The Festival d’Arts al Carrer de Calldetenes (FACC 2024), held in late April, has become a celebrated cultural event in the town of Calldetenes, located about 60 kilometers north of Barcelona. Organized by Associació La Pera with support from the Ajuntament de Calldetenes, this annual event blends various artistic disciplines, but murals are undeniably its centerpiece.
With a focus on creating an inviting atmosphere, the high quality murals presented at this festival are designed to resonate with the community. Their pleasant and reassuring imagery reflects the festival’s mission to foster an environment of cultural unity and artistic expression. Murals by Lidia Cao, Lily Brick, M. Calde, and Pablo Astrain—some of the more recognized names in the urban art scene—contribute to this welcoming aesthetic. Each year, around a dozen or more artists, both emerging and established, participate, bringing a sense of creative vitality to the streets of Calldetenes.
This festival is unique not just because of the murals but also for its broader cultural appeal, which includes music performances, circus acts, artisan markets, and more. It’s a family-friendly event that draws locals and visitors alike, offering them a chance to engage with the town’s artistic and cultural spirit.
Special thanks to Lluis Olive Bulbena for once again contributing his photography to capture these murals and for making the trip to this charming town to document the vibrant street art scene. His dedication continues to provide us with stunning visuals that bring the essence of this festival to life.
Today, we have new works from the 10th Annual Street Art Fest Grenoble, with photographs by veteran photographer Martha Cooper to show us the way. This is the first of two installments. Grenoble, surrounded by majestic mountains, once again becomes a dynamic canvas for artistic expression in a way that distinguishes this region from many others. The 2024 edition of the Street Art Fest Grenoble-Alpes celebrates its 10th anniversary with a diverse showcase.
The Spacejunk Art Center, under Jérôme Catz’s direction, organizes the festival, which features a variety of street art styles, from large-scale murals to digital installations. The robust program aims to inspire and educate through concerts, exhibitions, guided tours, and workshops. The event promotes accessibility and cultural dialogue, encouraging interaction between artists and the public. Luckily for Brooklyn Street Art readers, Ms. Cooper has an investigative mind and also treats us to fresh shots of graffiti in the open and hidden spots.
This year’s lineup includes prominent artists such as Madame, STOM500, JACE, Fintan Magee, Innerfields, Belin, Maye, and Jimmy Dvate. They join the collection of over 400 murals already in the city, adding new layers of creativity and commentary. Although the artists do not all arrive simultaneously, the festival’s evolving schedule ensures fresh installations throughout the event.
We invite you to explore this series of photographs showcasing the latest additions to Grenoble’s artistic landscape. Stay tuned for the next installment.
Fast and furious, that’s how the neighborhood filled with people – and how the paint hit the walls yesterday. Returning today long after the aerosol cloud dissipated, we discover so many things the first time we missed. In truth, it wasn’t all finished when we left earlier, and the artworks came to life while we were gone. Some even climbed walls. Here’s a quick rundown of the first few that we capture in their entirety, as artists for this years’ ‘Hit the North’ boarded planes, trains, and automobiles to places in the country and out – leaving behind a stunning array of new pieces in Belfasts’ Cathedral Quarter.
A dynamic duo whose steps are in sync, Vibes has the style and the letters, and Odisy wows with the characters precisely drawn. Together this London based team show you how their world pops off the wall like a page from your favorite graphic novel. With solid skills in graffiti for years, it is good to see such a shared dedication to the culture and an updated version of it as well.
Perspicere, a leading figure in East London’s street art scene, mesmerizes with his enchanting string portraits and large-scale installations. Using single long threads, he creates intricate, nostalgic narratives that evoke themes of vulnerability and self-discovery. With exhibitions in galleries, museums, and street art festivals, Perspicere’s work continues to captivate audiences with a live-action technique that borders on sorcery.
Zabou, a French street artist based in London, specializes in realistic black and white portraits, skillfully capturing expression and emotions with her subjects. With over a decade of experience, she has created about 250 large-scale murals across 22 countries, infusing each piece with inspiration drawn from everyday life in the surrounding environment. Contemporary and universal, it remains human.
The Spain-based Lidia Cao is a contemporary artist favoring emotive paintings that explore themes of identity, memory, and connection. Introspection rules the day, as do her tight lines and bold colors.
Sr. Papá Chango is a Mexican artist based in Berlin. He often paints vibrant realms of his own construction and everyday scenes, merging his fantastical characters with otherwise mundane scenes or offbeat scenes imbued with a hint of baroque opulence.
