All posts tagged: Niels Shoe Meulman

BSA Images Of The Week: 09.24.23

BSA Images Of The Week: 09.24.23

Welcome to BSA Images of the Week!

It’s no joke, this feeling of connectedness across cities and time zones that the street art and graffiti scene encourages – and often, it all overlaps in NYC, yo! This week, we have Martin Whatson and Hama Woods from Norway on the wall in New York, and it was a pleasure to see them both. It’s another honor to see Niels “Shoe” Meulman in the hood for only a minute, but long enough to see his new wall in Bushwick go up! We’ve been very lucky over these last 15 years to meet so many great people and talents worldwide, making streets in new cities seem like home because we see the work of friends and acquaintances wherever we are exploring. This week we have shots of New York and LA mixed together – enjoy the show!

Here is our weekly interview with the street: this week featuring Adam Fujita, Martin Whatson, Adam Fu, Niels ‘Shoe’ Meulman, Solus, Danielle Mastrion, Optimo NYC, Hama Woods, Cody James, BK Sckler, Toe Flop, Hiero Veiga, Hydrane, Notice, Jayo V, Alexali Gonzales, TBanbox, and Fenji93.

Hama Woods (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Hama Woods (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Niels Shoe Meulman with The Bushwick Collective. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Niels Shoe Meulman with The Bushwick Collective. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Martin Whatson (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Cody James NY (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Adam Fujita (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Unidentifed artist in Los Angeles. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Hiero Veiga references a decade since the release of The Weekend album that may have changed his trajectory. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Hiero Veiga. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Optimo makes his takeovers attractive and balanced compositionally, encouraging participants to fall in line. Optimo NYC (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Voluminized Hydrane (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Yes, I did. Notice (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Unidentified artist in Los Angeles. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Toe Flop (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Solus (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Jayo V (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Ah, the diamond life. Alexali Gonzalez tributes singer Sade in Los Angeles. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
TBanbox (photo © Jaime Rojo)
KIR (photo © Jaime Rojo)
BK Ackler (photo © Jaime Rojo)
A long distance romance perhaps? Fenji93 (photo © Jaime Rojo)
The Beastie Boys have their newly minted square in NYC and Daniele Mastrion was on hand to paint a tribute mural to the famed band – with a conversion of the garbage receptacle adding a third dimension to their sound system. The wall references Paul’s Boutique as well. Stay tuned next month for a massive new Beastie Boys tribute on a NYC wall by a name you know very well! (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Beastie Boys Square, and the all-seeing cameras gradually introduced across New York with very little comment, NYC. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Memorial to BLVCK DA DON in The Lower East Side. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Read more
BSA Film Friday: 04.07.23

BSA Film Friday: 04.07.23

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is BSA-Film-Friday-2021-900.gif

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

Now screening:
1. Damien Hirst – The Beautiful Paintings

2. SHOE – UNMOVEMENT

3. TCK – STEEL DIVISION – THE VIDEO (BERLIN) Via I Love Graffiti

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is BSA-Special-Feature-Static-900.jpg

BSA Special Feature: Damien Hirst – The Beautiful Paintings

Yes, of course, you could make art like this, in fact, it looks like you do the lion’s share of creating this one online and he signs the print – but that is not the point of this video here today. Damien Hirst has a corner on branding and selling that many do not, and he has been commercially successful at it. From our perspective, if an artist wants to live on their creative work, all lessons are welcome!

Damien Hirst – The Beautiful Paintings. Or a master lesson on selling art.


SHOE – UNMOVEMENT

Careful when you slam on the breaks here, SHOE is driving the painting process, and it is terrain yet unmapped. This promotional video for UNMOVEMENT at the Curators Room is a solo exhibition by SHOE featuring his most recent body of work.

As explained by the artist, “The title ‘unmovement’ is inspired by the ever-present dichotomy of movement and stillness. While the painted surface of a work is a still object, the particles of the paint are constantly moving, as well as the material quality of the canvas itself: time consumes, and transforms. The crystallization of an impression is, however, present in the here and now, prompting a question concerning the nature of time and, inevitably, of change.”

Click HERE to read about UNMOVEMENT on BSA

Video by: Sander Lanen
Music by MAYO

SHOE
UNMOVEMENT
(Curated by Gabriel Rolt for The Curators Room)

7 April – 27 May, 2023

Location:
The Curators Room – Art Chapel Amsterdam
Prinses Irenestraat 19
AMSTERDAM


TCK – STEEL DIVISION – THE VIDEO (BERLIN) Via I Love Graffiti

This movie by the TCK CREW from Berlin was available by the end of 2022 for a very short time, a limited quantity of 100 pieces, and was sold out as quickly as it came.

Now it’s time to show you the full-length film here:

“From the underground to the top at last. A concentrated 35 minutes of TCK and their partners banging non-stop trains in your face. Mostly footage from 2011-2016 and a few more recent shots. No 4K, no drones, just trains. Berlin only.”

Enjoy!

Read more
Tread the Path Less Traveled: Shoe Creates “Unmovement” in Amsterdam

Tread the Path Less Traveled: Shoe Creates “Unmovement” in Amsterdam

Using a 1992 Buick Park Avenue as your painting utensil is completely normal in late capitalism. So is calling yourself Shoe.

In his latest exhibition, the graffiti writer and contemporary artist Niels Shoe Meulman takes us the extra mile inside his shiny blue “paintbrush,” crushing cans in the process, tracking patterns across the canvas in a smoothly violent kinetic joyride. Unlike other tools one uses to create paintings, this Buick is central to the show.

Did you guess that he would coin a term? The author of “Calligraffiti” may imagine that this automotive move into contemporary art will be adopted by other’s who want to write with a steering wheel. In promotion of this UNMOVEMENT, “the artist reached what he semi-ironically calls Carrigraffiti: signs, interventions, actual paintings created by using his car as a tool.”

Niels SHOE Meulman. ZERO KELVIN (MINUS 273 DEGREES CELSIUS). (photo courtesy of The Curators Room)

Can you imagine a branding collaboration with Formula 1 racers and, say Montana Colors, as curated by the driver at the head of the pack, Shoe? What would that track look like? And would it be contemporary art?

Sara van Bussel, the art curator, researcher, and writer based in Milan, tells us this work is of the moment. “If everything is the contrary of everything we find ourselves here,” she says, “in the midst of a still movement, a temporal interval in the constant transformation of matter, absorbing Shoe’s work as precisely what it is: the paradox of our time.”

Niels SHOE Meulman. ALL DISORDER DISAPPEARS. (photo courtesy of The Curators Room)

SHOE /// 2023

The Curators Room is proud to announce UNMOVEMENT, a solo exhibition by SHOE featuring his most recent body of work.

