All posts tagged: Isaac Cordal

Urban Nation Museum. Art Mile: Installations In Progress. Dispatch 5

Urban Nation Museum. Art Mile: Installations In Progress. Dispatch 5

September 16, 2017

Today some progress shots – these projects were not completed while we were shooting so you’ll want to go to the Museum Mile today along Bülowstraße (Berlin U-Bahn). The Urban Nation Art Mile (Artmeile) is in full effect this weekend day and night and it will be difficult to pass up on this funhouse performance-packed interactive exhibition that includes single installations in pop-up spaces along the street and in one large car-free area beneath the trains, which roar appropriately over your head.

Icy & Sot at work at their installation for the Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Also overhead for those who are observant, Isaac Cordal’s small concrete businessmen watch over the proceedings below with guilt, ennui and existential worries . You have to check out Faith XLVII’s multi-disciplinary piece in a pop-up space with powerful video imagery of the sexy uniformity of marching soldiers and the panicked distraught migratory movements of people created in its wake – with fierce and expressive dance performer Manthe Ribane and sound/set direction by Inka Kendzia with Faith. Migration, or immigration, is also directly addressed by an unbending and heavy steel sculpture of a family who are just like yours, and different from yours, facing a wall topped by razorwire.

Sheryo at work at her installation for the Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Evan Pricco and Juxtapoz bring the famous newsstand that has been displayed in 6 locations, including Times Square, now moving into the UN collection. Make sure to look at the independent zines and tags from its many travels. HOTTEA has a splendidly sharp and effervescent takeover of a corner first floor space that illuminates the white box, here comprised of hundreds of hanging yarns in a multiverse of color.

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

This series of outdoor components feels more like a fair than a museum show, a cross section of works that you may associate with post-graffiti/graffiti/Street Art or any number of related influences without a timeline – cobbling together a hodgepodge illustration of the wide range of influences at play on the street today – attempting to channel the asymmetric energy that it generates.

It is possible that this collection represents a catalyzing of interest in sculpture, as a number of interpreters including Cranio, Ben Frost, and Anthony Lister, are blurring lines with these 3 dimensional expressions of work they’ve done in 2D. How will a general community audience interactive with these – the possibilities seem limitless. Considering the sheer number of authors and performers and documentors and artists and academics and critics on the street right now, you are garunteed to find some intellectual and/or visual stimulation.

Isaac Cordal at work at his installation for the Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Isaac Cordal. Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Isaac Cordal. Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Olek. Getting ready for her Art Mile performance on Sunday. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Herakut moment of levity and humor while at work on their installation for the Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Bordalo II work in progress for his installation at the Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Evan Pricco fastidiously arranges the magazines at the Juxtapoz Newsstand for the Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The Juxtapoz Newsstand for the Art Mile is almost completed. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Seth Globetrotter work in progress for the Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Zezao work in progress for the Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Women Power: A group of strong individuals who capture, enable dialogue and work, some daily, on the street art/graffiti scenes. From left to right. Nika Kramer, Karolina Pajak, Olek, Martha Cooper and Selina Miles. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Le Rat Has Arrived, Police Remove Cars from “Art Mile”, 2 Days to “Unstoppable” in Berlin : BSA Dispatch 3

Le Rat Has Arrived, Police Remove Cars from “Art Mile”, 2 Days to “Unstoppable” in Berlin : BSA Dispatch 3

September 13, 2017

Blek Le Rat arrived at the Urban Nation office today with his wife Sybille after a long car ride from Paris, ready for a coffee and possibly to take a look at the wall he’ll be painting here to celebrate “UNSTOPPABLE”, the inaugural exhibition of the UN museum this weekend. The wind taunted BustArt as he attempted to lay his irreverent stencil of Mother Mary coddling Pluto Jr. and the sliced cutout cardboard bent and bowed beyond an average person’s patience while his buddy Stephan helped hold it down for spraying.

Isaac Cordal. Detail of a larger outdoor installation for the Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Under the elevated train a legion of police and traffic cops removed 80 or so cars so the team could begin building stages, cages, platforms, lighting, electricity – for a slew of fresh outdoor pieces which will be installed Thursday and Friday for the weekend outside component.

Who is going to be on display as part of the Art Mile? Try Pixel Pancho, Franco JAZ Fasoli, Bordalo II, Mimi S., HowNosm, Zezao, Isaac Cordal, Olek, Seth Globepainter, Blek Le Rat, Hottea, Dot Dot Dot, Borondo, Herakut, Deih XLF, Faith 47, David De La Mano, Nespoon, Tank Patrol, Lister, Cranio, Sandra Chevrier, Aaron Woes M, Yok & Sheryo, Haroshi, Don John, Ben Frost, Various & Gould, Icy & Sot, Mademoiselle Maurice, the Juxtapoz newsstand, Mark Bode, Shepard Fairey, 1 Up, James Bullough, and 2501. It’s a real cross section of styles, influences, and voice that will be engaging guests this weekend.

Hot Tea at work on his site specific installation for the Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The Berlin police actually use a truss and truck that picks up the offending car, puts it on a flatbed. Then, believe or not, they look for an empty parking spot in the neighborhood an place the car into the new place – also signs are posted to let you know where your car was re-located to.

In New York City if you are unfortunate enough to park your car in the wrong place it is simply towed away to a massive car yard somewhere, banging into things occasionally on the way and flying through potholes – and then held for a King’s ransom. Then you have to simply guess if it was towed or stolen.  No word on what the London Police do in regards to cars parked illegally.

Hot Tea at work on his site specific installation for the Art Mile. Florian couldn’t wait to take a peek. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Hot Tea)

Up on a lift for painting today also were Mademoiselle Maurice, David De La Mano, and James Bullough, and the company plastering the corner façade of the museum with pink letters. When the winds got to strong everybody was forced to bring the lifts down for an hour. Intrepid and lucky photographers like Jaime Rojo and Nika Kramer still managed to go up in the buckets to get some good shots in.

Hot Tea is spraying a big installation space with a rainbow of colors – on the walls and floors completely. People who are peeking through the plastic sheeting that protects the windows are wondering what this world of color is going to be.

Hot Tea at work on his site specific installation for the Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Meanwhile the onslaught of arrivals continues, including hopefully we’ll see Martha Cooper and Carlo McCormick. Martha of course will be here to celebrate the beginning of the Martha Cooper Library within the museum and Carlo will be here to see the didactics and texts he wrote for the exhibition and catalogue –as well as speaking at the Unlock Book Fair. This publishing fair for graffiti, street art and related practices is a must see for those who relish the independent thinking minds who publish on paper in this scene. Other great speakers featured will be Pedro Soares, Jens Besser, Susan Phillips, Thomas Chambers, and Javier Abarca.

Okay that’s your update for today. See you on the streets tomorrow.

