All posts tagged: NANOOK

50 Years From Selma, Jetsonorama and Equality in Brooklyn

June 27, 2015 Artists, Interview

From Selma to Ferguson, Birmingham to Charleston, Jimmie Lee Jackson to Michael Brown, Street Artist Jetsonorama is crossing the country from Arizona to New York and a half-century of America’s struggle with our legacy of racism and injustice.

As marches have continued across the country in cities like Ferguson, Oakland, Baltimore, New York, Dallas and Cleveland in the past year addressing issues such as police brutality and racism, the south is taking down confederate flags on state houses and the US is mourning another mass shooting.

Now as Americans everywhere are pulling out and waving the stars and stripes to celebrate freedom, this new powerful installation on a Brooklyn wall reminds us of what New York poet Emma Lazarus said, “Until we are all free, we are none of us free.”

Jetsonorama in collaboration with Dan Budnik. The Bushwick Collective. Brooklyn, NY. June 2015 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Freedom and equality were the goals of those three marches from Selma to Montgomery, pivotal to the passage of the Voting Rights Act signed into law on August 6 1965, a turning point in outlawing discriminatory voting practices. But our legacy of racism cannot be easily legislated out of our hearts or institutions, nor extracted from our systems.

In preparation for this new public piece, Chip Thomas AKA Jetsonorama told us about his take on the undeniable similarities of the state of the struggle then and today.

“A quote by James Baldwin comes to mind,” he says, ” ‘…To be a Negro in this country and to be relatively conscious is to be in a rage almost all the time.’ Though the times have changed, issues such as institutionalized racism as evidenced by discriminatory law enforcement practices, poverty, high unemployment rates, challenges to voting rights have not. The struggle for respect and equality continues.”

Jetsonorama in collaboration with Dan Budnik. The Bushwick Collective. Brooklyn, NY. June 2015 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The original photograph by Dan Budnik that he replicates across the wall comes directly from those marches to freedom fifty years ago. “Frederick Moss, a 54-mile core group marcher, rest from exhaustion on Dexter Avenue, the Terminus of the Selma to Montgomery March (25 March 1965)” says the handwritten description of the black and white photograph of a young man lying on his back with one hand behind his head and with his other hand balancing a small American flag perpendicular above his stomach. Jetsonorama wheat-pasted that description on this wall as well.

The original image tells of the fatigue and determination of one marcher in a moment of respite, confident and asserting his place at the American table, willing to endure threats, insults, the fear of reprisal. By itself it can also feel solitary, abandoned.

Jetsonorama in collaboration with Dan Budnik. The Bushwick Collective. Brooklyn, NY. June 2015 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Using the visual language of contemporary art on the streets Jetsonorama ingeniously updates the image through replication and repetition of the silhouetted photographic image, evenly spacing the image across a deep red wall. Like Magritte’s Golconde, Warhol’s Cow Wallpaper, or corporate advertiser wildposting all over our cities, the repeated image evokes the impersonality of the mass production of everything, cheapening a life and lessening its importance. When multiplied like a mere decorative motif across a diagonal grid it hints at the callous disregard for a huge number of black bodies beaten and bloodied. The addition of a flag calls to mind a graveyard in high contrast, full of nameless lives cut short. The placement also implies that the graveyard extends further than your eye is seeing.

Jetsonorama in collaboration with Dan Budnik. The Bushwick Collective. Brooklyn, NY. June 2015 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

We spoke with Jetsonorama about the genesis of this project which was many months in the making:

Brooklyn Street Art: On the one hand the 50^th anniversary of the marches from Selma gives the events an even stronger resonance. But it may also seem distant from the concerns of a new generation. How do you hope to re-ignite the conversations with this work?
Jetsonorama: I chose to work with a visual metaphor in this piece. By repeating the image of Selma to Montgomery marcher Frederick Moss who was photographed exhausted, lying on his back in the street at the completion of the march, I’m referencing Eric Gardner, Michael Brown and other African-American men who have died on American streets by the institutions that are tasked with protecting all citizens. I like the fact that Frederick Moss is holding an American flag – emphasizing his status as a citizen who is deserving of equality. and his faith in the promise the flag represents. Granted, most viewers won’t know who Frederick Moss is but I think the poignancy of a black man on his back holding an American Flag, ad infinitum, will resonate.

Jetsonorama in collaboration with Dan Budnik. The Bushwick Collective. Brooklyn, NY. June 2015 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Brooklyn Street Art: Can you talk about Dan Budnik and his work and why you thought it would translate well to a wall as “street art”?
Jetsonorama: I was raised in the 1960s reading Life and Look magazines. The work of documentary photographers like Eugene Smith, Gordon Parks, Charles Moore affected me such that when I got my first 35mm camera at age 12, I started shooting black and white film, wanting to be a visual storyteller like them. For 22 years I maintained a darkroom where I live and work now on the Navajo reservation and I became part of a community of photographers based in Flagstaff, Arizona. A long time friend and photographer told me about this guy named Dan Budnik who had moved to Flagstaff.