(in cooperation with Niels Shoe Meulman, Amsterdam and Gabriel Rolt, Barcelona)


Niels SHOE Meulman. NOTHING CAN BE COLDER. (photo courtesy of The Curators Room)
Niels SHOE Meulman. ON AND UNDER THE VULCANO. (photo courtesy of The Curators Room)
Niels SHOE Meulman. PERMANENTLY CLOSED. (photo courtesy of The Curators Room)
Niels SHOE Meulman. Process shot. (photo courtesy of The Curators Room)
Niels SHOE Meulman. Process shot. (photo courtesy of The Curators Room)

SHOE UNMOVEMENT(Curated by Gabriel Rolt for The Curators Room) Click HERE for additional information.
7  April  –  27 May,  2023 
🥂Opening:  Friday, 7 April, 17 – 21 hrs

Video by:
Sander Lanen
Live DJ set by:
Cristel Ball

Location: The Curators Room – Art Chapel AmsterdamPrinses Irenestraat 19 AMSTERDAM

Read more
Behind the Scenes at Beyond The Streets London / Recap

Behind the Scenes at Beyond The Streets London / Recap

Behind the scenes at “Beyond the Streets London” is a hive of activity, with artists deeply focused on installing their work and seeking assistance with tools and equipment. Curators, organizers, and lighting professionals are bustling up and down the stairs, carrying props, or ladders, and communicating with vendors and artists via text message. Salespeople are diligently crafting wall texts to accompany the art pieces. It’s a few hours before showtime, yet everything is somehow accomplished just as the first guests arrive for the preview.

According to our sources, this subway installation included actual wires and security cameras were “nicked”. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Photographer Martha Cooper is electrified by the activity at Saatchi Gallery. The event preserves the rich history of graffiti, street art, and commerce while pushing forward with new trends and directions. Cooper, who has documented this scene since the 1970s, has attended and exhibited in “Beyond the Streets” exhibitions in New York and Los Angeles – and we anticipate the next stop could be Shanghai. This particular iteration showcases an evolving mix of archetypes and invention, drawing on diverse influences from the US, UK, and EU.

Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Cooper observed many surprising music references at the show. Rock icon Eric Clapton was at the opening admiring a photograph of text declaring him to be God while filmmaker, musician, and BBC radio host Don Letts had a personal collection of his memorabilia/ephemera on display. Ron West, designer of the “Duck Rock” boombox, also made a sudden appearance at the opening, allowing guests to pose with his creation. Among the standout pieces was a Bob Gruen photo of Malcolm McLaren holding that boombox in front of Keith Haring’s Houston Street wall, a masterpiece of intersectionality, if you will.

Overall, “Beyond the Streets London” offers a smorgasbord of colors, flavors, and influences that are difficult to encapsulate in one show. However, Gastman, the visionary, gives it a good try, with a respectful nod to the many artists who have shaped this worldwide people’s art movement. Enjoy these behind-the-scenes shots from Ms. Cooper.

AgnesB at Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Aiko doing the last minute touch-up. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Aiko. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
NYC’s CES, a leader in characters with a streamlined and aerodynamic ‘wildstyleʼ, Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Conor Harrington. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
SoCal Stecyk artist known for writing and photographs documenting surfing and skateboarding culture, CR StecyK. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
CR StecyK. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
OG Daze extends the space of this subway car. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Don Letts looking at an installation of items from his personal collection. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Don Letts and BTS mastermind Roger Gastman. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
DRAX. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Martha’s famous Dondi photograph shows up in the most surprising places. Martha Cooper. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Lawrence Watson with his iconic shot of Chuck D and Flavor Flav of Public Enemy. His other well known photos include Jam Master Jay, DMC, Rev Run, Chuck D, Flavor Flav and “Cool” James Todd Smith. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Clapton. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Clapton with Shepard Fairey. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Escif. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Espo. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Fab5 Freddy with his painting based on Martha Cooper’s photo of his soup can car. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Futura standing before his large stage backdrop created during the Radio Clash tour at the Lyceum Ballroom, London (1981). Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Futura with a mystery friend. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
HAZE in front of his new piece. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Henry Chalfant’s wall of train car sides was massive. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Husk Mit Navn. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Janette Beckman has helped you make selections with her red marker. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
John Ahearn in front of a poster for the seminal movie he directed. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Kenny Scharf points the way at Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Kenny Scharf. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Roger Gastman with old school graffiti writer “Pride”. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Ron West, creator of the original Duck Rock boombox. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
A guest posing with Ron West’s boom box. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Mode2 prepping his canvas. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Shepard Fairey wheat pasting his iconic Obey image of Andre the Giant. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Paul Insect. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Niels Shoe Meulman. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Installation of Toby Mott’s huge collection of punk ephemera (Mott not pictured). Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Vhils outside next to his sculpture for Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Vhils’ crew is pasting layers of posters on stairway in preparation for carving, which came later. Vhils. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
OG Zephyr in his clean wildstyle. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)
Shepard Fairey, Fab Five Freddy, Charlie Ahearn, Roger Gastman, and Janette Beckman. Beyond The Streets – London. Saatchi Gallery. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Beyond The Streets – London. Click HERE for more details, the schedule of events, tickets, and exhibition times.

Read more
Niels “Shoe” Meulman Reminisces, Shows New Work at Beyond The Streets in London

Niels “Shoe” Meulman Reminisces, Shows New Work at Beyond The Streets in London

Calligraffiti pioneer Niels “Shoe” Meulman tells us that he’s been having a great time during the opening of Beyond the Streets in London, where he is showing some new work that meditates on his path and represents this moment in his evolution. The unruly and elegant Dutch contemporary artist, designer, and calligrapher says that seeing his peers and heroes in person and on display in the exhibition reminds him of why he fell in love with graffiti in the 1980s.

Niels Shoe Meulman. Beyond The Streets – London. (photo © Janette Beckman)

Now principally a painter, Shoe continues in calligraphy and design and even teaches, but to get him excited here at the opening, show him what appears to be a precise replica of the “Duck Rock” boombox carried by Malcolm McLaren in front of Keith Harings’ wall on Houston Street in the 80s. Featured on the album cover of the same name in 1983, the artwork was designed by style writing master Dondi and designer Nick Egan against a backdrop by Haring. It’s a perfect nexus point for this prominent figure in the world of urban art and design – a point he doubles down on by rolling up his shirt sleeve to show you his bicep tattooed with a wild-styled “Duck Rock.”

Niels Shoe Meulman. Installation Process. Beyond The Streets – London. (photo © Niels Shoe Meulman)

We asked Shoe to tell us about his three-year triptych presented here at Beyond the Streets in London’s Saatchi Gallery, and he took us on a trip through his own memories and experiences to arrive at this moment.