Ron English. Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Graffiti Writer CARE at work for the Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Graffiti Writer CARE. Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Graffiti Writer CARE. Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Bustart fights with the wind. Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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

Tankpetrol at work. Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mademoiselle Maurice detail and process shot of her installation for Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mademoiselle Maurice detail and process shot of her installation for Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

David De La Mano at work. Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

David De La Mano at work. Art Mile. Urban Nation Museum For Urban Contemporary Art. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

 

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Isaac Cordal + INO. Up North Fest X BSA: Røst, Norway. UPN Dispatch 1

Isaac Cordal + INO. Up North Fest X BSA: Røst, Norway. UPN Dispatch 1

July 10, 2017 ,

This is the third year for Northern Norway’s UPN Festival and this year it’s on an Island called Røst and includes a collection of artists eager to do site-specific and environmental works – one evolutionary development in the mural festivals that blossom throughout the world right now. This week BSA is proud to bring you images and interviews along with Urban Nation this year at UpNorth, where the seagulls never stop calling and the sun never goes down this time of year.

Today we look at new work by Isaac Cordal from Spain and INO from Greece, with each artist telling us about their street practice up north.

“I think it was very interesting as Upnorth subtly left its footprint without overturning the aesthetics of the Island,” says Isaac Cordal about his experience at the UPN festival. You may be familiar with the miniature sculptural interventions by Isaac Cordal, whose corporate businessmen have sold their souls and are looking down at the traffic of the city from a ledge, contemplating their existence, dread, and guilt. Partly social critique, partly comedic play, partly redefining public space and scale, Cordal’s figures are reliably surprising. You can see that at UpNorth this year some of them are evolving as well.

Isaac Cordal. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Isaac Cordal)

Brooklyn Street Art: Can you tell us about the new figures that you did for UpNorth?
Isaac Cordal: In a way they are part of the same series called “Isolated in the modern outdoors”. They are covered by a blanket with the colors of the houses of Røst. They are isolated in the middle of the sea with no possibilities of returning, without a house, like a kind of shipwreck. Unfortunately blankets have become the street fashion for many homeless people. Blankets remind us of other times, of the devastation, of the migratory crises and of the human being succumbing to the hostilities of the outside.

Isaac Cordal. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Isaac Cordal)

Brooklyn Street Art: We notice that they look quite different from the little businessmen that many have become familiar with. What inspired you to change them?
Isaac Cordal: As I said before perhaps the idea is a little dense. In modernity itself we have intense reflections of the Middle Ages, there are still different speeds outside exponential progress, too many contrasts between rich and poor, the so-called globalization leaves a trail of images of people delocalized, confused in space and lost in time.

Isaac Cordal. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Tor Ståle Moen)

Brooklyn Street Art: How would you describe the environment working in Røst?
Isaac Cordal: Working in Røst was an interesting experience since you had to adapt to the peculiar nature of it; there were not many buildings to intervene so that gave me the opportunity to experiment with its geography. With its 24 hours of light its landscape became something completely hypnotic at certain times. The hours of sleep are altered and the perception of time changes in a certain way.

Isaac Cordal. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Tor Ståle Moen)

Brooklyn Street Art: How are you challenging yourself as an artist right now?
Isaac Cordal: I’m going to try to work more in the studio after an intense year from one side of the world to the other. Perhaps I will decrease a little more – until disappearing.

Isaac Cordal. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Tor Ståle Moen)

 

Isaac Cordal. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Isaac Cordal)

Isaac Cordal. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Isaac Cordal)

Isaac Cordal. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Isaac Cordal)

Isaac Cordal. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Isaac Cordal)

Isaac Cordal. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Isaac Cordal)

Isaac Cordal. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Isaac Cordal)

Isaac Cordal. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Isaac Cordal)

Isaac Cordal. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Isaac Cordal)

Isaac Cordal. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Isaac Cordal)

Isaac Cordal. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Tor Ståle Moen)

Muralist INO uses a monochrome palette and a splash of color with most of his photorealist/surrealist figurative metaphors to talk about society. Not exactly critique, often the commentary comes across as straightforward observation, openly stated.

INO. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Tor Ståle Moen)

An aerosol bomber in his teens in Athens, his hard work in his early thirties has brought his murals to many international cities and he says UPN was a great opportunity to address a favorite issue of late, our lack of privacy. The new piece is called “Photobombing”.

Brooklyn Street Art: Can you tell us about the piece that you did for UpNorth? 
INO: The invasion of privacy in our societies is constantly increasing with the pretext that our lives are improving. This exposure may not concern some, but maybe they should think again about it.

INO. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Tor Ståle Moen)

Brooklyn Street Art: How would you describe the environment working in Røst?
INO: It was interesting working on an island  that has only one policeman and 24 hours daylight.

Brooklyn Street Art: How are you challenging yourself as an artist right now?
INO: The production of images that will remain on people’s mind in this era of over-information could be a challenge.

INO. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Tor Ståle Moen)

INO. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Tor Ståle Moen)

INO. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Tor Ståle Moen)

INO. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © Tor Ståle Moen)

INO. Up North Fest 2017. Røst, Norway. (photo © INO)

Our thanks to our partner Urban Nation (UN) and to photographer Tor Ståle Moen for his talents.

See our Up North roundup piece on The Huffington Post

 

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Street Artist StrØk in Indonesia Ready to Catch Orangutans

Street Artist StrØk in Indonesia Ready to Catch Orangutans

May 17, 2017

Activism in the practice of Street Art and murals continues to inject itself into different situations, adding to its own definition, and perhaps challenging ours.

Part of a larger campaign called “Splash and Burn,” today we have Norwegian stencil artist Strøk, aka Anders Gjnnestad, with a brand new piece he did in Bukit Lawang, North Sumatra, Indonesia.

The image of a huge net is not remarkable except for Strøk’s characteristic play on perspective and planes, and the fact that the subject is Orangutans, or rather, an increasing lack of them.

Strøk for Splash & Burn Project. Sumatra 2016. (photo © Strøk)

EcoTourism has become such a huge industry in the last decade and a half thanks to Westerners longing to do something meaningful and engaging on their vacations aside from going to an amusement park or lying by the beach. Unfortunately, irresponsible development, untrained “guides” and uncaring tourists have trampled over the natural areas, changed the natural behavior of wild animals and endangered their future – with Orangutans in Bukit Lawang as a prime example. The lure of tour money and the behaviors of visitors ignoring even basic rules like “don’t feed the wild orangutans” has created a lot of aggressive animals who are now dependent on you for food and the uncontrolled hordes of visitors have damaged the living environment.

“I just found that what I wanted to create was a mural about Orangutans and one of the main problems they are facing – destruction of habitat,” says Strøk of his new piece.