The first time I met Dan I found him to be an unassuming, gentle spirit. I had no idea of the breadth of his work until a year later when he approached me about wheat pasting some of his work in Selma to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the march. I saw a copy of his book “Marching to the Freedom Dream” that documents approximately three years of witnessing the Civil Rights Movement and I couldn’t believe this guy was in Flagstaff. I mean, here was one of the photographers from the humanist photography movement that influenced me – living only 2 hours away. When the possibility of getting work up in Selma fell through I started looking for walls elsewhere to get some of Dan’s work from the march up. Dan’s images are powerful and timeless. They’d work well in any context.

Jetsonorama in collaboration with Dan Budnik. The Bushwick Collective. Brooklyn, NY. June 2015 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Brooklyn Street Art: The country is gripped in a conversation about police brutality and its use against communities of color and the poor. How can an artist address such a prevalent systemic racism and classism?
Jetsonorama: You know, like Bob Marley said “…Who feels it, knows it.” I think it’s especially true for artists of color that we don’t have the privilege of pretending like we’re living in post-racial America now that we have a black president. The challenge really is how to get a conscious message out without alienating wall owners (for those people working on legal walls). Personally, I still find inspiration in the utopian ideals of artists like Diego Rivera and the witty criticism of Robbie Conal + Blu who chant down Babylon.

Brooklyn Street Art: Do you think of this work as appropriation? Collaboration? Repurposing?
Jetsonorama: It’s straight up hip hop and punk in that Dan gave me the source photo and I remixed it. I think of it as a collaboration. Dan saw the mock up for the piece and was cool with it.

Jetsonorama in collaboration with Dan Budnik. The Bushwick Collective. Brooklyn, NY. June 2015 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Brooklyn Street Art: With this topic and Dan Budnik’s photographic work, you could have prepared a show in a more formal setting. How does the experience of your art here on the street differ from seeing it in a gallery, museum, or a home?
Jetsonorama: After presenting work indoors for 22 years I started getting up outdoors in 2009 and haven’t looked back since. I started working on the Navajo nation in northern Arizona in 1987 and have been photographing people from the tribe since that time. I’ve had shows of that work in various places around the county but the people who I was photographing never saw the work. Now that 95% of what I do is pasted images along the roadside on the reservation of people from the reservation, the work feels more honest and has deepened my relationship with the community. The dialog with the community and the level of trust have grown through the project.

Brooklyn Street Art: What do you hope a viewer will take away from this piece?
Jetsonorama: The piece speaks to parallels and patterns. A successful intervention might be for the viewer to be prompted to recognize patterns of behavior in his/her life and to consider whether those patterns are contributing to or detracting from humanity. On the other hand, not getting tagged would be a good thing.

Jetsonorama in collaboration with Dan Budnik. The Bushwick Collective. Brooklyn, NY. June 2015 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jetsonorama. The Bushwick Collective. Brooklyn, NY. June 2015 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The photo from Dan Budnik is of Frederick Moss. On the caption above, Mr. Budnik explains with his own handwriting the circumstances of the photo. CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE. The Bushwick Collective. Brooklyn, NY. June 2015 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jetsonorama in collaboration with Dan Budnik. The Bushwick Collective. Brooklyn, NY. June 2015 (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jetsonorama and BSA wish to extend a heartfelt Thank You to photographer Dan Budnik for the use of his photo for this project. Also to LNY, Nanook and Jess X Chen for their assistance and to Joe Ficalora at The Bushwick Collective for facilitating the wall in Bushwick, Brooklyn.

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Please note: All content including images and text are © BrooklynStreetArt.com, unless otherwise noted. We like sharing BSA content for non-commercial purposes as long as you credit the photographer(s) and BSA, include a link to the original article URL and do not remove the photographer’s name from the .jpg file. Otherwise, please refrain from re-posting. Thanks!
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This article is also published in The Huffington Post

A New Muralism Growing : Spotlight on Jersey City and “Savage Habbit”

August 6, 2014 Artists

An important part of the Street Art ecosystem is the mural and right now we are in the midst of a mural revolution in neighborhoods, towns and cities everywhere. These are not your mom’s mural programs; overwrought art-by-committee debates that result in something no one is really in love with. And while they are often born from the community in some way, they do not try to address the same needs that a traditional community mural has filled by touching on the historical, sociological, local topics or lore. Although they could.

These are mural programs fueled often by one or two people who approach landlords and businesses directly and get permission for artists to hit up a wall. The results can be varied and more often than not the good ones survive.