“As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be an artist. Even though I didn’t see graffiti as an art form in the beginning. I mean, all the kids were writing some kind of sobriquet in 1980’s Amsterdam and –apart from Dr. Rat (1960-1981) and friends– there wasn’t much artistic going on. Until I saw what they were doing on New York subway cars, and later in museums and galleries. 

Niels Shoe Meulman. Detail. Beyond The Streets – London. (photo © Niels Shoe Meulman)

When Dondi (1961-1998) and I were hanging out in Amsterdam in 1984, I proudly told him, my mentor, that I was going to drop out of school to study graphic art. There, I was just in time to learn many obsolete graphic techniques. One of them was metal typesetting (letterpress) with its typical case; a big, undeep wooden drawer with compartments for each glyph of the alphabet, cast in lead. Every size would have been cut by hand, in reverse. It was real easy to mix up the d, b, q and p.

Ever since those early days of writing graffiti, I always felt that what we were doing was part of something much bigger. Something old and dirty, as Ol’ Dirty Bastard (1968-2004) would later tell us. Maybe it was because of the teachings of my other mentor, the iconoclast Rammellzee (1960-2010) who stated in his rhymes with Gregorian chants that what we were doing started in Medieval catacombs.

Niels Shoe Meulman. Details. Beyond The Streets – London. (photo © Niels Shoe Meulman)

Before Gutenberg invented his wood block printing press, which lead to this moveable type setting, books were being copied by hand by monks, who I see as the graffiti writers of their age. Just like us, they were traveling with books, comparing handstyles, driven by competition and togetherness. But of course writing itself is much older than that. The oldest cave drawings (mostly done by women, recent research shows) were the beginning of letters. The letter ‘A’ derives from the sound and drawing of an ox. Letters have figurative origins. Words are images. Writing is painting. 

I feel connected to all of this and very excited to see where writing culture will go in the future. Already so much has happened. For instance when I first named my work Calligraffiti in 2005, I never imagined that it would become the world wide art form it is now. And whether is was in caves, catacombs or the subway systems, the culture began under ground and is having a peek above ground. My piece for Beyond the Streets is about that.”

Niels Shoe Meulman. Beyond The Streets – London. (photo © Niels Shoe Meulman)
Niels Shoe Meulman. Beyond The Streets – London. (photo © Niels Shoe Meulman)


Artist: Niels Shoe Meulman
Title: WRITING IS PAINTING AND PRINTING

A triptych consisting of three pieces:

Title: THE INVENTION OF WRITING MARKS THE END OF PREHISTORY
year: 2021
medium: acrylic and ink on linen
size: ± 400 x 280 cm (± 13 x 9 feet)

Title: FROM PAINTING TO PRINTING AND BACK AGAIN
year: 2022
medium: acrylic and spray paint on ten stretched cotton canvases
size (total): ± 160 x 160 cm (± 63 x 63 inch)

Title: UNAMBIDEXTROUS LETTER R
year: 2023
medium: stone lithography print on handmade Japanese paper
size: ± 32 x 43 cm (± 12.5 x 17 inch)

Niels Shoe Meulman being photographed by Martha Cooper. Beyond The Streets – London (photo courtesy of Niels Shoe Meulman)
Niels Shoe Meulman and the original album cover for Malcolm McLaren’s 1982 Duck Rock, designed by Dondi and Nick Egan with artwork by Keith Haring. Beyond The Streets – London. (photo ©Ian Reid, courtesy of Niels Shoe Meulman)
Beyond The Streets – London. A photo from a notebook on display in the Young Lee vitrine who was Malcolm McLaren’s girlfriend for the last ten years of his life. (photo © Niels Shoe Meulman)
Beyond The Streets – London. A photo of a jersey on display in the Keith Haring vitrine. (photo © Niels Shoe Meulman)
Niels Shoe Meulman chatting with Daze and Fab Five Freddy (left) and with Daze again (right). Beyond The Streets – London. (photos courtesy of Niels Shoe Meulman)
Beyond The Streets – London. Catalog. (photo © Niels Shoe Meulman)

Beyond The Streets – London is open for the general public at Saatchi Gallery and tickets are available now for booking through saatchigallery.com/tickets

Read more
Niels Shoe Meulman: Thank You For Shopping Here

Niels Shoe Meulman: Thank You For Shopping Here

Graffitti. Calligraphy.

Both celebrate the power and expressive ability of the letterform and yet each appear as entirely separate pursuits. Uniting them requires understanding both very well, contemplating their friction, their possibilities, and a lot of negotiation.

Niels Show Meulman. BedStuy Art Residence. Brooklyn, NY. May 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Since 2007 Niels “Shoe” Meulman has been investigating, experimenting with, enraptured by this pursuit. From thousands of hand sketches in his black book to the full-body immersion techniques of creating across large walls and floors, using paint and brush by the gallon in premeditated/subconscious all-inclusive gestural choreographies. Shoe knows how to stay in the moment.

It’s this elevating together of disciplines that reveals their contrasts; awakening the inner conflicts and core strengths, parading them on view.

Niels Show Meulman. BedStuy Art Residence. Brooklyn, NY. May 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

He discovered the perfect transmutation here in Brooklyn. It was that night of art-making with Haze that was a turning point..

“We both decided to go to the art store and get a whole lot of tools and stuff and just started working to see what would come out,” he says as he glances out the 1st floor brownstone window at the pile of recycled cardboard in the tiny courtyard. 26 years as a writer from Amsterdam who had met his New York graffiti heroes like Dondi, Rammellzee, and Haring, Shoe had pursued a career in advertising, and was still in love with fonts and their power to communicate.

“Without a commission, without a brief,” he remembers. “And like that – my old passion, calligraphy, mixing with graffiti, just came out!”

Niels Show Meulman. BedStuy Art Residence. Brooklyn, NY. May 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Shoe says he created “calligraffiti” and he ran with it: developing a body of work around it, writing a book about it (Calligraffiti), collaborating with a growing number of artists who also had an affinity for the penmanship of an artful communication modality that spans centuries.

He has developed brushes, tools, techniques, opened a gallery in a garage (Unruly), covered surfaces from cars to museum walls, finished three more books (Painter, Abstract Vandalism and Shoe is my Middle name). It was as if he had finally decided at 40 that it was okay to be an artist, and he left advertising to dedicate himself fully to his craft.

“Because my dad is also an artist- maybe I was finding the right moment to be an artist,” he says as he shows you a stack of many papers from the art supply store, and he contemplates why he had hesitated for years. It’s not that he was concerned about competing with his father, but the stakes were high. Speaking of his father, he says, “I think he was thinking ‘if you’re going to be an artist you better be a successful one’ – because being a struggling artist – that’s the worst!”