Reference photo. Rescuers working for  Sumatra Orangutan Society or SOS for its initials in English prepare a net to catch an Orangutan about to fall down from a tall tree. (photo © Andrew Walmsley)

With a desire to educate himself about what orangutans are like and how some of them need rescuing and relocating, the artist went to the Orangutan Information Centre headquarters in Medan and met with the people working there. “While being given a presentation of their work, I got the idea of what I wanted to paint. They showed us photos of how they work with the SOS (Sumatran Orangutan Society) to rescue and relocate orangutans in trouble,” he explains. “Orangutans travel great distances almost daily, in search for food. If the jungle is cut down around them and they get stuck in a small pocket of trees, that’s bad news for them.”

“Basically, OIC/SOS have a hotline that people can call if they see a distressed orangutan. Then the OIC/SOS gets together their team that is on standby, go to the location and they shoot the Orangutan with a sedation dart. When it sleeps and falls down from its tree, they are standing below it, breaking the fall with a net – much like the old school fireman rescue method. Then the orangutan gets checked by a vet, and depending on its condition it is either relocated into the wild, or taken to a rehabilitation facility.

Strøk for Splash & Burn Project. Sumatra 2016. (photo © Strøk)

The new stenciled and sprayed wall piece was created to evoke the image of the animal falling to safety and as a larger metaphor about our collective responsibility to care for nature and its other inhabitants. Strøk says he really liked the location he worked with, and after taking photos while standing on a roof of local guys holding the net, he created the stencils and started painting.

“I was free to do whatever I wanted, on whatever wall or surface I preferred and that we could get permission to paint. On top of my list was a rusty old tourist agency billboard with a barely visible map of Sumatra that was along the main road as you enter the village. I integrated the oil palm tree that was already directly behind and leaning over the billboard into the composition of my painting,” he says

Strøk for Splash & Burn Project. Sumatra 2016. (photo © Strøk)

This might be a bit of a sidenote, but I wanted to include this photo of the construction I was standing on to paint. “I´ve always had massive respect to people who can put together something good and solid, in an effective way. This construction was put up for me by two local men in about an hour, and proved to fit me and the work I needed to do, like a glove. I am glad they got a look at me before they started, though, as I am about 1,5 times the height and at least double the weight of an average Indonesian. They tailored it so I could stand up straight on the middle level and climb up and down with confidence.”- Strøk

Strøk for Splash & Burn Project. Sumatra 2016. (photo © Strøk)

The palm oil tree that reaches over the front of the new piece is significant because this installation is part of a larger campaign about the palm oil industry begun by Lithuanian artist Ernest Zacharevic, who raised money for Strøk and six other artists this January by selling a special lithograph print called “Splash and Burn”

Other artists like Mark Jenkins, Isaac Cordal, Pixel Pancho, Gabriel Pitcher, Bibichun, and Axel Void all participated in the first series of installations, and Zacharevic intends to develop the project further to raise awareness about the negative impact that our often unregulated industrial world is having on the natural one, and the people, animals and ecosystems that depend on it. For more information on “Splash and Burn” check out the new article just published in The Guardian.

“For this project I knew I wanted my work to connected on more levels, to tell a more specific story in a way,” StrØk tells us. “I wanted to create a work about Orangutans without painting one. It was a challenge, but a very welcome one.”

To read about an unregulated industry of ecotourism that is not eco-friendly and is very possibly ruining the habitat for orangutans, go here.

Our sincere thanks to Charlotte Pyatt for her help in the project and with this article.

 

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BSA Images Of The Week: 04.23.17

BSA Images Of The Week: 04.23.17

April 23, 2017 ,

BSA-Images-Week-Jan2015

Boom! There it is! This is springtime and there is a lot of new stuff popping up like tulips and out like cherry blossoms. If you didn’t get to the Martha Cooper opening at Steven Kasher gallery this week it is open during the week- a great cross section of her work during the last four decades or so. Additionally the Richard Hambleton film “Shadowman” debuted at the Tribeca Film Festival Friday night and is making a lot of waves and you can see works of his at Woodward Gallery right now.

Also this week a group of New York Street Artists officially are suing McDonalds for using their street work in long-form commercials without permission – a story we first brought to fore and we subsequently discussed – including giving one of the artists who was deeply affected a platform to speak. It remains to be seen who is directly responsible for this infringement but that doesn’t stop the fabulous loose talk and salacious assertions. Some people are lovin’ it.

Here’s our weekly interview with the streets, this week featuring: Add Fuel, C3, Cash4, D7606, Cope, Don Rimx, Hardened Lock, Hervé, Immaker, Isaac Cordal, Jaune, Julien De Casabianca, Lunge Box, Okuda, Order55, Phil, and Queen Andrea.

Top image: Collaboration with Add Fuel and Jaune (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Add Fuel and Jaune collaboration in Aberdeen, Scotland. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Add Fuel and Jaune collaboration in Aberdeen, Scotland. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Raf Urban (photo © Jaime Rojo)

#missingobama (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Raf Urban (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Don Rimx drops the can… (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Don Rimx (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Don Rimx (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Cope and Okuda collaboration. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

D7606 with Kafka is Famous in Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

C3 in Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Hervé in Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Queen Andrea and Cash4 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

A stencil by an unidentified artist reminds us of Russian geometric modern art from the revolution. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Isaac Cordal in Aberdeen, Scotland. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Phil (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Hardened Lock (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Lunge Box . Imamaker (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Order55 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Julien de Casabianca/Outings Project in Aberdeen, Scotland. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Untitled. Spring 2017. Manhattan, NY. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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BSA Film Friday 04.21.17 – Vids from Nuart Aberdeen 2017

BSA Film Friday 04.21.17 – Vids from Nuart Aberdeen 2017

April 21, 2017

bsa-film-friday-JAN-2015

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

Now screening :
1. ADD FUEL – Nuart Aberdeen 2017
2. Alice Pasquini – Nuart Aberdeen 2017
3. Isaac Cordal – Nuart Aberdeen 2017
4. M-City in Aberdeen for Nuart 2017 via BrooklynStreetArt.com

bsa-film-friday-special-feature

BSA Special Features: Vids from Aberdeen

Doug Gillen from Fifth Wall TV shadowed artists at work in Aberdeen, Scotland last week and began a series of videos that give you an idea about their art and their individual approach to it. Today we have the first three freshly released from Nuart Aberdeen for your enjoyment.

ADD FUEL – Nuart Aberdeen 2017

So, how do you get the party started in Aberdeen? You Add Fuel!  The artists’ practice of tile making back home in Portugal is translated here by his study of local Scottish decorative motifs and tradition – with one layer tearing back to reveal another beneath it.