Case Ma’Claim for Savage Habbit. Jersey City, NJ (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Three forces are at work today contributing to this rise in freelance muralism and mural programs as far as we can discern. First, the rise of Street Art as a recognized grassroots global phenomenon has opened the eyes of moribund neighborhoods (and real estate developers) to the revitalizing effect that art in the streets can have on an area’s desirability and, along with it, has suddenly relaxed the nerves of many a politician and police officer.

Secondly, the rapid proliferation of a global Street Art festival scene that is creating a circuit of relatively young traveling painters “getting fame” with genuine D.I.Y. personal art and parlaying it to their following across digital platforms has certainly sparked the interest of more than a just a few peers.

Case Ma’Claim. Detail. For Savage Habbit. Jersey City, NJ (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Finally, now that we are a good ten to fifteen years into the modern Street Art explosion, many of the artists who stuck to their craft have actually developed it, broadened it, deepened it. Consequently we are blessed with a new generation of ever more gifted painters, wheat-pasters, sculptors, knitters, and installation artists who can knock out big pieces in the public space with speed and panache.

Today we take a look at a nascent local mural scene in Jersey City, New Jersey, but we could just as easily have examined nearby Newark – or a growing constellation of towns. Begun just a handful of years ago by a local blog named Savage Habbit, this small mural program showcases local and internationally known Street Artists and co-founder Inez Gradzki has organized many walls in an around an arts community that has been growing in fits and starts.

DULK for Savage Habbit. Jersey City, NJ (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Using their enthusiasm for the scene and connections to artists, the blog has worked hard in a bricks-and-mortar way to show their love for their community. With an eye on the potential of this town that lies just a few minutes from Manhattan to be a magnet for culture and artists, programs like these are already attracting New York artists. Not surprisingly, a growing number are also deciding to live in these towns, having found friends and given up on trying to live in the expensive city that once drew and retained the creative class by the thousands annually.

So here we are with some recent walls and murals in Jersey City – a template for many more to come.

Sean9Lugo. Detail. For Savage Habbit. Jersey City, NJ (photo © Jaime Rojo)

LNY. Jersey City, NJ (photo © Jaime Rojo)

LNY for Savage Habbit. Jersey City, NJ (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Pixel Pancho for Savage Habbit. Jersey City, NJ (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mike Makatron for Savage Habbit. Jersey City, NJ (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Li-Hill for Savage Habbit. Jersey City, NJ. This piece was completed but cars parked in front of it prevented us from taking a full photo of it. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Li-Hill for Savage Habbit. Jersey City, NJ (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Alice Pasquini for Savage Habbit. Jersey City, NJ (photo © Jaime Rojo)

NoseGo for Savage Habbit. Jersey City, NJ. We could only get a detail and a strange angle of this piece due to cars parked in front of the piece. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mata Ruda and Nanook for Savage Habbit. Jersey City, NJ (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mata Ruda and Nanook for Savage Habbit. Jersey City, NJ. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Sean9Lugo for Savage Habbit. Jersey City, NJ (photo © Jaime Rojo)

LNY and Mata Ruda for Calle 13 Multi-Viral Project. Jersey City, NJ (photo © Jaime Rojo)

LNY and Mata Ruda for Calle 13 Multi-Viral Project. Jersey City, NJ. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

To learn more about Savage Habbit click HERE

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Please note: All content including images and text are © BrooklynStreetArt.com, unless otherwise noted. We like sharing BSA content for non-commercial purposes as long as you credit the photographer(s) and BSA, include a link to the original article URL and do not remove the photographer’s name from the .jpg file. Otherwise, please refrain from re-posting. Thanks!

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GAIA : New Mural Work in Greenville, Atlanta, Detroit

June 30, 2014 Artists

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

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

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

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

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

“City of Altruism” – Greenville, North Carolina

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

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

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

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

“Boundary” – Atlanta, Georgia

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

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

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

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

The Murder of Vincent Chin in Detroit, Michigan

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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OWB2 : Open Walls Baltimore 2 Winding Up (VIDEO)

May 31, 2014 Artists

Two years after Baltimore opened its walls to Street Art, the street artist Gaia has again summoned artists this spring and summer to regale walls with murals throughout the up and coming neighborhood it was meant to help develop and revitalize, the Station North Arts & Entertainment District. From March through June this year fifteen artists from hometown Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York, Europe and South America were slated to come through and hit big walls.

Escif. Open Walls Baltimore 2014 (photo © M Holden Warren)

With the majority of the original works still remaining from the first phase, the new walls OWB2 were scheduled for Lesser Gonzalez Alvarez, Betsy Casanas, El Decerter, ECB, Escif, Gaia, LNY, Logan Hicks, Santtu Mustonen, Nanook, Ozmo, D’Metrius (DJ) Rice, Ernest Shaw Jr., Katey Truhn & Jessie Unterhalter, Zbiok, and the Urban Playground Team.