Additionally, he thought that before he could call himself an artist, he should have something substantial to show. “It also felt like there was something more profound to it,” he says. “I always thought that to be an artist you have to have life experience and have some knowledge and purpose to bring to the table, you know?”

Niels Show Meulman. BedStuy Art Residence. Brooklyn, NY. May 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Whether wide tip, wide brush, or wide cap, the bending letters are cryptic and stern in their old-worldliness. Fluid and stilted, wild and ornate, gilded, in black, in iridescence, in silver and gold. The additional layers of ink burst violently with destructive force in the swipe, the slash, the bash. The splatters are sometimes built up like an aura that glows around the cavorting dark letters – as if bruised and pummeled, their damaged and moistened epidermis now sweating black blood, infusing the air with a miasma of industrial soot.

Niels Show Meulman. BedStuy Art Residence. Brooklyn, NY. May 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

With broad interests that delve into abstract, into wordplay, even poetry, this moment is the clarity in early morning fog on a quiet street in old BedStuy, now rumbling with the sweet sickness of gentrification. The residency that brings him here is so named to recall history and to look forward, offering a respite for many a visiting Street Artist.

“I didn’t really have a plan when I came here but, like many times, I come up with something on the plane like the day before – and of course it’s brewing in my head.”

Niels Show Meulman. BedStuy Art Residence. Brooklyn, NY. May 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

He points to a couple of handled black plastic shopping bags that he has tacked to the wall. With a capacity to recognize and understand his own emotions and the emotions of an era, he has connected to the pleasantry printed on them “Thank You for Shopping With Us!”. It’s not just the sentiment that captures the late 1970s design hand, for him, it’s the upbeat openness and lyrical bending of the letters and lines that attract him.

The letters are sweet like cherry lip-gloss on a rollerskater in hot pants in Central Park. Suddenly you are flipping through the pages of Eros, Fact, or Avant Garde, a relief of melodic line and sexual liberty.

Niels Show Meulman. BedStuy Art Residence. Brooklyn, NY. May 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“Thank you for shopping!” he exclaims like a fan. “That’s so New York for me; that’s exactly graffiti – that 70s Herb Lubalin look,” he says of a time when magazines were so head-over-heels in love with new type treatments that they might feature a 2-page spread of it entirely just for you to salivate over.

“It’s free,” he says, perhaps reflective of the liberal sway of social mores and the swinging romance that advertising had with the Baby Boomer’s ‘me’ generation of the seventies. It’s a phrase rooted in consumerism, cities were in the last throes of an ample middleclass America who had cash and credit to shop with.  That fact contrasted with the suffering of a bankrupt NYC – a spirit that inspired train writers as well, even if used as critique.

Niels Show Meulman. BedStuy Art Residence. Brooklyn, NY. May 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“I think the whole graffiti scene that started here had something to do with this sort of lettering,” he says. “It came from that freedom that you could see in advertising. The type design was so good.”

Niels Show Meulman. BedStuy Art Residence. Brooklyn, NY. May 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

For now, this month-long residency is a reprieve for Shoe, a time to examine and relax into the spring that gradually warms New York and brings rose blooms to the bush in the small front yard of this residential street. His new sketches from his black book contain pithy barbs, hidden meanings, pop-culture references, and life truisms drawn in what he might refer to as a monk-like manner.

“I’m not religious. I don’t follow any religion and I don’t meditate but I like this idea of knowledge and introspection,” he says. “This is where Chinese calligraphy comes in and you are reminded of the medieval monks and all kinds of calligraphers”.

Niels Show Meulman. BedStuy Art Residence. Brooklyn, NY. May 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

A congenial host, Shoe shows us walls full of new pieces, individual words or phrases on a large variety of papers, textures, and stocks. He describes his inks with as much enthusiasm as his personal relationships, which are sometimes as tumultuous as the intense splashes of midnight here. You can see there is definitely work being done.

“That knowledge comes from that kind of introspection. The influence of Japanese and Chinese calligraphy comes in because at that time if you were by yourself writing…. Those monks either wanted to be enlightened or were enlightened in some way; it’s a search,” he says.

“This is where I am.”

Niels Show Meulman. BedStuy Art Residence. Brooklyn, NY. May 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Niels Show Meulman. BedStuy Art Residence. Brooklyn, NY. May 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Niels Show Meulman. BedStuy Art Residence. Brooklyn, NY. May 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Niels Show Meulman. BedStuy Art Residence. Brooklyn, NY. May 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)
Niels Show Meulman. BedStuy Art Residence. Brooklyn, NY. May 2019. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

To learn more about the BedStuy Art Residency, please go HERE.

Read more
BSA Images Of The Week: 06.17.18: The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018

BSA Images Of The Week: 06.17.18: The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018

BSA-Images-Week-Jan2015

Bushwick is in the mix this week as the new murals made to augment the collection for this years Bushwick Collective Block Party brought more persons and personality to the streets here. As murals are ruling this moment in the Street Art scene, today for your edification, this is how its looking out here.

Here’s our weekly interview with the streets, this week featuring Bert, BK Foxx, Cabaio Spirito, Franck Duval, Golden 305, Hops1, Jeff Henriquez, Li-Hill, Loomit, Michel Velt, Mr. Hydee, Mr. June, Niels Shoe Meulman, Reme821, Ruben Ubiera, Sipros, Skewville, and Solus.

Top image: A new Biggie by Sipros for The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Sipros. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Niels Shoe Meulman. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

BK Foxx. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Li-Hill. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Ruben Ubiera. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Skewville. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Skewville. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Skewville. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Reme821. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Cabaio Spirito. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Cabaio Spirito. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Solus. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jeff Henriquez. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jeff Henriquez. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Golden 305 (with the work of Celso “Work” on top from a previous edition). The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Michel Velt. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Hops1. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Hops1. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Hops1. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Loomit . Bert. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Loomit . Bert. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Franck Duval. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mr. Hydee. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mr. June. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mr. June. The Bushwick Collective Edition 2018. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Read more
“Beyond The Streets” Exhibition : Gastman’s Train Pulls In to LA

“Beyond The Streets” Exhibition : Gastman’s Train Pulls In to LA

A steel-wheeled graffiti train with Roger Gastman at the controls roars into LA’s Chinatown for a two-month stay at this station, a 40,000 square foot warehouse that houses “Beyond the Streets.” Originating at the streets and train yards of the 1960s and 70s, this express survey carries with it 100 or so artists and writers from across the last five decades as practitioners of graffiti, Street Art, and mural painting. Somehow, everyone gets represented.

Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Opening night featured many of the names associated with its earliest beginnings of the New York /Philadelphia graffiti scene like Cornbread, Taki183, Futura, Lady Pink, filmmaker Charlie Ahearn, among many others, including photographer Martha Cooper, who in addition to being an artist in the show, shares these photos with BSA readers. She also extensively shares her photos for the accompanying show catalog,  providing documentation from the scene that exist nowhere else.

Retna. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

A diverse and almost overwhelming series of displays present the works in a way that can only hint at the thousands of artists who built this story, necessarily viewed through a wide lens: sculpture, photography, installations, and multi-media all join the canvasses and ephemera and Gastman’s collection of vintage paint cans. Smartly planned for the selfie generation, large pieces are presented almost as backdrop ready to be Instagrammed; a direction coming from the “Photos Encouraged” sign that is next to the wall covered with Retna’s original alphabet near the entrance.

Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Somewhat of a rejoinder to Art in the Streets, the eponymous graffiti and Street Art exhibition in 2011 at LA MoCA, Beyond the Streets takes a focused look at the multitudinous peoples’ art movement from the perspective of one of that first shows’ original curators, Roger Gastman. When arranging the two month exhibition that closes July 6th, Gastman says that his focus was to celebrate those with street cred, in terms of individual practice, and to combine that requirement with a respectable semblance of a studio practice.

Ultimately he looked for artists who have used their particular approach to expand the definition of art in the streets in some way. That definition by now has become quite wide and it’s also a tall order for any curator to find the common themes here and present them in a cohesive manner.

Beyond The Streets, compiled by Roger Gastman.

Both the accompanying catalog and exhibition take a welcome stance toward educating the audience in many ways, helping the viewer to decode this freewheeling graffiti and mark-making history with basic vocabulary terms, historical events, pop culture inflexion points and examination of tools of the trade all adding context. Catalog essays and interviews are incisive and enlightening, including wit, sarcasm and even the occasional admonishment – notably in the essay by author, filmmaker, and curator Sacha Jenkins, who has been documenting the graffiti scene for a least a couple of decades.

Studying the move of some artists from street practice to commercial gallery that began in earnest with early NYC train writers transitioning to canvasses in the early 1980s, Jenkins upbraids a disgruntled faction among old-school graffiti writers who he characterizes as perhaps intransigent in their stylistic evolution and unwilling to adapt with the game. Later in his essay he lambasts the overtly pleasant and narcissistic cultural newcomers who he sees as milk-toasting the scene with their adoration of pretty murals and shallow sentiments, obtusely ushering in gentrification and “leading up to hearing about how my mother’s building is going to get bulldozed for a hip residential building that has a hot tub in every apartment.” He also may be the only writer here so openly addressing race and class distinctions present during the evolution of the scene and now.

Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

The selection of artists and writers in the book and exhibition, many of them friends and colleagues with whom Gastman has worked with in the past, offers a rewarding and accessible panoply of styles and views. With some study the visitor understands connections in a widely dispersed multi-player subculture that coalesced and continuously changed its shape and character. But even if they don’t, they still get an amazing amount of eye candy.

The catalog offers extensive sections like those devoted to The History of Spraypaint and Graffiti in Galleries, and offers petite exegesis on influencing factors and benchmarks that shaped the art form’s route like Mobile DJs, The ’77 NYC Blackout, the European graffiti scene and graffiti’s role in gang culture, hip-hop and hardcore music. The compilation aids and supports the fullness of a story that frankly requires many voices to tell it. Gastman even gives forum and exhibition space to activist and defiant guerilla gardener Ron Finley and the holistic urban horticultural oases that he creates in South Central LA, calling it his form of graffiti in empty lots of the city.

Martha Cooper with Taki 183. Beyond The Streets. (photo courtesy of Martha Cooper)

With insightful interviews of artists in the exhibition from talented writers like Caleb Neelon, Caroline Ryder, John Lewis, Alec Banks, Evan Pricco, John Albert, Shelly Leopold, and Gastman himself, there are enough colorful anecdotes and decisive signposts en route to help tell the stories of the artists and their individual approaches to the street.

“The artists do not share a singular style, since they are primarily united by a common element of their personal biographies – the fact that they once made their art in the streets,” says self-described novice to the Street Art / graffiti world, Adam Lerner, the Director and Chief Animator at the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver. “There are, however some threads that run through the works.”

Beyond the Streets will help visitors find some of those threads for themselves and undoubtedly they will forge their own interpretation of art in the streets.

Faile. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Invader. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Slick. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Takashi Murakami with Madsaki, Snipel, Tenga One and Onesker. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Lady Pink. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Charlie Ahearn . Futura . Lady Pink. Crash. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Mr. Cartoon. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Futura. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Futura takes a photo of Haze’s art work. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Niels Shoe Meulman. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Ron Finley’s Gansta Gardener installation. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Corn Bread. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Corn Bread. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

 

Crash . Daze. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Katsu. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Bill Barminski. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Faith XLVII. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Shepard Fairey. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Jenny Holzer, Flashlight (In Collaboration With A-One). Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Blade. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Aiko. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Al Diaz. Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)

Barry Magee. Beyond The Streets. (photo and video below © Martha Cooper)

 

Beyond The Streets. (photo © Martha Cooper)


For more information please visit https://www.beyondthestreets.com/

Read more
Top 15 Videos on BSA Film Friday From 2017

Top 15 Videos on BSA Film Friday From 2017

Every Friday we invite you to stop by and take a look at new videos that have been submitted or recommended or that we tripped over walking by the railroad tracks. This year we showed you about 250 of them.

We call it BSA Film Friday and it travels with us to cities around the world now when we do it LIVE with you and other audience members in theaters and lecture halls and museums. The beauty of the video/film form is you can get a full story quickly, and you are often surprised by how transformative it can be. You can also see how many people are affected by urban and street culture through these films – we see people’s eyes light up when they realize that they too can create in public space, that the world is not simply a product but is a piece of art that many of their peers are now jumping in to co-create.

As a collection, these 15 are illuminating, elevating, riveting, strange, soaring, and achingly beautifully normal. From looking at the Separation Wall and Banksy to a travelling crew of graffiti writers on farms in Polish pig country to the amazing dance troupe who interpreted the 5 floors of art installations in a downtown Berlin former bank, you have before you a massive buffet of a visual feast.

The final desert is hand-held phone video caught in the moment last month in Mexico City. We didn’t know Keith Haring was coming down the tracks to surprise us, and we didn’t know that this unpolished jewel would garner thousands of viewers and commenters – effectively placing this little piece of video at number 1 for its popularity. Maybe the fact that it is so raw is what people relate to – along with an ongoing adulation for Haring.