Alice Pasquini – Nuart Aberdeen 2017

Roman Street Artist Alice Pasquini has a color palette rather custom made for nautical scenes and seaside cities- and somehow brings a Mediterranean air of romance to this stormy Scottish city on the North Sea. Her figures and portraits seem to appear by surprise on small sections of doorways or corners of disused billboards – and this larger mural sized piece is rightly juxtaposed on Ship Row almost across from the Aberdeen Maritime Museum.Video by Doug Gillen/Fifth Wall TV.

Isaac Cordal – Nuart Aberdeen 2017

The Spanish Street Artist continued his indirect critique of corporate capitalists by installing his little grey-suited businessmen throughout the oil city that has been shaken by markets. For some reason, the scale makes the figures comic, and the context of the great wide world helps put these soldiers of white-collar shenanigans into a position of low impact. But we’re just kidding ourselves if we think they are inconsequential – they are the enablers of the machine. These are the human levers of the oligarchy who Isaac Cordal is perching on ledges, balancing on wires, placing on terraces staring intently at spreadsheets and stock numbers on their phones. Now his miniature worried men are perched all over Aberdeen. Can you spot them? Video by Doug Gillen/Fifth Wall TV

 

M-City for Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Video by BSA

Who would like to experience the slow ascent into the air on a cherry picker with M-City as you survey his new completed mural for Nuart Aberdeen? This short home made video by Jaime Rojo gives you a look at a street level perspective while travel mills around the freshly painted piece.

 

 

Many thanks to Doug/Fifth Wall for sharing his video work here with BSA readers. For for information about Fifth Wall please go HERE.

Twitter @FifthWallTV

https://www.instagram.com/fifthwalltv/

 

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Nuart Aberdeen 2017 Already Has Locals Saying “Haste Ye Back!”

Nuart Aberdeen 2017 Already Has Locals Saying “Haste Ye Back!”

April 19, 2017

The sky is still twilight blue above the streets of Aberdeen at 21:00 this time of year and as you walk the city’s edge on the beach of the North Sea the winds pick up with a chilly bluster. Of course, that’s just for this minute. In a half hour it may be a gentle warm caress, or you’ll be pelted with hail and sleet mercilessly. Locals like to say that this northern Scottish seaside city has 4 seasons in one day. During one Street Art tour that we gave for 350 Aberdeenians on the day before Easter, we cycled through those seasons, twice.

This is Nuart, the festival begun in Stavanger, Norway in 2001 by loveable bad boy and (some would argue) curatorial visionary Martyn Reed which invites Street Artists from around the world to partake in thoughtful aesthetic excursions on the street and in public space.

The cumulative success of Nuart’s indoor/outdoor programs is now well recorded and looked to as a model. Remarkably they have risen despite tensions that occur when commingling frameworks of illegality and institutional acceptance; including a relatively new academic rigor that is now investigating the family of practices called Urban Art, their absorption into the commercial market as contemporary art, the badass anti-establishment musings of jilted outcasts who want nothing of it, and a somewhat romantic notion of communicating with the public in a meaningful dialogue.

Jaune. Detail. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Ah, but this is the bumpy, potholed, slimy street along which counter-culture becomes culture and the marginalized becomes the mainstream – producing a modicum of nausea for all involved. While not explicitly aiming for legitimacy on these fronts, the Nuart Festival has gradually metamorphosed into a standard by which some others are judged, with reason.

Now for the first time Nuart exports its hard won and uniquely prickly formula in a perhaps more reserved manner to this new, old city which lies 500 kilometers across the North Sea in Scotland.

This is the stirring, storied North Sea known globally for the black oil lurking beneath it, and the two cities of Stavanger and Aberdeen have both been impacted greatly by the plunge of world-wide petroleum prices since the end of the last decade; a downturn described by London’s Telegraph as “vicious”.  We may have stumbled upon evidence of this during one of our walking tours when we remarked on the large number of people there who were interested in seeing the new artworks and one woman cracked with some sarcasm, “that’s because none of us has jobs.”

Jaune. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

And here we are with eleven international artists to ease the grayness of this historic and granite Gothic city by the sea where daffodils cover the meadow in Union Terrace Gardens and single malt whisky eases the sight of iron leg fetters in the 17th century prison museum called Tolbooth.

When it comes to Nuart Aberdeen the people whom we met are nearly exuberant in their responses, even awestruck by the appearance of this new art in their city. With the introduction of aerosol, brush paint, wheat-paste, stencils, miniature sculpture, and poetry to street walls, it is as if a hidden pent-up desire for art in the public sector has burst open, a geyser if you will.

“I think there are quite a lot of places now in Aberdeen that are quite plain. It’s like there are a lot of empty canvasses. It’s good to see something be done with them,” says Mark, who’s touring the new pieces through the streets with Julia, who’s originally from the capital Edinburgh. Map in hand, the couple appears to be about 30 and they say that while they’ve seen work like this in other cities, they’re glad to see something more youthful now appearing here in a historical seaport that boasts soaring, turreted and spired cathedrals and narrow stone streets.

Jaune. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“I’ve been to Leipzig lots of times and there’s lots of sides of buildings,” says Mark, “they’re similar in size to these, with lots of murals in the city center, and it really kind of brightens the place up, makes it a lot more lively.”

“Welcome to a city investing it its city and its culture,” says Councilor George Adam, the Lord Provost, a prestigious post and an ancient office with its roots in the 13th century. During a reception with other members of the Aberdeen City Council and the local business improvement district (BID) named “Aberdeen Inspired,” Mr. Adams says that he is excited by Nuart and has received a lot of positive feedback as well.

Add Fuel. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Indeed, the reception from youth, middle aged and senior patrons at our 14 short-video film lecture and the sold-out screening of the premiere of “Finding Bansky” at the independent art theater Belmont Filmhouse was ardent, enthusiastic and full of inquiries afterward. The walking tours had more people than anyone had predicted, with a few people using canes and others pushed in strollers. It would appear that the worldwide Street Art phenomena had seemed frustratingly out of reach for some of the young people, who have been fascinated by it from afar. Seeing these works by international artists here in their city was like a jolt of electricity.

During an entertaining slide show by festival participant Julian De Casabianca at the Lecture Theatre at the Anatomy Museum Thursday night, the steeply angled seats held a full capacity crowd, with many sitting on the floor and steps. The somewhat inebriated and raucous artists and students in their twenties hooted and hollered and pounded on desks during the 50 minute lecture which included mobsters, murder, the Holocaust, stolen artworks, and Street Art – specifically the museum art images which De Casabianca has been wheat-pasting on public streets for all to see for the last decade or so called “The Outings Project.”

Add Fuel. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Martin Reed’s curation of the program is wise and the selections are contextual from the perspective that Nuart Aberdeen 2017 presents an array of disciplines from a solid thoughtful selection of perspectives, each attached to the history of graffiti and Street Art from their unique evolution of practices – as well as to the culture of Aberdeen.