Thematically derived in many cases from local history and figures and culture, the publicly/privately funded mural program is complemented by a series of free performances and workshops throughout the duration of this year’s installations.

Here are some recent images of walls being completed thanks to Martha Cooper and M Holden Warren. Back in April we also published a selection of images from OWB from photographer Geoff Hargadon.

Escif. Open Walls Baltimore 2014 (photo © M Holden Warren)

Santtu. Open Walls Baltimore 2014 (photo © Martha Cooper)

Gaia. Open Walls Baltimore 2014 (photo © M Holden Warren)

Ozmo. Open Walls Baltimore 2014 (photo © M Holden Warren)

Nanook. Open Walls Baltimore 2014 (photo © M Holden Warren)

Nanook. Open Walls Baltimore 2014 (photo courtesy © OWB)

Logan Hicks. Open Walls Baltimore 2014 (photo © M Holden Warren)

New Shots from Open Walls Baltimore 2

April 8, 2014 Artists

Open Walls Baltimore 2 has begun and only a few pieces have been completed but we thought you’d like to take a look, courtesy photographer and BSA Contributor Geoff Hargadon, who was tooling around one afternoon.

This spring Baltimore will be hosting a list that includes Zbiok, Anttu Mustonen, Ozmo, Nanook, Logan Hicks, Lesser Gonzalez, LNY, El Decertor, ECB, D’metrius Rice, Ernest Shaw, Escif, Gaia, Jessie and Katey, and Betsy Casanas.

Gaia (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Clearly! Baltimore (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Nether at work on his wall. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Nether. Detail. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Santtu Mustonen (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

What’s the 911? A police mini-bunker features Open Walls Baltimore 2 posters. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)

Click HERE to learn more about Open Walls Baltimore 2

Nanook and Overunder Saw a Building in Half in Reno

November 5, 2013 Artists

For those who were perplexed by the title of ‘residency’ in Banksy’s recent visit to New York, lets just say it was rather tongue-in-cheek to call it that. Artists have been applying for and getting residencies for many years from benefactors of one sort or another – institutions and individuals offering opportunities for artists to come and create with variables of lodging, materials, and length of stay all tied to the mission of the residency and the resources available.

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Nanook . Overunder. Detail. Big Little Residency. Reno, Nevada 2013. (photo © Overunder)

Street Artist and fine artist Overunder has hosted his own artists residency for a couple of years since leaving Brooklyn for Reno, Nevada called the Big Little Residency. Focused on social practices through public works of art, the residency is one week to one month long and he has had a few artists come out to live in the little cabin he built out back.

Yesterday Nanook finished his visit and today we bring you some images of the site-specific collaborative wheat pastes, paintings, and installations he completed which include a large wooden handled saw that cuts a building in half. The whimsical element is not entirely to be coy, but to re-frame our perspective on size and scale, a recurring visual feature of certain works by Nanook. Given the shrinking economic expectations of many Americans for the forthcoming generations, this sizing down of the dream also feels like an apt metaphor for our growing serfdom.

So enjoy the collaborative intervention with latex paint and wood entitled “Do You See What I Saw”, as well as some other pieces of public art Nanook completed with Overunder within the Truckee Meadows in this part of Nevada.

Nanook . Overunder. Detail. Big Little Residency. Reno, Nevada 2013. (photo © Overunder)

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Nanook . Overunder. Detail. Big Little Residency. Reno, Nevada 2013. (photo © Overunder)

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Nanook . Overunder. Detail. Big Little Residency. Reno, Nevada 2013. (photo © Overunder)

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Nanook . Overunder. Big Little Residency. Reno, Nevada 2013. (photo © Overunder)

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Nanook . Overunder. Big Little Residency. Reno, Nevada 2013. (photo © Overunder)

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Nanook . Overunder. Detail. Big Little Residency. Reno, Nevada 2013. (photo © Overunder)

Nanook . Overunder. Big Little Residency. Reno, Nevada 2013. (photo © Overunder)

Nanook . Overunder. Detail. Big Little Residency. Reno, Nevada 2013. (photo © Overunder)

Nanook . Overunder. Big Little Residency. Reno, Nevada 2013. (photo © Overunder)

Nanook . Overunder. Big Little Residency. Abandoned railroad tunnel with Donner Lake and the Sierra Mountains seen in the distance. Reno, Nevada 2013. (photo © Overunder)

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BSA Film Friday 10.25.13

October 25, 2013 Artists

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

Now screening:
1. Debut: Nils Westergard x Nanook in the Navaho Nation
2. MTO in Berlin
3. Vhils Talks About His Work
4. Sajjad Abbas In Iraq
5. Duality by MATEO

BSA Special Feature: DEBUT
Nils Westergard x Nanook in the Navaho Nation

The debut of a video seen here for the first time, this timelapse of the experience that two Street Artists had while in “The Painted Desert” project sponsored and cultivated in and around the Navaho Nation by Jetsonorama for the last couple of years.