We hope you can take some time to enjoy some of the best Street Art videos from around the world and on BSA this year.


No. 15
Faith XLVII / Aqua Regalia Hong Kong

From BSA Film Friday 05.19.17

“Distant universes delicately tangled,” says the near-whispering narration as you are gazing upon scenes from Hong Kong – those interstitial moments that carry you between the more remarkable ones. Faith XLVII gives us a quiet look at these inside a the dencse cacophony called “Aqua Regalia”, looking at the parts of a culture that a visitor is sensitive to because they are not taken for granted. With this ability to see, one takes a quick course of a city, a society. Invariably you end up with more questions.

“We speak of death and birth in terms of celebration and mourning.” Faith XLVII is in search of more universal truths, the timeless ones, since we understand them so poorly. Herein are glimpses, romantic and unvarnished.

“This is one of the first videos I’ve co-directed, alongside filmmaker Dane Dodds,” Faith tells us. “Its a project that is close to my heart.”

No. 14
Gonzalo Borondo / Cenere

From BSA Film Friday 08.11.17

Borondo keeps it open for you. He provides the stage, the staging area, the proscenium, the altar, the emanating light, the associations and memories you have with your belief system, or lack of one. During his artist residency with Pubblica, curated by Carlo Vignapiano and Elena Nicolini in May, the Street Artist (among other things) creates a journey as much as a destination in this intimate chapel. The video by Gerdi Petanaj captures this and perhaps a little more.

 

No. 13
The Haus / Lunatix Dance

From BSA Film Friday 04.07.17

From the moment it opened on April 1st, the Haus was a hit! BSA was very lucky to be there in February for a full tour while still in development in Berlin, nearly dancing ourselves through all five floors of this former bank with full scale installations in places that once held offices, conference rooms, employee coffee lounges.

By inviting Creative Director/dancer Serdar Bogatin and the film crew “Shuto Crew” into the space with members of the Lunatix Dance Production troupe, these spaces and art environments come completely alive, invoking stories and dramas – clearly making the spaces into elaborate set-design pieces.

 

No. 12
Ella & Pitr / Frappés PinPins

From BSA Film Friday 05.05.17

The French duo Ella + Pitr here revel in the simplicity of the gestural act of a full-body full-bucket splash of black paint.

Carnal, visceral, overlaid with psychographical information, the motion of splashing inky pigment across a white quadrilateral is an act of defiance and a release of the inner chaos – instantly recognizable as chaos elsewhere in the world.

The uncontrollable quality, especially when purveyed within an atmosphere of prim control, provokes amplified emotions in some. Fear, liberation, rage, release. Which ones will you experience?

 

No. 11
Indecline/ Rail Beast

From BSA Film Friday 10.20.17

“This reminds why I hate vandals! All this does is create more unnecessary work for the guys at the paint shop,” says a commenter on the Vimeo page where INDECLINE has posted this locomotive takeover.

You see kids, this is why we can’t have nice things. I just mopped this floor and you come running in here with your muddy boots! For Pete’s sake.

Truthfully, this decidedly unpolitical piece is a surprise coming from INDECLINE. Guess they were taking the day off from railing against hypocrisy and injustice with this animated train that recalls Saturday morning cartoons like Bugs Bunny and the Road Runner.

 

No. 10
Olek / In the Blink of an Eye

From BSA Film Friday 01.13.17

“It is one thing to read about the events in those parts of the world, but it is something totally different to actually look in the eyes of the women who lost everything while running from the war,” says artist Olek about how her world view changed when crocheting the project featured this week.

While gathering and producing materials for her installation with Verket Museum in Avesta, Sweden, the Brooklyn based Street Artist was holding informal crochet workshops with volunteers who would be producing the decorative yarn skin that covered every single item inside and outside of the house with their handmade crochet stitches.

Some invited guests were refugees who had escaped war in Syria and Ukraine and the artist and local folks shared stories and crocheted, sewed, and prepared the art materials together over the course of a number of days. It was during these exchanges of personal stories that, “a conversation started that has changed me forever,” she says – and she immediately needed to reflect it in her project with the museum.

 

No. 09
Sebastian Purfürst – Soniconoclasm / Broken Motor

From BSA Film Friday 06.02.17

In Berlin recently we met a photographer/media artist/musician who showed us a music video he just made of regular people whom you might meet on the city streets at night. This spring he asked more than 25 of them to recite phrases and “cut-up of army radio slang phrases” and by splicing them together with his band mate’s recitation of the lyrics synched to their lips, the rawness and rage and disconnected connectedness of people whom you can meet on the street rang true. “

This unvarnished quality bypasses the styled self-awareness of a lot of commercial media, and the anger actually comes across as fear. Perhaps you’ll think its too dark in demeanor – but then suddenly the melding together of the faces into one common entity makes it magic, even transcendent – revealing a simple sameness of everyone.

“This suspenseful individuality of the people is almost completely dissolved in the chorus,” says Sebastian Purfürst of his video with bandmate Markus F.C.Buhl.

Together they are called SONICONOCLASM.

 

No. 08
Pixel Pancho/ UN – Berlin

From BSA Film Friday 09.22.17

Pixel’s original installation was nixed by the city at the last moment but that didn’t prevent the Italian Street Artist from rallying to find another solution!

This new installation in the back courtyard was conceived of, designed, and constructed over a period of 4 days last week and became the secret surprise behind the museum for those who wandered there. Using landscaping techniques and botanical knowledge that come naturally from his farm in Italy, the artist create a mise en scène of epic impact with his robotic folk-futurist sculptures. Night time lighting took it to another world, but you can see the details better here in this short video Jaime Rojo shot on site.

 

No. 07
FifthWall TV / Occupied in Bethlehem – A visit to BANKSY’s “Walled Off Hotel”

From BSA Film Friday 06.16.17

“It’s almost become a playground for people to come to,” says your host Doug Gille as he looks at the section of the Separation Wall that the Banksy “Walled Off” Hotel is installed upon. “I think it is so crucial for people not to just come to see the wall or to paint on the wall,” he says.

“50 years under military control makes it the longest occupation in history,” is a quote that Gillen brandishes across the screen from the United Nations. The fact that Banksy is using his art star power to keep this on the front burner says a lot about the man.

“I think a lot of these people feel like we are forgetting about them and we have to remind them that we’re not,” says Gillen as he soul searches next to the Dead Sea.

 

No. 06
Various & Gould / City Skins – Marx und Engels

From BSA Film Friday 07.14.17

Conceptual Street Artists often perform interventions without explanation, satisfied with their own observations of the outcome. For Berlians Various & Gould the process has more often included the participation of the public – a way for more to take ownership and inspire dialogue. Sometimes many dialogues.