Germany’s Herakut dominates one concave wall of Aberdeen Market overlooking “The Green” with their improvisational blending of illustration style portraiture, textual flourish, and symbols germane to the city. De Casabianca chose images form the Aberdeen Art Gallery of two children – haunting in a narrow street known by local folklore for ghosts of children who were sold as slaves to America in previous centuries.

Belgium’s Jaune peppers doorways and electrical boxes with multi-layer stencils of fluorescent-vested municipal workers in humorous scenarios. These are partnered in scale by small grey-suited and somber businessmen by Spain’s Isaac Cordal, which are hidden before your eyes and camouflage into the daily city until you discover one standing on a ledge, balancing on an electrical line, or sitting atop a CCTV camera.

 

Robert Montgomery. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Norway’s Martin Whatson has perhaps the most obvious reference to the locality, with a golfing figure swiping into a plume of colorful graffiti tags. With Donald Trump’s golf course only minutes away, the piece raises an immediate association with a guy who is heartily disliked here. The Street Artist named Add Fuel create an enormous tile-patterned wall that refers to local motifs and decorative artisans on a wall that can be seen easily by pedestrians looking from Aberdeen’s Union Bridge the largest single-span granite arch in the world. Italy’s Alice Pasquini brings imagery of the harbor into her figurative pieces and Norway’s Nipper works directly with local artists to compile gifts of art posted on clipboards around the city.

This is not to say that Reed is running from possible controversial material or opinion: Poland stencilist M-City is without doubt critiquing the oil industry with his oil barrels flying through the sky and tankers in the sea, the UK poet Robert Montgomery’s piece addresses topics like the definition of modernism, race, and social equality, and Australia’s Fintan Magee’s very large mural diptych obliquely references rising sea levels and man made environmental degradation.

Martin Whatson pays an homage to graffiti writers and taggers, from whom much of today’s Street Art and mural festivals evolved. “Luckily we got one of the local guys who came past,” says Aberdeen photographer and expert art blogger Jon Reid, “He left a tag in the bottom right hand side. So at least he managed to get a bit of ‘local’ in as well.” Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

In review of the successful event and the relatively young history of the Street Art movement as one that is continually in motion, a few points come to mind as worth mentioning: The first is the ongoing discussion of illegal graffiti and Street Art culture giving way to legal mural festivals that have as their aim some form of business improvement and/or gentrification in a city, particularly when a city previously persecuted and derided the organic and illegal artists who began the scene.

This situation is not specific to Aberdeen, but the concern probably will come up in conversations (including during panel discussions at Nuart) and at the very least it is an irony that art practices once reviled or verboten are now to some extent embraced as worthwhile because they can be economically advantageous. These are not direct relationships, but close ones certainly.

Isaac Cordal. Detail. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Similarly there have been a few so-called Street Art festivals in recent years where the primary driver is commercial brand-building and while they give opportunities to artists they somehow cheapen the dialogue between people. It is always ironic, if inevitable, when a subculture becomes more closely associated with mainstream culture, sometimes specifically because of its cache as being rebellious. The trick here would be to accommodate the activist voices in the program, and clearly Nuart aims to do so with panache.

An argument could be made that counters the quick-on-the-draw “selling out” charge that says true rebels are somehow abandoning their values by working for “the man”. From our perspective, we’re happy when artists are working, are treated fairly, and when people get to enjoy their work. Even in this second least affordable city in Scotland  where artist spaces are at a premium if not scarce altogether, it is a good development to see art on the walls outside and a public dialogue facilitated by art.

Isaac Cordal. Detail. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

This mural initiative will invariably jump-start two outcomes. One will be a renewed interest in the zone in which the art appears, driving foot traffic and, if all goes according to plan, new business initiatives and increased interest in the arts in general.

Secondly, it will spur an uptick in locally grown Street Art. We already witnessed it mushrooming overnight on surfaces during the days we were in the city and were pleased to learn of many local artists who have been looking for opportunities for exposure in addition to this one and last years’ “Painted Doors” project, which was spearheaded by Aberdeen artist Mary Butterworth. As this local scene continues to coalesce in public space, one hopes that the city will challenge itself to find healthy and proactive ways to support this organic scene as well.

Isaac Cordal. Detail. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Overall, the first year of Nuart Aberdeen has been hands-down successful by many standards, and talk of a 2018 program has already started popping up in discussions online and elsewhere. From what we could see and hear, the city is longing for more.

“We want you all back! You showed us what can be done!” says Dr. Fiona-Jane Brown, the author of “Hidden Aberdeen” and founder of Graft Theater Company in her comment on Facebook to the Nuart team.

“Haste ye back, loons and quinies!” says Morag Russell, another Facebook commenter as the Nuart artists, production team and assorted misfits say their final goodbyes in a posting.  The sentiment rings just as sweet at the song it comes from, like this version from Scotland’s legendary entertainer Andy Stewart.

Isaac Cordal. Detail. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Isaac Cordal. Detail. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Isaac Cordal. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Herakut. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Herakut. Detail. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Fintan Magee. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jon Reid)

Fintan Magee. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jon Reid)

M-City. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Alice Pasquini. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Alice Pasquini. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Julien de Casabianca. Outings Project. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Julien de Casabianca. Outings Project. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Nipper. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Nipper. This is an interactive piece where the public is invited to use the stencil. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Nipper. And an enthusiastic street art fan is accepting the invitation. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The very supportive people of Aberdeen came out in huge numbers to all four of the official art tours. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Untitled. We began with pigeons…we must end with pigeons and spring love. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

We would like to express our gratitude for the professionalism and support of the Nuart Team, to all the volunteers whose work and dedication made our work more efficient and our stay a lot more pleasant, to the team at Aberdeen Inspired and to the people of Aberdeen for being such gracious and generous hosts, and to all the artists whose work we love and admire and for your inspiration and talent. Thank you. We hope to meet again next year.

For more information on Nuart Aberdeen click HERE.

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BSA Images OF The Week: Nuart Aberdeen Edition

BSA Images OF The Week: Nuart Aberdeen Edition

April 16, 2017 ,

BSA-Images-Week-Jan2015

End of Passover for many, the best day of Easter weekend for others, just another spring day for still others, and a fine finish to our little Aberdeen excursion. As we ready ourselves to charge forward on small streets in this city that has a severe case of Multiple Weather Disorder, we’re bringing scarves, gloves, umbrellas, a zip-lock bag with salt, sun block, swim suits, a snow shovel and a road flare in the backpack, for emergencies. Also a small flask of Highland Park 18 single malt skotch whisky for medical purposes.