Entertaining illustrator of characters and large-scale and loved Belfast muralist Kev Largey took on a rollikick horizontal strip with his buddy Pens to liven up the corner here at Hit the North.
Veks Van Hillik is a French street artist known for his captivating and surreal murals, draws inspiration from nature (often fish), pop culture, and art history. His unique style, influenced by artists like Gustave Doré and Salvador Dalí, features intricate details, richly warmed colors, painterly strokes, and fantastical creatures. Based in Toulouse, Hillik has left his mark on cities across Europe with his paintings, aiming to evoke emotion and curiosity while inviting viewers into a world of boundless imagination.
Eoin, an enigmatic artist with roots in 90s-era graffiti, has also roamed the globe, adorning walls across four continents with his mesmerizing anamorphia and energetic abstraction. With training in Fine Art Sculpture from the UK, he delved into painting in the city’s margins, drawn to abandoned sites and the allure of vast outdoor canvases. While his outdoor escapades once took center stage, he now crafts a harmonious fusion between his street art adventures and his studio explorations, weaving together a narrative that crosses boundaries.
Hurmorous FGB – or Francois Got Buffed, is an artist in Belfast known for his versatility in illustration, painting, and cartoon art. His vibrant use of colors and tightly rendered outlines immediately draw attention, creating visual entertainment that conveys narratives or roundabout societal commentary. Through his art, FGB sometimes brings attention to overlooked or disregarded issues, connecting with viewers of all demographics and leaving a lasting impact with his ability to engage audiences regardless of background.
Kitsune Jolene, born Jolien De Waele in Ghent, Belgium, has a background in Visual Art & Architecture and experience assisting others on the street art scene. She embraced spray paint in 2017 and has expanded her reach from Belgium to Portugal and Dubai. Her portraits of women, animals, and nature reference myths, dreams, and folkloric storytelling.
Decoy likes big walls for his flat graphic abstract and plenty of the current palettes for illustration-style rendering. From Cork, Decoy can tell the real thing from a facsimile easily…
Friz, originally from Sligo, on the northwest (Atlantic) coast of Ireland, is a visual artist currently based in Bangor, Co. Down. Working fluently across both digital and traditional mediums, she adeptly blends aerosols and acrylics to realize her creations, adjusting her technique to suit the canvas at hand. Her art delves deep into the layers of history, myths, and folklore, serving as a conduit for cultural exploration and enlightenment. Her portfolio often concerns formidable female figures and their interconnectedness with the natural world, offering reflection and aspiration.
As the busy streets of Belfast hum with anticipation for the weekend’s festivities, an air of artistic energy and cultural vibrancy permeates the city, punctuated by the occasional liberty of a flying seagull overhead to remind you this is a historic port town.
“There’s a lot on,” says the cashier at Sawers, a specialty food shop that will sell you some smoked salmon or a bucket of mixed olives or a plate of boxty (a traditional Irish grated potato pancake). On your way to a talk by Bill Rolston at the Ulster Museum about his 40 years photographing political murals in Belfast, you’ll have a chance encounter with artist Lidia Cao atop a cherry picker. This Gen Z muralist offers a glimpse into the creative fervor igniting the city, and this time. Her solitary portraits of young women in contemplative states are lyrical; Cao’s work adds a touch of introspection to this urban landscape.
Meanwhile, French muralist Veks Van Hillik is hard at work, channeling the spirit of Irish mythology into his latest creation. Inspired by the legendary tale of the Salmon of Knowledge, Hillik’s mural depicts a nine-eyed fish, a symbol of wisdom and insight. “I grew up in a countryside not unlike the ones here – where we have a lot of landscapes like the one I placed here behind this Salmon of Knowledge,” he says while speaking of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur region of France. Drawing from the techniques of Flemish painters like Flanders and Jan van Eyck, Hillik’s brand-new masterpiece promises to transport viewers into an enchanting surreality.
Two blocks away, Mexican artist Sr. Papá Chango references those warm painting techniques as well. Still, his references are to the homey reproductions that are sometimes found in family homes – eventually given to a charity second-hand store. Since his painting is on the side of such a store that sells donated homewares and personal goods to benefit those in need, it’s a perfect way to render his golden vase, which accompanies one of his signature imagined creatures. The 4-leaf clover not only refers to good luck but to the tales told in Ireland for decades, or centuries perhaps.
