All posts tagged: Mima Museum Brussels

Invader is the “Rubikcubist” at MIMA in Brussels

Invader is the “Rubikcubist” at MIMA in Brussels

Remember those paint-by-numbers kits that Mrs. Measley used to keep on the top shelf of her hallway closet next to a couple of handmade quilts and a moth-eaten cardigan? During the winter months, the lady who lived in the apartment upstairs used to have one on her kitchen table by the window for some lovely afternoon painting – filling in the appropriate shape with the color corresponding to the number printed inside the form. Somehow you knew what the picture was when she was finished, but it was easier to see if you stepped back a few feet and sort of blurred your vision.

Invader. RUBIK SELF-PORTRAIT WITH CUBE, 2005. (photo © Invader)

You may want to use that skill when viewing the new Invader show in Brussels opening this month at MIMA, the Millennium Iconoclast Museum of Art. The French street artist is known for creating popular characters in the style of vintage 8-bit video games on walls in cities around the world. It is an early video game reference that is nostalgic for a particular age group of people who long for those simpler times before streaming surveillance and facial recognition.

Invader. RUBIK INGRES (Making of), 2006. (photo © Invader)

A few years ago, the artist created his digital reference for his rounded square pointillism called Rubikcubism. Presented as a feat achieved by manipulating the popular kid’s toy from the 1980s, the artist recreates famous artworks and movie scenes as ‘canvases.’  The obliqueness of the image recognition also echoes the anonymity of the street artist, who steadfastly hides behind the Invader name after a few decades of illegal installations of tiles stuck high above the street.

With “Invader Rubikcubist” the museum is bracing for a hugely successful summer show with the exhibition featuring the first sculptures presented from the series and a few special new sections like Rubik Bad Men, devoted to the figure of the villain, and Rubik Masterpieces, an homage to masterpieces of art history.

Invader. RLRI, 2010. (photo © Invader)
Invader. RUBIK SCARFACE MACHINE GUN, 2007. (photo © Invader)
Invader. RUBIK ROCK’N ROLL ANIMAL, 2011. (photo © Invader)
Invader. RUBIK SELF-PORTRAIT WITH CUBES, 2011. (photo © Invader)

INVADER RUBIKCUBIST
​24 June 2022 > 08 January 2023
​MIMA
39-41, Quai du Hainaut
​1080 Brussels

For more information and details click HERE

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BSA Film Friday: 02.22.19

BSA Film Friday: 02.22.19

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

Now screening :
1. Escif: Magic Piano
2. Adele Renault: St+Art India. Lodhi Art Festival 2019
3. Jeff Koons at the Ashmolean Museum
4. OS Gemeos: Flying Steps at Hamburger Bahnhof in Berlin

BSA Special Feature: Escif: Magic Piano

Spanish Street Artist Escif creates a museum installation that uses irony, sarcasm, and deep truths that we’re not always ready to see.

By hi-jacking some of the current interactive nomenclature enabled by augmented/mixed realities and the normalizing of tablet use, he alerts viewers to the connection of age-old mineral mining that is just as contemporary as the hi-tech gadgetry many have embraced.

Since you can use the device to contemplate human suffering and make music, it is an indictment of modern attitudes that dehumanize and turn real stories into a video game.

From the artist:

“Coltan is a mineral, found specially in eastern Congo, used to make cells and computer chips. Violent rebel groups are exploiting coltan mining to help finance a bloody civil war which is now in its 12th year.

The link between the bloodshed and coltan is causing alarm among high-tec manufacturers slowly they are beginning to realise that their products may contain the tainted fruits of civil war. Since the outbreak of fighting in august 1998: an estimated 5.4 million people have died; 45.000 continue to die each month; Children account for 47% of these deaths.

Magic Piano is a music installation. With the help of a tablet (that obviously contains coltan) you will be able to play the piano. Use the device to navigate on the wall. When you pass on the screen over a charater, a sound will be activated. If you push the character with your finger a sound loop will be activated. You will also activate the animation of each character.”

Adele Renault: St+Art India. Lodhi Art Festival 2019

A couple of weeks ago we shared with you new photos by Adele’s mom of the Street Artist painting this wall for St+Art India in New Delhi. Today we share a video made of her installation.

📺Lodhi Art Festival 2019 || Adele RenaultAdele's imprints are visible in the winged beauties that now adorn the walls at Lodhi. Laying on a main arterial road know the colony, her birds now peek through the trees and woo passersby.Watch the film to get a closer look into her creative process! 📽 Pranav Gohill & Jay NuEdited by Filterkaypee Festival supported by Asian Paints.#artforall #startindia #startdelhi #startdelhi2019 #asianpaints #lodhiartdistrict #lodhiartfestival2019

Posted by St+art India on Wednesday, February 20, 2019

Jeff Koons at the Ashmolean Museum

“It lacks all the give and the breath of fresh art,” the bespectacled art critic intones with all the weight of a final damnation.

“We need haters out there. They are affirmations that we’re doing something right,” says the streetwise pop star with clever sunnies and sans big hat.

Taking a break from the Banksy beat, Doug appears to put forth that supposition that Jeff Koons is proving once again that as long as you are a white guy and you reference European art history you are 80% on your way as an artist whose work will be collected and exhibited.

OS Gemeos: Flying Steps at Hamburger Bahnhof in Berlin

A splendid hybrid that sends heartbeats racing, even involuntarily, here is a trailer for Flying Steps and Os Gemeos as they interpret Mussorgsky’s “Pictures at an Exhibition”, the famous piano composition that has become a showpiece for virtuoso pianists. Good to see museums of contemporary art truly stretching, redefining the street and Street Art.


Another interpretation by ELP from December 1970.

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