Top image: A new figure by Isaac Cordal. The Donald taking his toys for a walk. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Isaac Cordal. Nuart Aberdeen. Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo) Perhaps needless to say, but the American president is not popular in any way here, and we sort of get reminded of it a few times a day – wherever we go.

The panel discussions with Evan Pricco and Pedro Soares and artists and Brandalism representatives were intellectually stimulating and sometimes deliciously gossipy. According to one audience member who attended Saturday’s talks, a favorite feature was when one participant was when a German guy in the audience took an opportunity to launch a diatribe against simply pretty pleasant public art and to compare this pleasantry with Hitler and death camps. That sort of thing always advances the conversation, don’t you think? But the point is well taken, even if it was delivered by hammer.

And they don’t stop. Herakut . Alterego. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Interesting to see that smaller pieces are also popping up here and there in the areas that these large and small approved artworks have appeared. You can sense again that there is an excited contingent of visual artists here who are feeling like they need an outlet and an outlet. We spoke with some really enthusiastic art students at the Drummond club, yelling over the thumping electronic music, who had fashioned hats and costumes out of tin foil.

Alexander Campbell, a sprightly and activist artist and student here at Gray’s School of Art who has the intensity of three, explains that the tin hats are really “conspiracy hats”, and speaks about larger issues that his photographic collage work addresses about war profiteering, definitions of terrorism, objectification of people, power, the coercive power of sex. The usual.

Herakut . Alterego. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

It appears that joy and pain are intertwined always, histories overlap with today of the city always includes stories from locals about the white slave trade that flourished here in the area where Julian de Casabianca wheatpasted his two enormous children. Taken directly from images in the collection of the Aberdeen Museum he says, and a stunning installation that acknowledges the cultural history.

The overwhelming response of people on the tour to the pleasant and the unpleasant themes expressed or alluded to in a number of the works in Nuart Aberdeen says a lot about a culture’s willingness to look things frankly in the eye, as well as to just celebrate for the art of it. At the very least, people here say that they are experiencing something new in the public space with many other Aberdeenians, a true measure of the successful engagement of art in the streets.

Okay, gotta go do our last tour. See you all soon.

So here’s our Aberdeen interview with the streets with images from Alice Pasquini, Herakut, Isaac Cordal, Juane, Jet Pack Dinasaur, Julian De Casabianca, and Martin Whatson

Herakut. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Herakut. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Herakut. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Herakut. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Martin Whatson. Detail. Art tour goers admire the art. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jet Pack Dinosaur. Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified artist sending some love. Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Alice Pasquini. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Alice Pasquini. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Tags. Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Julien de Casabianca . Outings Project. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jaune. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Isaac Cordal. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Isaac Cordal. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified Artist . Brooklyn, NYC. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Untitled. Nuart Aberdeen 2017. Aberdeen, Scotland. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

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Tours, Films, & Fight Night : Nuart x Aberdeen x BSA Dispatch 3

Tours, Films, & Fight Night : Nuart x Aberdeen x BSA Dispatch 3

April 15, 2017

“I have two questions,” said one smartly sweatered and coiffed lady of a certain age. She had grabbed an elbow as we waded through the 350-person tour that we were leading through Aberdeen streets with Jon Reid. “Who gave you all permission to paint your pictures on these walls?” she asked. “And number two: When and where did this whole movement begin?”

Martin Whatson (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Those seemed like relatively easy to answer questions, and they would have been if a small blue car didn’t start honking it’s little insistent horn at us, seeing as we were standing in the middle of the road with Mrs. Siddens. As it turns out, Mrs. Siddens didn’t just have two questions. She had 162.

But that is to be expected here in Aberdeen right now as Nuart has more or less popped open the magic Street Art lamp and the lively spirits are swirling up Jopps Lane camera-in-hand behind parking lots and mechanic shops, and other streets that locals rarely explore.

So here’s an aspect of the scene that we don’t interact with too much – the completely gob-smacked art fan who can’t believe their luck to be regaled with new art and artists. The big cities that have a history with graffiti and, later, street art – or just the plastic arts in general, are often blasé when encountering a new addition to the street, so easily spoiled us humans are.

Jaune. Need we say more? (photo © Jaime Rojo)

But here in Aberdeen – today it looked like there had been such a pent-up desire for any kind of public visual expression of art in the streets that it erupted inside the bottle and verily foamed and frothed out to these historied brick streets.– Like a top secret camera-armed terrorist cell suddenly activated; old, young, entire families… all fanned out across the streets to capture hundreds, thousands of images of M-City and Jaune and Nipper and Alice Mirachi and Martin Whatson and all of the crew.

Okay terrorist analogies are ham-handed, but its just like that!

Jaune (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Our BSA Film Friday LIVE event at the Belmont Filmhouse was a lot of fun, with engaged and aghast reactions to art interventions by artists like Kut Collective, Akay, and Vhils. Hawaiian born artist Hula’s portraits painted on ice rafts in the melting arctic cap amongst the Inuit people was the one that actually elicited gasps, with at least one woman crying.

Also Street Artist Fintan Magee left his wall early to come to the show and be our special guest presenter of his video about his mural made during his time with Syrian children who were confined to refugee camps in Amman, Jordan recently.

 

Add Fuel at work. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Also, have we mentioned the Fight Night? A Nuart tradition worth preserving, with artists and experts of all ilks convening as small teams on the stage to debate two sides of an issue. Friday night in the “Underground”, a basement pub with wood and soldiered steel stools and deliberately dark lighting, the assembled clump of fans Street Art and beer gathered around the stage to hear a debate that pitted large murals against small interventions.

Among the sparring, personal insults, laughter, and flashes of Juanes leg’s vexing and tantalizing the crowd beneath his new his new plaid kilt, somehow the female panelists on each team landed some of the strongest arguments. – Alice Pasquini for the small interventions and Jasmine from Herakut presented thoughtful reasoned rationale while the men bandied about jokes referring to size and an inexplicable reference to baby pandas by Evan Pricco turned into a running joke. Ultimately, the “small interventions” team prevailed by the thinnest of margins over large murals in during the final audience vote.

Isaac Cordal (photo © Jaime Rojo)

So the panel discussions, on-stage interviews with artists, kids programs, tours and movie screenings continue today, with us introducing the debut of “Saving Banksy” and Nuart’s James Finucane introducing the 2011 mini-doc about Nuart and it’s early beginnings.

In an exciting development, there are some surprise Street Art pieces going up in the areas that the new formal interventions are going, suggesting that a seeding of the soil is producing local fruit. It is spring after all. Time for a renewal. Slàinte mhath!