As the city pulses with excitement, visitors are spoiled for choice with many events, attractions, and conversations. From the Moy Park Belfast City Marathon to the Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival to the Festival of Fools, there’s no shortage of arts and entertainment. If you seek the thrill of live music that invites you to participate, the streets are also blessed with live musicians playing on wee stages in bars and pubs; everything from American country covers of Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers to “Whisky in a Jar” and “Wild Rover” to Van Morrison’s “Brown Eyed Girl” and Neil Diamond’s “Sweet Caroline”. Not that they compare to the floating euphoria of the periodic hen & stag parties on “party bikes” as they roll past you singing with unmatched enthusiasm, their voices bouncing off small winding brick streets. Notable songs sung at the top of lungs this afternoon were “Wonderwall” from Oasis, and a screaming rendition of “Back to December” from, yes, Taylor Swift.
But perhaps the true highlight of the weekend lies in the celebrated tradition of street art, as “Hit the North” returns for its 12th installment. Spearheaded by the brilliant self-effacing cultural advocate and organizer Adam Turkington of SeedHead Arts, this small team of creatives and producers somehow host and direct over 60 local and international artists who have arrived to showcase their ideas and talents on the streets. And while the May Day March on Writer’s Square is raising consciousness about Palestinians in Gaza, we’ll save stories about that very public demonstration for, as they say, another day.
‘If you can see the mountains, it’s going to rain. If you can’t see the mountains, it’s already raining.’ – just one of the witty quips that people here say to face the soggy inclemency. It helps that all that rain has brought a spring that is deeply green and blossomed. On a foggy spritz of a day like today, the enthusiasm and stoic insistence on enjoying the public sphere is on proud display here in Belfast. Maybe we’re just suckers for emotive expression, but coupled with the occasional poem someone recites on a barstool or a park bench, these songs all make one feel nostalgic and yearning, even if you’re drinking a Guinness Open Gate Pure Brew.
The weeklong celebration will culminate in a ‘Block party’ on Sunday 5th May where spectators can soak up the party atmosphere and enjoy entertainment, food trucks, and refreshments as they watch murals come to life. HTN 24 will welcome an impressive list of international street artists.
As Lleida has discovered, the murals that we place in public these days can have a contemporary finish that is professional. Perhaps that is why this Catalonian city in Spain has begun in the historic center of this city, a storied place that is documented back to the Bronz Age. Here the traditions of past artisans are revered, studied and emulated – with the new vocabularies still determining the tenor.
Today we share a few of the new walls at the Lleida Pot Fest, a collection of the new generation of mainly figurative painters who go large scale and then go home.
Our weekly focus on the moving image and art in the streets. And other oddities.
Now screening participants at Festival Asalto 2020: 1. Isaac Cordal 2. Elbi Elem 3. Akacorleone 4. Lida Cao 5. Diego Vicente 6. Karto 7. Marta Lapena 8. Sawu 9. Slim Safont
BSA Special Feature: Festival Asalto 2020
In Barrio San Jose (Zaragoza) the Festival Asalto mounted its 2020 edition in spite of, and perhaps because of, the very strange time that we are living in. Once considered an expression of the counterculture, illegal street art has evolved in some ways to spawn legal mural festivals that actually reinforce a sense of normalcy. The organizers and participants of Festival Asalto had to overcome logistical obstacles as well as the fears of many to mount the outdoor exhibition this year, and we salute them for their fortitude and successes.
A pioneer in public art festivals, Asalto celebrates its 15th year here in San José, in Zaragoza (Spain) with a lineup of very thoughtful artists. The intensity of 2020 and the toll it is taking on the countries of the world – is somehow reflected in the gentle dispositions of this year’s collection, who add their works to the 300 artists and works of art here. Organizers say the connection to the community is predicated on the organizing structure of the festival, which doesn’t decree what is good, but Asalto creates “a dialogue with neighbors who see art as something intimate and in the works they can see scenes in which they can be identified.”
This years Asalto 2020 line-up
includes artists Akacorleone, Diego Vicente,
Elbi Elem, Isaac Cordal, Karto Gimeno, Lida Cao, Marta Lapeña, Slim Safont,
Anna Taratiel, Sawu Studio and Aheneah.
Below are a few that we thought you would enjoy, along with brief descriptions of the artists directly from the Asalto organizers.