Here we see Nanook and Nils Westergard create works influenced by the people they got to know while there, a cultural exchange that helps expand the knowledge of all the participants. In the video you see Nils create two portraits; one of King Fowler, “who was a Navajo Codetalker during WWII,” says Nils, and who died not too long ago. The other is a kid named Calvin, who lives on the reservation and who you can see in the red flannel shirt actually watching Nils put his face on a wall.

In a community where people know everyone else’s family and friends, Nils says it felt like a real honor to paint these people and “it was especially interesting to talk to kids around my age, and see how Navajo culture adapts to the 21st century.” Lots of conversations and even participating in a sweat lodge, Nils felt his mind being reorganized.

He smiles when he mentions the speed that paint dries in the desert, and the ingenuity he used to keep the mural going. “I didn’t have enough buckets, so almost all of my paint was held in broken 40 oz. beer bottles while I worked,” he says. “They got a kick out of that.”

MTO in Berlin

Frenchman MTO appears in this new video that is more music video and sleek hipster ode to the moment than Street Art film. Using art, artifice, nightlife and poetic romantic interludes woven with signifiers of power and light debauchery, it’s a sexy romp. We don’t know what we just said either.

“Je me suis embarqué vers les tristes rivages de cette “île” du bonheur fictif.”

Vhils Talks About His Work

A quick primer on the work of Vhils from the man himself. “I started to see stencil as not something you paint over, but as a window you see through.”

Sajjad Abbas In Iraq

We don’t often see videos of Street Art in Iraq, but this one gives some insight into how they do it – and there are similarities to everywhere else, as it turns out.

Done under cover of night the subject matter points to the topic of militarization and the stencil itself reveals an international Street Art style that has emerged since the Internet connected us all.

Duality by MATEO

And ending on a happy note this week, here’s Mateo flipping and bouncing down a wall in a balanced performance. Also, corn on the cob.

Street Art and Activism with “The Slumlord Project” in Baltimore

October 9, 2013 Artists

In a twist on the Broken Windows Theory, Street Artists are using their skills to combat urban blight in Baltimore with “The Slumlord Project”. By drawing the attention of neighbors to abandoned and vacant properties and giving pertinent ownership information to take action on, 17 artists are spray painting and wheat-pasting in a D.I.Y. educational program that aims to renew the social contract in communities hard hit by crumbling real estate, crime, and diminished opportunity.

Harlequinade. Slumlord Project, Baltimore Summer 2013. (photo © Tarek Turkey)

With tongue in cheek, Baltimore Street Artist Nether calls “The Slumlord Project” an “unsanctioned public art festival”, where artists are invited to conceive of targeted installations on neglected properties. Along with Carol Ott, the founder of website and organization The Slumlord Watch, he encouraged artists to create with a sense of focus to draw attention to the companies, investors, private tax payers, and even the Housing Authority of Baltimore City about the large swaths of depressing and dangerous buildings decaying where neighborhoods and communities once flourished.

The result? A good old-fashioned bricks and mortar shaming project that calls property owners on the carpet, activates city agency responses, and encourages neighbors to get involved in a civic way to improve conditions on their block.

Harelequinade. Slumlord Project, Baltimore Summer 2013. (photo © Tarek Turkey)

“The goal of the project was to catalyze a larger conversation about Baltimore’s ignored vacancy issue,” says the Nether, who had been putting up his wheat-pasted portraits of neighborhood folks on boarded-up doorways of the city’s abandoned buildings when he met Ott and became impressed with her enthusiastic online blog that documents the sad side of Bmore. Just how many buildings are vacant ranges from the city estimate of 16,000 to community group estimates of more than 40,000. But just looking at a Google map that uses some of the data from the groups website gives an idea how widespread the problem of vacancy is in Baltimore.

“It’s really frustrating when the government won’t acknowledge the problem,” says Ott in a video about her experience with her organization and her work to make neighborhoods structurally safer, “You cannot fix what you won’t acknowledge.”

Nanook. Slumlord Project, Baltimore Summer 2013. (photo © Tarek Turkey)

Now with “Wall Hunters Inc”, a recently created non-profit organization, Nether has invited 17 artists to create this new series of installations that combine art and activism – installing unauthorized artwork on various dilapidated vacant houses. Next to the art are posted notices that incorporate QR codes that link to online data on the Slumlord Watch website so community members may learn about the housing and safety code violations on the property and about the owner responsible for the property’s decline. When neighbors started accessing this information, phones began ringing. Already some of the properties have been razed because of their precarious condition and the danger they posed.