Isaac Cordal (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Alice Pasquini. Process shot. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Alice Pasquini at work. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Alice Pasquini at work. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

This Nipper interactive piece provides all the tools a passerby needs to be a Street. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Nipper an aspiring artist plays with interactive piece. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Nipper (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Nipper (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Herakut. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

At the Fight Club/Pub Debate last night from left to right. Jasmin from Herakut, Pedro Soares Nieves, Sasha Bogojev, Alice Pasquini, Jaune and Evan Prico debating the merits of large murals vs small scale interventions. Pedro’s team argued in favor of murals and Evan’s team argued in favor of small interventions. (photo © Steven P. Harrington)

Almost 350 people showed up for the first ever street art tour in Aberdeen battling cold, rain and hail, sun and clowds all at once!. Here they admired the piece by Martin Whatson.  (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The crowds in front of Fintan Magee’s work in progress. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The crowds in front of M-City’s mural. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

These intrepid art lovers who lasted throughout the entire tour were such troupers and they stood at the last mural by Add Fuel in the background braving the intense cold rain falling on them. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

 

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BSA Film Friday Special Edition: Nuart x Aberdeen x BSA

BSA Film Friday Special Edition: Nuart x Aberdeen x BSA

April 14, 2017

Aabody* at the club got tipsy* last night in the Anatomy Rooms, a former academic space for students at University of Aberdeen that still has random skeletons and 3-D plastic diagrams of humans cut in half.

Julien de Casabianca. Outings Project. Nuart Aberdeen  April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Anatomy Rooms is now an artist-run space with studios for “makers” and creatives of various disciplines and the Nuart Aberdeen event brought a central focus to Street Artist Julien De CasaBianca in the main lecture hall; we watched attentively pacing back and forth in front of us where bodies were probably dissected for lectures.

To many people’s delight, he gave a riveting and humorous lecture to the packed hall of rowdy desk-pounding bookish attendees, recounting his path of accidental entry into the Street Art scene via reluctant museum visits and classical painters – which alone would have been entertaining enough.

Jaune. Nuart Aberdeen  April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

However Professor Julian just happened to throw in additional colorful story-lines about Corsican mobsters, stenciled signs at concentration camps, jail time, accidental homicide, and an uncle’s planned suicide that was accompanied by an elaborate display of fireworks.

At the end of Julien’s barrage of 234 slides and the accompanying raucous applause, the rambunctious guests headed down the steps for the beer (2 pound donation), the loo, the Street Art Instagram projection show by Jon Reid, and the darkened DJ chill lounge which seemed to be playing slow jams from the 80s and 90s, encouraging art folk to gently sway their anatomies in close proximity to one another.

Also, murals.

Jaune, stencil artist who features city workers in his small pieces for Nuart Aberdeen, heralds the important contributions they labor over to make our cities and homes livable day after day after day. Just steps away from one of those new stencils with paintbrush in hand, we found this municipal worker maintaining the city’s streets with a coat of fresh paint. Nuart Aberdeen  April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

 

De CasaBianca’s “Outings Project” completed his second enormous installation of a thoughtful boy in a previously industrial passage over slippery rounded brick streets.

With all that wheat-paste splashed acrossed the wall in buckets there was a huge puddle of the white gooey stuff just waiting for at least one intrepid camera-happy Street Art hunter to evaluate carefully.

M-City. Nuart Aberdeen  April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

M-City put the final aerosol touches on his two walls, which are set at a 90 degree angle with one another along a tightly winding street that snakes among old factories with smokestacks and a parking garage that serves a nearby shopping district.

The images of oil barrels falling through the sky onto two oil tankers below and into the ocean have a direct relationship to the petroleum-fueled economy of  Aberdeen and we’ll need to get that full story from the Polish stencil machine and professor – We’ll get back to you on it.

Herakut. Nuart Aberdeen  April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jasmine was high on the lift making final adjustments to the Herakut mural that on Aberdeen Market that now commands a triangle of pedestrian activity while Falk, the second half of the German Street Art/fine art duo, was off getting married. Slacker.

Juane continued to find secret small locations to install his miniature workmen stencils while Isaac Cordal prepared a wall for a larger multi-terrace show of his morose and guilty businessmen to contemplate their existences upon.

Fintan Magee at work. Nuart Aberdeen  April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Nipper, the Norwegian (Bergen) of generous spirit, worked with local artists and volunteers to create his glassine envelopes stuffed with artworks – which are then snapped onto clip-boards and hung around the city center. These missives are meant as encapsulated communications, with some containing directives to carry out activities, while others are simply a collection of collage, drawings, crafts from local artists, poets. He calls them #missiondirectives .

Fintan Magee at work. Nuart Aberdeen  April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

This is Street Art as a most engaging act, a method of somewhat random communication that meets you at eye level and asks you to participate if you would like. While Cordal and a friend and Jaime played Jenga nervously at the breakfast table and the waitress brought a small iron skillet of eggs, tomato, sausage and bacon, (John) Nipper talked about one of the local artist contributor’s idea for the street missive that she was making contents for.

Nipper. Nuart Aberdeen  April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

John says that she wanted to encourage the concept and practice of taking a creative journey, so she was thinking of buying a bus ticket to a favorite Scottish destination and putting it in the pack to be hung anonymously on the street.

Fintan Magee has been working on the first of two walls that will together form one complete story, with the assistance of local artist and public art curator Mary (check out “Painted Doors” here in Aberdeen) and her legs and knee-high boots are actually featured standing upon a boulder in the brand new mural.

Robert Montgomery. Process shot. Nuart Aberdeen  April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Fintan tells us that he still has a lot of work to do, but he will be to stop work today by 1800 hrs so he can get over to our BSA Film Friday LIVE show tonight – we’re actually showing one of his videos among the 12 we have selected for the Belmont Filmhouse – Aberdeen’s foremost independent cinema. As our special guest tonight, Fintan is going to regale the audience about the genesis of the film and what he was doing in Amman, Jordan at the time.

So we are about to run out on the street and see as much as possible right now – but if you are in Aberdeen we’re really looking forward to meeting YOU tonight at BSA Film Friday LIVE! (see more information below).

If you got tickets to “Saving Banksy” which we’re introducing tomorrow, lucky you! It’s sold out the for largest theatre of their three screens. Aberdeen represent, yo!

Isaac Cordal. Nuart Aberdeen  April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Window dressing. Nuart Aberdeen  April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

BSA Film Friday LIVE tonight at Belmont Filmhouse – more HERE.

*Aabody – Doric for everybody, or as J-Kwon says in that dope 2000’s jam “Tipsy” – “errrbody”.

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Nuart X Aberdeen x BSA: Dispatch 1

Nuart X Aberdeen x BSA: Dispatch 1

April 13, 2017

This white and grey skurry appears rather plump as he waddles across the stone road in Aberdeen toward the cherry picker that holds Jasmine from Herakut aloft as she paints the new piece on the concave wall. Skurry is the Doric term for seagull, and Doric is a dialect of the North East of Scotland that thrives principally here in this seaside oil city of 230,000, so you’ll hear a few terms creeping into the sentences here and there.