You may have seen our piece on their most recent public project called “City Skins”: Marx and Engels Statues Re-Skinned & Re-Located : Various & Gould.  Here is a mini-documentary that shows you the artists, the process, and the thinking behind the process.

 

No. 05
Rurales

From BSA Film Friday 01.27.17

Now to the Polish pig farms! Another Street Art/Mural road trip movie, this time across Poland with JAYPOP, Seikon, Krik KONG and filmmaker Cuba Goździewicz. See the discoveries, the relationships, the reactions to the work from a warm and considered human perspective.

The beauty of randomness and the randomness of beauty. These guys are fully engaged with their surroundings, the opportunity, the myriad people they befriend or portend to make allies. It’s an uncharted trip where permissions are sought and often refused, but they never stop painting somehow.

 

No. 04
Swoon/ Fearless

From BSA Film Friday 10.13.17

Using existing and new footage of Street Artist Swoon and selected interviews with people in her orbit, director Fredric King presents and hour long documentary that looks over two decades of art making. The stories told and the insights that Calendonia Curry aka Swoon presents while en route to her next adventure illustrate the fluidity with which she pursues the creative spirit, whether on the street, on a vessel down a river, or installing in a museum. An integrated explorer, Swoon brings you into the fold to go on this journey that always feels like its just begun.

No. 03
Fin DAC/ Rooftop in San Francisco

From BSA Film Friday 08.25.17

On an expansive rooftop in rainy/sunny/rainy San Francisco, Street Artist Fin Dac brings to life ‘Shukumei’, an ebullient and mysterious muse. The film is largely a stop motion record of the work set to music, but did you notice how much dexterity and effort goes into this precision play when you are working at this angle, basically painting the floor? The remarkable integration of the glowing skylight orb, dramatically revealed, imparts the figure a mystical dimension as well.

Video editing by Tonic Media, Soundtrack by Mombassa/Lovechild, and shout out to Ian and Danielle at Rocha Art and Missy Marisa, model.

 

No. 02
Niels Shoe Meulman In Magic City / The Art Of The Street

From BSA Film Friday 12.01.17

Niels Shoe Meulman spent some nights in a Munich jail thirty years ago for mucking about on the walls. This year he was paid to do it in Munich for Magic City, the travelling morphing exhibition (now in Stockholm) where Street Art is celebrated along with all its tributaries – including a film program and a number of photographs by your friends here at BSA.

Born, raised and based in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, Shoe shares here his new improvisational piece and some of his reflections on his process and his evolution from being in advertising as an art/creative director and reclaiming his soul as a graffiti/Street Art/fine artist. As ever, Martha is in the frame, putting him in the frame.

No. 01
Keith Haring- Rough Cut / Mexico City Metro

This rough cut lil’ video reached more than 300K individuals and had 100K views with thousands of shares on FB and on Instagram with dozens of comments and high engagement was easily propelled to the #1 spot.

From BSA Film Friday 12.01.17

It all took us by surprise last week in Mexico City when suddenly a whole train covered on both sides with Keith Haring’s work approached while we were waiting at the platform to catch the Linea 2 of the Metro. He made his name in part by illegally doing drawings like these in NYC subways and here now they are crushing a whole train. The name of the project is “Ser Humano. Ser Urbano” or “Being Human. Being Urban” and it aims to promote human values and human rights. The pattern you see is from “Sin Titulo (Tokyo Fabric Design)” – now stretched across these whole cars, if you will.

The train itself is inexplicably having brake troubles, so we get some jerky spur-of-the-moment footage but all week on Instagram and Facebook we’ve received tons of comments from people reacting to this little bit of Keith video by Jaime Rojo on BSA.

 

Read more
BSA HOT LIST: Books For Your Gift Giving 2017

BSA HOT LIST: Books For Your Gift Giving 2017

Documenting the Street Art scene has always been important to BSA and we know it is important to many of our readers as well. This year BSA brought you a number of reviews of Street Art related books that we have run across during the year. It’s not an exhaustive list but now that it is Christmas / Hannukah / Kwaanza / Solstice / New Year time we thought you would like our brief roundup of some of the best books of 2017. Enjoy!


“Street Art World”, Alison Young.

From BSA:

Alison Young Examines and Presents the “Street Art World”

Contested space is a term accurately describing the Street Artists’ relationship with the world outside your door; a place where the aesthetics are up for grabs, autonomously determined, willfully exploited.

Drawing upon twenty years of empirical observation, scholarly study, and interviews with artists and experts throughout a constellation of cities where this art-making has flourished, “Street Art World” by Alison Young examines this contested space from every angle to present a balanced assessment for understanding our moment.

A professor of criminology at University of Melbourne, Young delivers her fourth volume on the topic of Street Art with a confidence and unique perspective that few can claim thanks to extensive travel and periodic, repeated and ongoing tracking of an evolving family of practice.

Alison Young Street Art World was published by Reaktion Books Ltd. London, UK. 2016. Click HERE for more about this book.

______________________

“Shoe Is My Middle Name”, Niels Shoe Meulman

From BSA:

“Shoe” is His Middle Name: New Book by Niels Shoe Meulman

Carlo McCormick writes in his essay, “We honor Shoe as the great cross-pollinator who came to New York City as a kid to meet the graffiti master Dondi and brought Wild Style back to Europe, but his strength remains just how far he can still can carry this immoderate load.” Based on his path and his evolution, we’ll consider this beautiful monster to be in a mid-career retrospective and some of his most masterful work is yet to come.

Niels Shoe Meulman “Shoe Is My Middle Name” was published by Lebowski Publishers / Overamstel. Amsterdam, 2016. Click HERE for more about this book.

______________________

“Time Traveller Artist Man”, Giacomo Bufarini AKA RUN

From BSA:

RUN: “Time Traveller Artist Man” Tells All With His Hands

The founder of analytical psychology would have looked at the hands of RUN and perhaps understood more about his lifelong psychological process than the average intellect, and yet seeing RUN’s carefully formed people on the street captivates your imagination as well.

These are the dreams he creates with his expressive hands, conscious or unconscious features that over time have developed into archetypes to be combined, adorned, alone, and recombined. Not surprisingly, his people often have a grasp, a hold, a flair for the five fingered gesture as well.

RUN Time Traveller Artist Man is published by Unicorn Publishing Group. London, UK. 2016. Click HERE for more about this book.

______________________

“Street Art”, Ed Bartlett

From BSA:

“Street Art” by Ed Bartlett: A Quick Primer for the World Traveler

Since the early 70s Lonely Planet publishing has made guidebooks for travelers of the world, enabling people to gain a greater understanding and to appreciate localities, cultures, and histories. Ed Bartlett now adds to this vast compendium of understanding a concise and varied survey of Street Art from his vantage point as an avid bicyclist, traveler, and expert on Street Art.

