case, their work and talent is garnering more attention daily in the Street Art world and beyond.

Interesni Kazki

Text by Alexandra Parrish
Photos by Dustin Chambers
Video by Dustin Chambers

Our process with artists is, in essence, quite simple – we house and feed the artists, purchase their paint and materials, and ensure mural completion by offering assistants and steady schedules. In reality, this simple process is foiled by secondary factors, namely weather and compelling distractions. However, when Interesni Kazki arrived in Atlanta, everything fell perfectly into place. They came here to paint with an impeccable work ethic.

Interesni Kazki (photo © Dustin Chambers)

AEC and WAONE of Interesni Kazki finished their large mural situated in the bar-heavy neighborhood of East Atlanta Village in only five days. They woke up early, ate a modest meal and set off to their wall. From dawn to dusk they meticulously incorporated every finishing touch to their work.

The completed mural epitomizes their signature style, integrating science fiction and religion with obvious Escher influences. The meaning, however, is left for interpretation. AEC noted early on that their work personifies a multitude of meanings. Four days into the process, Monica and I came up with an intoxicated interpretation after a bar crawl – the Shepard (who remarkably looks like Atlanta’s own Evereman) opens Pandora’s box which harvests the “Big Bang,” creating the solar system and human kind. Interesni Kazki’s work truly incites a heap of explanations.

The Ukranian duo plans to return to Atlanta later in the year to complete a much larger mural in the heart of downtown, hopefully to cook the Living Walls team more borscht.

Neuzz, fellow Wynwood Walls artist, and Evereman are next to follow.

Interesni Kazki (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Interesni Kazki (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Interesni Kazki (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Interesni Kazki (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Interesni Kazki (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Interesni Kazki (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Interesni Kazki (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Interesni Kazki (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Interesni Kazki (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Interesni Kazki (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Interesni Kazki (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Interesni Kazki (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Interesni Kazki (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Interesni Kazki (photo © Dustin Chambers)

To learn more about Living Walls Altanta: The City Speaks and to make a donation to help this year’s conference click here. BSA thanks you for supporting this good work.

 

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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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La Pandilla and Trek Matthews in Cabbagetown for Living Walls Atlanta

April 2, 2012 , , , ,

Let’s start off the week with our 2nd installment of Living Walls in Atlanta for 2012, a splendid overview of Cabbagetown and the installation by three of this years participants creating new murals over a nearly two week stretch, just finished and fresh for you.

La Pandilla and Trek Matthews

Text by Alexandra Parrish
Photos by Dustin Chambers
Video by Albert Lebron

Before I engage you with an individual take of La Pandilla and Trek Matthew’s twelve-day long mural production, I must foray into a brief history lesson; Cabbagetown is a tight-knit neighborhood in Atlanta that is rich with folklore and idiosyncrasies. Adjacent to the Fulton Bag and Cotton Mills, the neighborhood began as a mill town complete with shotgun-style houses built by Jacob Elsas, the factory owner. After recruiting poor whites from the Georgia Appalachian region to work in his factory, Elsas offered free housing to compromise for insignificant wages and working conditions. Legend has it that the neighborhood assumed the moniker “Cabbagetown” after a truck-load of cabbages spilled across the neighborhood; many recount a brutal smell of cabbages that could be assumed to have followed the accident or maybe it just permeated from their kitchens.

La Pandilla (photo © Dustin Chambers)

After an extensive effort towards revitalization (some would say gentrification), Cabbagetown reigns as a treasured locality in Atlanta. Although Krog Tunnel features an ever-changing display of graffiti and street art, the CSX walls that enclose the neighborhood have remained four shades of grey. Surprisingly, when Living Walls contacted the Cabbagetown Neighborhood Association to allow La Pandilla, from Puerto Rico and Trek Matthews from Atlanta to paint two murals, they more than accommodated.

La Pandilla (photo © Dustin Chambers)

As soon as La Pandilla and Trek Matthews began on their wall, joggers, walkers and rubberneckers routinely stopped to chat and observe. Throughout production, community support yielded endless tokens of gratitude – fresh baked bread, beer runs, grilled cheese sandwiches, salvaged fresh-till packaged meals, oral histories and loud music. Even the infamous rogue buffer that verbally threatened La Pandilla (yes, Cabbagetown is home to it’s very own vigilante, occasionally violent buffer) grew to appreciate the finely detailed work that replaced decades of juvenile tags.

The truth is, Alexis Diaz and Juan Fernandez of La Pandilla are insane. Their method of using Chinese ink to translate immensely detailed drawings into full-scale murals costs a lot of time. Although they’d camp out at their wall from sunrise to sunset each day, they failed to finish on time. Hardly defeated, La Pandilla opted to stay an extra day and completed their 25-foot mural in their last hours.