Lidia Cao. Festival Asalto. Zaragoza, Spain. Edition 15th/2020 (photo courtesy of Festival Asalto)
Lidia Cao: “The artist Lidia Cao gives us in a large mural those hugs that we have been missing in recent months. With great sensitivity to capture moments in all her works, Lidia Cao makes this gift to the neighborhood. As the artist says ‘A hug. An act as simple as it is difficult. We have seen how a world, in the blink of an eye, has become something completely distant.’ This is a hug of joy or comfort but always comforting and that has already become a symbol for all the people who see it every day in its wake.”
Elbi Elem. Festival Asalto. Zaragoza, Spain. Edition 15th/2020 (photo courtesy of Festival Asalto)
Elbi Elem: “The artist Elbi Elem has explored every corner of the area of Zaragoza where the Festival Asalto has been held to continue on her path of artistic research. Elbi Elem has used the possibilities of water and reflection to create installations that lead us to recognize the duality between balance and movement or the constant change in which we find ourselves.”
Isaac Cordal. Festival Asalto. Zaragoza, Spain. Edition 15th/2020 (photo courtesy of Festival Asalto)
Issaac Cordal: “The small figures that Isaac Cordal has placed in different parts of the San José neighborhood are part of his series, called Cement Eclipses. With this game he invites us to look for the works – he wants to draw attention to our behavior as a mass and the effects of the evolution of society. Isaac Cordal presents this intervention to us as a game and as a surprise, each encounter with one of the figures makes us wonder and question who we are.”
Isaac Cordal. Festival Asalto. Zaragoza, Spain. Edition 15th/2020 (photo courtesy of Festival Asalto)
Karto Gimeno: “Karto Gimeno makes his first foray into public art at the Asalto Festival and he did so by transferring his characteristic style to the large format: photography and almost scenographic installation.
With that style with which he captures the urban environment that surrounds us, Karto Gimeno wanted to bring to the people some characteristic buildings that surround the neighbourhood where Festival Asalto took place this year: abandoned and invaded by vegetation and humidity houses. Three large photographs located on the facades of the buildings become three new windows from which to look and recognize the past of an area that has forgotten its agricultural past.”
Karto Gimeno. Festival Asalto. Zaragoza, Spain. Edition 15th/2020 (photo courtesy of Festival Asalto)Karto Gimeno. Festival Asalto. Zaragoza, Spain. Edition 15th/2020 (photo courtesy of Festival Asalto)Marta Lapeña. Festival Asalto. Zaragoza, Spain. Edition 15th/2020 (photo courtesy of Festival Asalto)
Marta Lapeña: “In a large mural of five panels, the artist Marta Lapeña remembers the everyday life of the San José neighborhood of Zaragoza with some of the elements that represent its past: glass, ceramics, wheat and barley or the thread with which industrial tarpaulins were manufactured. The 50s and 60s saw the birth of a neighborhood that was born around the industry and now the artist wants to take us to that simplicity of workers’ homes with a figurative mural in which color takes us from one scene to another.”
Marta Lapeña. Festival Asalto. Zaragoza, Spain. Edition 15th/2020 (photo courtesy of Festival Asalto)
Slim Safont: “After meeting the neighbors of the building in which he was going to make his mural and walking the streets of the neighborhood capturing his life, the artist Slim Safont noticed a scene as everyday as it was loaded with a message; a slogan on a young girl’s shirt and a nursery in the background remind us of the future that lies ahead. And he does it with that technical skill that characterizes his work: almost photographic paintings that acquire texture as we get closer.”
Slim Safont. Festival Asalto. Zaragoza, Spain. Edition 15th/2020 (photo courtesy of Festival Asalto)
Akacorleone: “Akacorleone’s mural ‘ILUSIÓN’ is a set of vibrant colors halfway between abstraction and figuration. With this work, the Portuguese artist wants to defend the life and flourishing of the human being after experiencing difficult situations. As he said “my idea was to create something that simbolized the calm after the storm, something beautiful that can emerge from dark times”. Painted with the spray technique, the refined shapes that we appreciate in this work also lead us to a oneiric world.”
Akacorleone. Festival Asalto. Zaragoza, Spain. Edition 15th/2020 (photo courtesy of Festival Asalto)
Sawu Studio: With the challenge of transform into a new space a degraded -although widely used- square, the Sawu Studio team has built an ephemeral installation that claims play and meeting spaces for people. A large circle symbolizes that circle or safety space in which dialogue arises and which also protects the little ones.