Here are the stories of some of these installations as told by artists themselves and along with images of their work you can read some informational, insightful, even poetic, observations about their pieces for “The Slumlord Project”. As you read, you realize that some undertook a fair amount of research to understand the relationship of their art with the vacant and abandoned property.

Underlying some of these stories are also critiques of the developers who have more recently begun rehabilitating or renaming neighborhoods, social conditions, and the history of the properties. Below the images of the new pieces here some of the artists give background of their process and the conditions. While we would have liked to confirm the names of some of the landlords who have been referenced in their accounts, we could not in time for publication and felt it would not be responsible to print them.

Jetsonorama. Slumlord Project, Baltimore Summer 2013. (photo © Tarek Turkey)

Jetsonorama

“I spent a month in Baltimore in 1982. Shortly after leaving I heard Nina Simone’s version of Randy Newman’s song ‘Baltimore.’ Though I’ve never heard Randy Newman’s version, Nina sang is like she owned it and defined the persevering spirit of the city.

I shot this image in May of 2012 during Open Walls Baltimore. The girl in the photo, Johnnyasia, is an apprentice of Tony Divers, who is known at the Birdman of Greenmount West. The lyrics of the song appear around the periphery of the photo as a shout out to the city.”

Stefan Ways. Slumlord Project, Baltimore Summer 2013. (photo © Tarek Turkey)

STEFAN WAYS

“When conjuring up an idea I will be the first to admit I did play it a little “safe” going for a Raven — Baltimore’s football mascot — but I feel the piece received a very positive response from the community. That was important to me since they are the ones who not only have to live with the eyesore of the building, but my semi-permanent installation as well. I created a mixed-media piece of a Raven building a nest. Wood slats from the building are held tightly in its grasp while “caution” tape blows in the wind from its calling beak. Nether popped up the QR code and we were out in a couple hours.

To our surprise, days later the QR code displaying the owners info had been torn down. Nether went and put it up again – it was later found torn down. About a week later Demolition signs were put all over the property – did our project come to fruition? Nobody is quite sure, but I want to say ‘yes’. The property was eventually demolished about two weeks after its set date. All and all I am so glad for the neighborhood that those terrible buildings are gone.

The project was amazing to be a part of and everyone’s work was held in high regard by everyone – community members, the police, the drug boys, city officials, the general public, and fellow artists. Wall Hunters has now made me look at my work, where I work, and my city in a much more specific way and I hope to do many more ‘unsanctioned murals’.”

Stefan Ways. Slumlord Project, Baltimore Summer 2013. (photo © Tarek Turkey)

Nether. Slumlord Project, Baltimore Summer 2013. (photo © Tarek Turkey)

Nether

“The piece I made for my second install for the Wall Hunters ‘Slumlord Project’ was a piece that I designed for the Cherry Hill/ Westport/ Mt. Winan’s area of southwest Baltimore. This is an area of town that is very off-the-map and many people don’t even know it exists. It’s an area with a lot of historic importance, has been crippled by drugs, vacancy, and poverty since the 90s, and soon will be developed into the new “Harbor West”. It was created after FDR’s “New Deal” and was built for black veterans returning from WW2. I find it most interesting and shameful when developers change the names of neighborhoods as they develop them. This area will become another example of that.

The character in the piece is my good friend Troy, who is from Cherry Hill. Troy has talked to me a lot about the area’s history, and he encouraged me to do a Wall Hunters piece on the side of the abandoned Mt. Winan Projects.

The Mt. Winans projects have some unsettling history in the dating from the 1990s. The police department twice, in 1995 and 1998, tried to put police substations into the projects and both times the substations were firebombed before opening. The drug operation running out of the Mt. Winans projects was estimated by some to gross $100,000 a month.

It is my belief, and the belief of many people in the area, that the City and developer’s plans are to destroy the collapsed identity of the area rather than help it once again thrive. In the piece, Troy is holding together three structures which symbolize the fading history of the area, probably never to be revitalized. From left to right, a burned down abandoned multi-purpose center at the top of Cherry Hill which has been turned to a methadone clinic, some Westport-style row houses along Annapolis Boulevard, and the Section 8 building called The Cherry Hill Homes.”

Gaia. Slumlord Project, Baltimore Summer 2013. (photo © Tarek Turkey)

GAIA

“This piece depicts the crown of King Tut with the visage replaced by a cotton field that fades into another row home owned by Rochkind. A normal suburban home from Pikesville with eagle wings floats above the words Exodus in Hebrew and English. Rather than vilify an individual who could fairly be labeled a slumlord, this piece visualizes the connection between the Jewish and African American experience with migration.”