Jaune plays with Elki Stencils’ Piper painted 13 ago in Aberdeen, Scotland. Nuart Aberdeen. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

There are plenty of skurries flying above and cawing and milling about these narrow streets. With their clean feathers and portly dispositions they are also looking a lot like a Sunday dinner, bellies round from a hearty diet of shellfish and other small sea creatures – and Doritos, according to a humorous story of theft you’ll hear here over a tall beer in a dark bar.

We’ve just arrived and it’s a cold and windy Passover/Easter week and nope, no bagpipes or kilts yet. Well, except for the one punk girl in a kilt-inspired skirt and black boots near Belmont Street walking past the former St Nicholas Congregational Church, now the home of booming nightclubs called Priory and Redemption over the last couple of years.

Jaune at work. Nuart Aberdeen. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Elsewhere we found a kilt on one of Street Artist Jaune’s miniature stencil workmen, newly sprayed at the foot of a larger 13 year old stencil of a traditional ‘piper’ by Scottish Street Artist Elki, who now does a lot of studio stencil work in Glasgow. This fresh collaboration is a metaphor for what is happening here with Nuart Aberdeen this week, say a number of the local art scenesters, including artist Jon Reid, who is touring us around on foot with his friend Justine and Evan Pricco from Juxtapoz.

Jon peppers his tour with plenty of local history and pointed commentary as we head up Castle Street (well named), past the Salvation Army citadel, glancing at the old clock tower, the courthouse tower, the Tolbooth Museum in a 17th century former jail with steep spiral staircases and tales of crime and punishment.

Isaac Cordal. Nuart Aberdeen  April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

He looks at the old Elki stencil of the bagpiper and says that its one of those Street Art pieces that somehow is taken care of, despite the rules of ephemerality one usually expects in the urban art game. “They’ve always preserved this one. There’ve been tags and stuff around it and you can see where its been whitewashed but they’ve always preserved it.”

For Jon, a tall young guy with a beard and strong voice who has been following and advocating the local art scene with his blog “Dancing in the Dark” for a number of years, seeing this new addition of Jaune’s signature workmen is a meaningful development, symbolic for the local artists scene and to street culture here. And Nuart is a part of it.

Hera from Herakut at work. Nuart Aberdeen. April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“Seeing it makes me quite proud, to see that Aberdeen has got this festival up and that people are embracing it – everybody can take something from it, the artists and yourselves and the local people,” he says as we walk a few more meters past the a large billboard that will be new Robert Montgomery piece for Nuart Aberdeen.

Only two words from the upcoming missive are visible so far, written in white block font on the upper left corner of the black rectangle.

“Modernism Modernism”

Perhaps this is a most apt description for a this new festival that is inserting fresh artistic voices among the winding streets and the historic buildings of Aberdeen. Sort of like these teens you watch doing hardcore BMX bike tricks despite the cold April winds blowing here across the fortified base of the yet another ornate Flemish-Gothic granite behemoth from hundreds of years ago. The tricks and energy of the new generation brings the site alive on the street, startling and relevant in these raucous moments of change and upheaval.

Herakut. Process shot. Nuart Aberdeen  April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Julien De Casabianca. Nuart Aberdeen  April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Alice Pasquini. Nuart Aberdeen  April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Nipper. Detail. Nuart Aberdeen  April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Nipper. Nuart Aberdeen  April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Martin Whatson. Detail. Nuart Aberdeen  April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

M-City. Process Shot. Nuart Aberdeen  April 2017. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

 

 

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BSA Film Friday: 03.10.17

BSA Film Friday: 03.10.17

March 10, 2017

bsa-film-friday-JAN-2015

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

Now screening :
1. Rone: The Alpha Project
2.  FKDL – Petites Chroniques Urbaines
3. Irene Lopez León: 12+1 Contorno Urbano
4. The Batcave, Henry Chalfant, on The New York Times
5. Isaac Cordal “Giza Komedia”

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BSA Special Feature: Rone: The Alpha Project

In this new revelatory video Street Artist Rone appears to unveil romantic and healthy figures from beneath a veil in isolated patches. The austere minimalist soundtrack contributes to a disorientation, a feeling of suspension while a visual wonder appears before you. The ruins of industrial production are legion in parts of the West as manufacturing is now done in the East, so our artists again have discovered enchanting ways to make something remarkable with the tools at hand, even transcendent.

 

FKDL – Petites Chroniques Urbaines

Mon Film, La Femme Chez Elle.

Only two of hundreds of magazines collected from the fashionable Parisian ladies of the 1950s and 1960s that FKDL flips through. In his studio you find his materials carefully archived and labeled, a well of pleasant and smartly chick ladies to select from and to collage together. A painter before he was a street art, his muses have been many and now he takes his stuff to the street with part illustration, part collage, often upon a bright blue or phosphorescent pink thin synthetic backing. Here he shares openly with you how the process goes, how he first loved these ladies and how he came upon his style for the street, now for a decade or so.

FKDL recalls a moment of epiphany with clarity; “Right. I got it. I’m going to dress up my collage characters with more collages”.

Irene Lopez León: 12+1 Contorno Urbano

See the direct relationship between the studio practice and the mural painting here in this video with Spanish artists Irene Lopez León for the 12+1 wall.

 

The Batcave, a Graffiti Landmark in Brooklyn, Grows Up

By MATT A.V. CHABAN

The New York Times discovered the Batcave just as it is about to be developed, and invited Henry Chalfant, whom writer Matt A.V. Chaban regards simply as “a graffiti expert” to come along and speak about the rather hallowed site. The experience is multidimensional in this gorgeous video, with an opportunity for you to drag your mouse across the screen to glance around the room and ceilings while Henry talks.

“Though few individual pieces in the Batcave are particularly notable, Henry Chalfant, a graffiti expert, remarked on a recent tour how the totality of the art is what makes it special, a reminder of the “outlaw spaces” that once populated much more of the city.”

We found a few pieces that were notable in 2012 in our piece New York Interiors and Urban Exploring.

Isaac Cordal “Giza Komedia”

Follow Street Artist Isaac Cordal as he stages small scenes outside the Guggenheim in Bilbao, Spain, where he has his current solo show at SC Gallery. The corrugated metal shelters mimic closely the undulating shapes of the Frank Gehry designed architecture of the formal museum across the street. We need to get this guy INTO the museum, instead of being kept outside. We will.

 

ISAAC CORDAL. “GIZA KOMEDIA”. SOLO SHOW. SC GALLERY BILBAO. from SC Gallery + Art Management on Vimeo.

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