The effect of light on wood turns four colors into an infinite palette that changes with the sun and the movement of those around it. With this installation, Sawu has managed to point out the need to humanize public spaces and respect them and has responded to the more than 300 surveys with which the neighborhood expressed its wishes towards the “nameless square”, the place where locate this facility.
Sawu Studio. Festival Asalto. Zaragoza, Spain. Edition 15th/2020 (photo courtesy of Festival Asalto)
A valiant and revolutionary woman and winner of the Nadal Prize for literature in 1952, Delores Medio gets new life here at the 2020 Parees mural festival. Painted by artist Lidia Cao, the character of the writer comes through, a veiled portrait of her personality, her intensity.
Our weekly focus on the moving image and art in the streets. And other oddities.
Now screening : 1. Doug Gillen/Fifth Wall TV: Is New Brighton a future model for the British Sea Side Town? 2. Lidia Cao. Tribute to Dolores Medio. Parees Fest 2020 3. INDECLINE: On Second Thought. A reflection on gun violence in collaboration with artist David Fay.
BSA Special Feature: Visit a Sea Side Town with Doug Gillen
You can’t really send out a gilded invitation to your cousin Gentrification to come visit and be surprised when his emotionally draining wife and video-game playing snot-nosed kids are in the car with him. When you use words like “platform” to describe art-washing of a town, and your organization has a “brand director”, there won’t be much surprise when the moneyed professionals complain that music at the curated-bar across the street is keeping their new baby awake at night.
Doug at Fifth Wall is more surreptitiously stealthy than ever, gradually upping his stealthy-stealthitude as he lets this story basically tell itself while posing as a merely curious art-fan.
The story is literally everywhere you look right now, and apolitical, non-confrontational Street Art and murals are almost always intercedent. A small town is sucked dry after decades of neo-liberal economics and back-room political deals, leaving a godless lot feeling listless and depressed without prospects for the future. Broad strokes, but you’ve undoubtedly heard the concept proffered by real estate investors that comes next.
“Yes there’s a commercial side to it but there is also very much a community element to what we’ve been doing,” says one male voice as the camera scans some run-down architecture with good bones and historical character. They’ve been buying up properties and “introducing a new independent concept into them”.
You predict what comes in this chapter; small portions of fussy food, art galleries, street art, vinyl!, kooky cafes with drip coffee and cold brew, clever grandma-anti-fashion fashion, artisanal cheeses, greater police presence and the occasional night-time social cleansing of hardscrabble types pushed into other neighborhoods.
Next step, edgy
lifestyle brands will need some quirky space to set up shop.
“We’re
trying to keep the big boys out of our little part of town.”
“2020 is a year calling out for change,” says Doug in his wrap-up, but he knows this particular model is not at all new. It’s still a reaction to the devastation, and we all seem to be trapped in it. Even so, this can be a kind of rejuvenation that many small towns would ache for and there is reason to think that the formula can be configured to be more just to those who will get displaced – if you’re dedicated to it.
And your cousin Gentrification could be cool to hang out with, even if his very classy wife gently insults your wife and the décor of your home and the food you eat and the music you listen to.
Doug Gillen/Fifth Wall TV: Is New Brighton a future model for the British Sea Side Town?
Lidia Cao. Tribute to Dolores Medio. Parees Fest 2020
Lidia Cao paints a portrait of Dolores Medio, the Spanish writer, teacher, and journalist for the Parees Festival in Spain in this short video by Titi Muñoz.
INDECLINE: On Second Thought. A reflection on gun violence in collaboration with artist David Fay.
600 decommissioned weapons were
combed over and refashioned by Las Vegas based artist David Fay into this
semi-kinectic sculpture that recalls Rodin’s “The Thinker”. In an America that
is fascinated by weapons, at least in movies and television, this sculpture may
make people think, or not.
From their press release: “The
piece stands just over 6 feet tall and weighs approximately 250 pounds. It took
David Fay 4 months and over 750 man-hours to complete the piece.”
Here’s something to look forward to! A good solid regional actual mural festival celebrating its fourth edition, and one that we are proud to support. For those not able to travel, BSA will bring you the process, the art and the flavor and color of the locals with Fer Alcala and Mira Hacia Atras gorgeous photos.
Here are JPGs of the press materials from the Parees Oviedo mural intervention festival in Spain. We’ll bring you the murals as they go up next month.
BROOKLYN STREET ART LOVES YOU MORE EVERY DAY