Gaia. Slumlord Project, Baltimore Summer 2013. (photo © Tarek Turkey)

Mata Ruda. Slumlord Project, Baltimore Summer 2013. (photo © Tarek Turkey)

Mata Ruda

“ ‘The Slumlord Project’ is a direct overture to a much-needed, urgent dialogue layered with complexity. To put it simply, the project is a visual catalyst for reform. From its conception to the moment I approached the wall with paint, two terms, in particular, had resonated with me: narrative, as a lead-up and description to a conversation of the condition of a specific form.

I painted a bust depicting a Greek Hellenistic muse next to a deteriorating cube. I chose the muse as a source of knowledge, relating a historical narrative of the neglected block. And for posterity, the bust of the muse personifies a face of prudence, relating the ability to govern and discipline oneself by the use of knowledge, reason, and truth.”

LNY. Slumlord Project, Baltimore Summer 2013. (photo © Tarek Turkey)

LUNAR NEW YEAR (LNY)

“ ‘Shawnee’s Call’ was totally colored by the public conversation Baltimore was having about the “Wall Hunters” project on paper and around town. I arrived a day before the Baltimore Sun published this article voicing businessman and real estate owner Stanley Rochkind’s allegations of racism as a distraction to the real issue and I was painting on yet another one of his neglected properties. Needless to say the whole experience was very political but that is the point: anything that happens in the public realm is inherently political. Loitering, picking up trash, smoking, putting up illegal murals, commenting on newspaper articles – it all comes loaded with meaning so my attempt was to channel that focus and attention back to the core of this project, which the mural depicts.”

From what I understand, a neighbor of this property called the Baltimore Slumwatch and reported the property next to her house along with its violations, which, in turn, led me to that location to paint and it is this small act of concerned citizenship that the mural celebrates.”

Pablo Machioli. Slumlord Project, Baltimore Summer 2013. (photo © Tarek Turkey)

Pablo Machioli

To describe his project and his experience, artists Pablo Machioli wrote this poem.

“Breathing Peace”

Mother Nature’s arms warmed
By colorful patches of human skin.

Urgently they break through
Among millions of fallen daisies,
And open our windows.

They beg us to look outwards,
They beg us to look inwards .

Outside there’s Milagro, but she is my sister.
She’s nine years old.
Each time she inhales, a daisy falls,
Each time exhales, a dove is born.

Each dove brings a vein in its beak:
To continue sewing patches ,
To continue warming arms,
To continue opening windows,
To enable us to look outwards and inwards,
And to let us and them breath peace.

Sorta. Slumlord Project, Baltimore Summer 2013. (photo © Tarek Turkey)

SORTA

“Like many of the pieces in the project, mine was catered for the specific property. The “Vacant” that I pasted up on was noted as a lead paint infested dwelling. The house, which is listed as being owned by the Mayor and City Council, sits on the corner of a block with occupied houses all around it. Many of these houses have children living in them.

Lead paint exposure has been proven to cause many problems for growing children, including learning disabilities. The subject of the piece is a real person, the son of a friend of mine. He’s holding a Baltimore City Schools report card with failing grades and he’s standing in an oversized bucket of Dutch Boy lead paint.

I loved this project and the piece as the majority of my street works are portraits of people from the community. Additionally I often focus on children. But more often than not I try to capture real life topics, regardless of content and put it all together in a tasteful way. Sometimes I fail at this.

However I know who is walking or driving down that street. As a parent I am cautious to not offend other parents who might be exposed to my work without compromising the point I’m trying to make. The best part about street art for me is the interactions I have with the people walking up and down the street when I’m installing something. Baltimore offers a lot of love for street art and street artists; at least that’s been my experience. They seem to appreciate it. I mean, what’s easier to look at, a 14 foot tall portrait of a young man or the naked vacant building behind it that has been sitting there rotting for years?”

Sorta. Slumlord Project, Baltimore Summer 2013. (photo © Tarek Turkey)

Specter. Slumlord Project, Baltimore Summer 2013. (photo © Tarek Turkey)

Specter

“ ‘The Scaffold’ is a work that uses elements of construction and demolition
to comment on the uncertainty of vacant properties in Baltimore. The stairs have an eerie emptiness to them that reflects on this uncertainty leaving the viewer in limbo and questioning the fate of these structures.”

