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BSA Images Of The Week: 11.19.17 : Barcelona Special

November 19, 2017 Artists, BSA Images Of The Week

Barcelona this week was a tale of many opinions, passionately expressed, even hammered home. Geographically at the epicenter of a fight for/against the secession of Catalonia this fall, the conversations about everything from futbol to Guaudi to tourists can take on great enthusiasm. Although, no one argues about tapas. Tapas are just always good.

The organic Street Art scene in the city that was famous during the early 2000s has been calmed as a result of a crackdown on illegal works, but some still exists in pockets of stencils and stickers and one-off paintings. The legal stuff, or ‘permissioned’ murals, are more likely what you will find in the central city, with a little more illegal stuff as you move away from the center to Sant Feliu de Llobregat or L’Hospitalet de Llobregat,

In general the Barcelona scene feels alive, vibrant, varied; and the quality of execution can be quite high. There is also an elusive feeling of magic and history infused within the integrated street scene and a healthy amount of socio-political critique – a swirling mix of illegal murals, commissioned murals, and controlled chaos in the artist compounds. Our sincere thanks to our hosts on the streets this week, especially Fernando and Esteban.

Here’s our weekly interview with the streets, this week featuring 1Up, Axe Colours, Escif, Hosh, Kenor1, Kwets1, Mina Hamada, Pantonio, Rice, and Zosen.

Miss Van at La Escocesa from 2012. Barcelona. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Escif at La Escocesa. Barcelona. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Axe Colours. Barcelona. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Pantonio at The Hangar. Barcelona. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Rice. Barcelona. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Zosen and Mina Hamada. Hospitalet de Llobregat. Barcelona. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Hosh. Contorno Urbano.12 + 1. Hospitalet de Llobregat. Barcelona. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Kenor1. Hospitalet de Llobregat. Barcelona. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

1UP Crew. Hospitalet de Llobregat. Barcelona. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Bombers. Sant Feliu de Llobregat. Barcelona. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Kwets1 . Kaligrafics. Sant Feliu de Llobregat. Barcelona. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Kwets1. Hospitalet de Llobregat. Barcelona. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Street Artist and muralist Kwets1 spent three months working on two monumental murals on two tunnel walls right across from each other in the immigrants friendly, working class town of Hospitalet de Llobregat in Barcelona. The obvious theme of the mural is nature, conservation and climate change. The underpass is located right next to a river that attracts a plethora of exotic birds that use as a sanctuary and a rest stop as they migrate south during the winter season. We were actually witness to several large parrots flying from tree to tree while we were there.

The artist says that he took his inspiration directly from the nature story, and the human one of immigration here as well.

The other source was the human immigrant stories in this town. In the late 60’s and 70’s the immigration to the town was from several regions of rural Spain, with agrarian families who left farmlands and came to Barcelona seeking job opportunities in the large manufacturing companies that had established themselves in Barcelona. Many of those original immigrants eventually left the town to retire within Spain or to other European countries – leaving room for a new wave of immigration coming from several parts of Africa and Central and South America.

Presently Hospitalet is a vibrant community of old and new residents, and these murals capture the feeling of colorful, tumultuous, exiting and difficult change.

Kwets1. Hospitalet de Llobregat. Barcelona. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Untitled. Mine is bigger than yours. Barcelona, Spain. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

BSA en Barcelona: Miss Van, La Escocesa, and Reskate! Dispatch 1

November 15, 2017 Artists

This week BSA is in Barcelona to participate in the Contorno Urbano competition to select an artist for a new community mural and residency in the municipality of Sant Feliu de Llobregat – and of course to see the famed Barcelona Street Art scene as it continues to evolve.

Fresh off the plane from New York at 7 am, BSA hit the streets with the talented Street Art photographer Fer Alcalá and the director of Fundacion Contorno Urbana, Esteban Marin – both amazing and generous hosts.

Miss Van (photo © Jaime Rojo)

We covered a lot of terrain in this pretty, clean and relatively quiet European city (Catalonian referendum marches last month not withstanding) and there is a wide variety of sanctioned and unsanctioned art on the streets even today, years after the city began cracking down on an organic Street Art scene that flourished here in the mid 2000s.

You’ll find a lot of local Street Artists here as well as a few international names who are passing through, or who have settled here and have studios in addition to a street practice.

Yo también ! A very early Escif at La Escocesa. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

For lunch you may want to check out the regional special dishes like Escudella d’Olla , a hearty Catalan stew with poached meats and vegetables, or fideuà, a noodle dish that locals may prefer to paella – made with seafood like cuttlefish, monkfish, prawns all cloaked in alioli, a thick garlic and olive oil sauce.

Afterwards you can check out La Escocesa, a self-managed artistic production center that focuses on the visual arts with the public in mind. The artist spaces, performance spaces, gallery spaces – a real hothouse of invention and an art factory on the site of a former textile factory that reminds you of what artist communities can be like when the right elements are present and in balance.

A number of artists have residencies here at the moment, including muralists Mina Hamada and Zosen, who we just saw in Brooklyn at the Vinz Feel Free “Innocence” show while they were in town to paint a huge wall in Jersey City – it is a small world.

Unfortunately in two years La Escocesa will be demolished to make room for affordable housing – it’s owned by the city council which purchased it from the banks.

Also if you come here you’ll want to check out a new mural by Reskate, an artistic collective formed by Maria López and Javier de Riba, who have a workshop and studio in the Sants district of Barcelona.

With an illustrative style full of life, you can see influences from popular culture, graphic design, pop and traditional sign-painting. Our hosts tell us they often paint referencing social themes – and they certainly are loved here. Here’s a shot of our little touring group at one point. See you all tomorrow!

Fàbriques de Creació. La Escocesa from Barcelona Cultura on Vimeo.

For more about Jiser: www.jiser.org

For more about The Hangar: www.hangar.org/es

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