La Pandilla (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Three blocks down, Trek Matthews, an emerging artist from Atlanta, began on his first public wall. His work incorporates a mash of Aztec patterns and Native American designs, which turns out nicely on the grey concrete. Despite the daunting height of his wall, Trek toughed it out on a scrappy extension ladder.

In a perfect world Living Walls would serve as proverbial residents of Cabbagetown forever. I could tell Juan felt the same way as he waved saying “bye y’all.

La Pandilla (photo © Dustin Chambers)

La Pandilla (photo © Dustin Chambers)

La Pandilla (photo © Dustin Chambers)

La Pandilla (photo © Dustin Chambers)

La Pandilla (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Trek Matthews (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Trek Matthews (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Trek Matthews (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Trek Matthews (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Trek Matthews (photo © Dustin Chambers)

Trek Matthews (photo © Dustin Chambers)

La Pandilla and Trek Matthews by Albert Lebron (VIDEO)

 

 

To learn more about Living Walls Altanta: The City Speaks and to make a donation to help this year’s conference click here. BSA thanks you for supporting this good work.

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Fun Friday 03.23.12

March 23, 2012 , , ,

Welcome to Friday! You made it!  It’s sunny and warm in New York this morning – time to hit the streets and parks and bookstores, before they’re all gone.

1. BOOKLYN in the House (VIDEO)
2. Adam Void “American Dream”
3. La Pandilla and Trek Matthews @ Living Walls Concepts
4. NSM “Justified Scriptures” (San Francisco)
5. Street Artist on the Street – Hugh Leeman (VIDEO)
6. Allan Dalla and Kero – Street Artists in Romania (VIDEO)
7. Slim Shady Mitt Romney (VIDEO)

BOOKLYN IN THE HOUSE

La Shea Delaney and Annabelle Quezada Go Hard on Books

Big Ups to these two serious readers. Read Books Ya’ll.

“(I) read so hard, libraries tryin’ to find me.”

“Animal Farm, Jane Eyre,
Barnes & Noble, FourSquare”

Adam Void Shares His American Dream (Baltimore)

Adam Void has a show called “An American Dream” at the MICA Decker Gallery in Baltimore, opening today. This is the artist’s MFA Thesis show. Congratulations Adam!

At work on an Adam Void piece on a wall in Venice, CA in 2011. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

For further information regarding this show click here.

La Pandilla and Trek Matthews at Living Walls Concepts (Atlanta)

Saturday Living Walls Concepts in Atlanta will be at The Jane with a show featuring new works from Street Artists La Pandilla from Puerto Rico and Trek Matthews from Atlanta in conjunction with their participation in this year’s edition of Living Walls, The City Speaks.

La Pandilla in Miami for Art Basel 2011. (Photo © Jaime Rojo)

For further information regarding this show click here.

NSM “Justified Scriptures” (San Francisco)

941 Geary Gallery in San Francisco invites you to the opening reception of an NSM solo show entitled “Justified Scriptures” this Saturday.

(photo courtesy of the gallery)

For further information regarding this show click here.

Street Artist on the Street – Hugh Leeman (VIDEO)

French videographer Clemence Demerliac filmed the San Francisco based Street Artist Hugh Leeman to understand his original thinking and in inventive approach to helping other with his work.

Allan Dalla and Kero – Street Artists in Romania (VIDEO)

Allan Dalla and Kero teamed up with Ion Bardaleanu for their most recent project.

Slim Shady Mitt Romney (VIDEO)

An INGENIOUS compilation of clips to create this parody of Eminem’s “Slim Shady”

 

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Living Walls Concepts Presents: New works featuring La Pandilla and Trek Matthews. (Atlanta, GA)

March 20, 2012 , , , , ,

La Pandilla and Trek

 

This Saturday, Living Walls Concepts’ artists La Pandilla (Puerto Rico) and Trek Matthews (Atlanta) will premiere their gallery show at the Jane. This one night gallery opening will present 12 original works, a limited edition of artist prints and shirts by Kemeza, and the screening of the mural process video by Albert Lebron.

La Pandilla are internationally recognized street artists from Puerto Rico whose stunning detail remain intact from large-scale murals to works on paper. This art duo, comprised of Alexis Diaz and Juan Fernandez, invent surreal depictions of animals with human elements throughout their work.

Trek Matthews is an emerging, self-taught, Atlanta based artist. A unique mixture of sacred geometry, Native American designs, Aztec patterns, and Egyptian myth & culture inspires his pen and ink drawings.

Drinks and DJ will be provided along with an after-party featuring a performance by Mirror Mode. After the opening, the show at the Jane will hold special gallery hours Sunday 3/25 from 1:00-5:00pm. All profits from art sales will go to the artists. As always, this event is free and open to the public.

The Jane (behind Octane in Grant Park)
437 Memorial Dr
Atlanta, GA 30312

Gallery Opening, Saturday, March 24th 7:00-11:00pm
Extended Gallery Hours, Saturday, March 25th 1:00-5:00pm

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