Specter. Slumlord Project, Baltimore Summer 2013. (photo © Tarek Turkey)

Tefcon. Slumlord Project, Baltimore Summer 2013. (photo © Tarek Turkey)

TEFCON

“In addition to my installation, I was given the opportunity to design the ‘Wall Hunters’ logo. The project was rooted in some pretty complicated cultural issues. Attempting to broach such an involved ideology was causing me to churn out this… overly complex, incomprehensible logo art. So, I decided to approach both the logo and my piece from a more literal standpoint, using animal hunting imagery.

I illustrated the lettering for the logo, adding a pair of horns as the ‘t’ in ‘Hunters.’ I mimicked the knotty / gnarled horn texture throughout the lettering and added a cool light source to give it some dimension. My installation was a carryover from the logo. I chose to go with a hunter character in a ‘hero’ pose. I would never go as far as to say what we were doing was heroic as I have too much respect for the actual heroes out there. However, I did consider the participants and the overall project to be a force for good and I wanted to convey that feeling in my piece.”

Doom

“This piece was pasted on what was reported to be the former base of operations for a self-proclaimed ‘King of Baltimore’, who was a convicted cocaine dealer and slumlord. These properties have been vacant for over 10 years.”

CERA

“In order for this piece to function, it simply needed to be activated. Creating ‘A Ship Will Sink With A Neglectful Captain,’ was such an exciting experience.

One of the more crucial points I try my hardest to maintain in my practice is the attention given to the viewer. Working on this wall, with this community, gave me the opportunity to see the their reactions to my artwork as well as their interest and noninterest.

Literally speaking with the community while working on this piece helped me understand what I do in my practice, and why I do it. I’m there for the process of assembling content, altering content, fragmenting it and spreading it out in layers. But I’m mostly driven by our people and our commonality.”

For more information on The Baltimore Slumlord Watch please click HERE:

For more information on The Wall Hunters Slumlord Project please click HERE:

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Images of The Week 08.18.13

August 18, 2013 Artists

This week in Atlanta we’ve had a blast meeting the artists and organizers and capturing the new works for you to see here. We’ve published many of the walls in the last few days so here are some that we have not, including works by 3TTman, JR, Pastel, Elian, Gyun Hur, Joshua Ray Stephens, Nanook, Trek Matthews

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Living Walls 2013 ALIVE in Atlanta

August 15, 2013 Artists

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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LNY, Gaia, Nanook and RAE in Cleveland for Zoetic Walls

July 9, 2013 Artists

New stuff from Cleveland today gives us a look at a project in the Waterloo District called Zoetic Walls that includes Street Artists LNY, Nanook, RAE and Gaia.

“You are doing awesome stuff for our neighborhood – keep it up!” says Cleveland resident, Linda Zolten Wood on the Zoetic Walls Facebook page.

Organizer Nick Marzullo explains the new piece by Nanook that is firmly rooted in local history and politics.

“Nanook worked closely with the neighborhood on the development of his piece depicting a portrait of Carl Stokes, the former Cleveland Mayor and first Black mayor of any major city in US,” says Nick. Other symbols include the hand of city planning practitioner Norman Krumholz as he guides a car along a modernized highway system, something Krumholz is credited with bringing through the City of Cleveland.

LNY used a local hero of sorts ‘Doug’ as his model for this Atlas inspired piece. LNY. Zoetic Walls. Cleveland, Ohio. June 2013. (photo © Pawn Works Gallery)

Gaia’s barbershop pieces came out great and Mike from the barbershop is pretty psyched for the facelift in an old-skool airbrush style. Now if they can just fix that canopy, the 10th anniversary of Mike n Syd’s will be officially slammin’!

Special thanks to Pawn Works for sharing these images with BSA readers.

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Images of the Week 12.02.12

December 2, 2012 Artists

As you know, this is the last month in human history so it’s been great knowing you. Hold still, let me memorize you.

Here’s our weekly interview with the street, this week featuring Anthony Sneed, Bast, Cavite, Con, Cost, Curtis, Dceve, Defs, Esma, Eyez, Faile FKDL, Gaia, Miyok, Nanook, New Chalk City, Obey, Peat Wolleager, Phooey, Read, and Wing.

From left to right; FKDL, Cost, Faile, Bast, Judith Supine and Anthony Sneed on an overnight installation for a special project. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

From left to right: Anthony Sneed, Faile, OBEY, Judith Supine, Faile on an overnight installation for a special project. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Space Shuttle Enterprise on a final fly over NYC shown here catching a piggy ride above The Statue of Liberty in April of this year. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Esma, Con, Dceve and Curtis on the top. Photo taken after hurricane Sandy brought down fences on empty lots. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“The cycle of neoliberalism is broken when in 2002 Ghelco was occupied by its employees during the Argentine financial crisis. The last chain link hand floats voting on the other side of the composition. There are 41 Ice cream cones for each worker in the occupied factory. One hand voting represents the democratic decision making process of the cooperatively run ice cream plant” -GAIA

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