Ed Bartlett’s “Street Art” Was published by Lonely Planet Publishers. UK, April 2017.  Click HERE for more about this book.

______________________

“Happily Ever After”, Jeremy Fish

From BSA:

Jeremy Fish and “Happily Ever After”

It’s unusual to see his work in New York (or in this case New Jersey) since after leaving Upstate New York nearly two decades ago this fine artist/commercial illustrator has been dancing in the arms of San Francisco. You think we’re being poetic about his West Coast cred, but he literally illustrated 100 drawings in SF City Hall over 100 days, was awarded with his own “Jeremy Fish” day by the city, might have the record for the most shows at Upper Playground Gallery, and has even collaborated with a cannabis company to create a branded oil and vape pen.

Jeremy Fish “Happily Ever After: The Artwork of Jeremy Fish”. Click HERE for more about this book.

______________________

“The Art Of Writing Your Name”, Patrick Hartl & Christian Hundertmark

From BSA:

“The Art Of Writing Your Name” Expands Potential for Both Art & Writing

Born of many late night talks and collaborative painting sessions together, merging Christian’s abstract graphics and collage with Patrick’s calligraphy and tagging, the two slowly discovered a mutual collection of writers and artists whose work they both admired, a book slowly taking form in their minds. “Our late night sessions also implied long conversations about the evolution of Graffiti to Street Art to urban calligraphy,” the authors say in their preface.

The Art Of Writing Your Name: Contemporary Urban Calligraphy and Beyond by Patrick Hartl & Christian Hundertmark. Publikat Verlags – und Handels GmbH & Co. KG. Mainaschaff, Germany, 2017. Click HERE for more about this book.

______________________

“Saturday Mornings”, Jerkface

From BSA:

Jerkface: “Saturday Mornings” Deconstructed, Reconstructed, Repeated

A direct link to his childhood and the televised cartoons of Saturday morning, where the majority of cartoons were relegated to appear in the 1970s and 1980s, Street Artist Jerkface recreates and multiplies his associations of happy times full of adventure, mysteries easily solved, crimes categorically punished.

His new book “Saturday Morning” collects the recognizable works of other artists and removes the emotional expressions found in facial features, recombining their other characteristics and playing with their associated resonance.

Jerface “Saturday Morning”. Published by Over The Influence. December 2016. Click HERE for more about this book.

______________________

“Street Art In Sicilia”, Mauro Filippi, Marco Mondino & Luisa Tuttolomondo

From BSA:

“Street Art In Sicilia” Tours You Through 31 Cities and 200 Artists

A serious undertaking that documents 31 urban centers that vary widely in distinctive personality, more than two hundred artists are captured and carefully, succinctly described for a wide audience of tourists, Street Art fans, students, even academics. With three authors who collectively have studied architecture, semiotics, sociology and photography, you get a mapping that reveals not only physical location but a describes a cultural one as well.

Street Art in Sicilia – Guida ai luoghi e alle opere
Mauro Filippi, Marco Mondino, Luisa Tuttolomondo
Dario Flaccovio Editore, 2017. Click HERE for more about this book.

______________________

“Metamorphosis”, Tavar Zawacki

From BSA:

Tavar Zawacki: Being Fearless and “Metamorphosis” with Urban Spree

“The whole thing is a metaphor,” he says at one point when describing a particular piece, but you realize that the statement applies to the show as well. A metaphor for the evolutions that an artist must go through to keep alive; a recreation, a metamorphosis, however bold or subtle, that can push him or her into a new direction.

He sits on a window sill and pulls back the sleeve of his t-shirt to reveal a tattooed sleeve that moves from densely inked pattern to bare skin. The finespun graduated marking is repeated on the books’ cover, designed by Kelly Jewell.
“I’m really interested in gradients as well because it’s a slow transition – when you can see the tattoo and the cover of the book; it’s like with each circle, if you look at it compared to the neighboring one, you won’t see a big difference. But over time and with effort you can keep going forward, day by day.”

Tavar Zawacki. “Metamorphosis” Published by Urban Spree Gallery. Berlin. September 2017. Click HERE for more about this book.

______________________

 

Read more
“The Art Of Writing Your Name” Expands Potential for Both Art & Writing

“The Art Of Writing Your Name” Expands Potential for Both Art & Writing

Niels Shoe Meulman on the cover of The Art Of Writing Your Name by Patrick Hartl & Christian Hundertmark. Publikat Verlags. Mainaschaff, Germany, 2017.

“Writing”, as in the graffiti sense of the word, has become quite tastefully adventurous of late, as calligraffiti pushes and pulls it in height, dimension, finesse. Evolved from our first recorded history, the modern stylizing of the letter form is as fascinating and wild as it is domesticated, the mundanity of your particular tag now veritably swimming in many depths and swirling currents, weaving complex melodies, hitting notes previously unheard.

JonOne The Art Of Writing Your Name by Patrick Hartl & Christian Hundertmark. Publikat Verlags. Mainaschaff, Germany, 2017.

This was inevitable, now that you think of it, this organic and ornate practice of making your mark, and the freedom to explore it came from the street. Mark-making indeed. You can call it “The Art of Writing Your Name,” as have the authors/artists Christian Hundertmark and Patrick Hartl.

Born of many late night talks and collaborative painting sessions together, merging Christian’s abstract graphics and collage with Patrick’s calligraphy and tagging, the two slowly discovered a mutual collection of writers and artists whose work they both admired, a book slowly taking form in their minds. “Our late night sessions also implied long conversations about the evolution of Graffiti to Street Art to urban calligraphy,” the authors say in their preface.

Poesia The Art Of Writing Your Name by Patrick Hartl & Christian Hundertmark. Publikat Verlags. Mainaschaff, Germany, 2017.

Graff writers in the mid 90s Munich scene, both had developed their individual styles beyond the classic street vocabulary, now evermore interested in discovering new materials, forms, processes, influences. Just released this summer, this new collection confidently illustrates what until now may have been evident to only a few; the aesthetics of writing have expanded and permutated far beyond their own roots in graffiti, tattoo, traditional calligraphy.

“Every artist brings a different approach with their calligraphy artwork,” says perhaps the most prominent of the genre today, Niels Shoe Meulman, who blazed into the publishing world with his tome “Calligraffiti” in 2010 after bringing his practice to the street and gallery. “We all come from different experiences and have different things to say.”

SheOne The Art Of Writing Your Name by Patrick Hartl & Christian Hundertmark. Publikat Verlags. Mainaschaff, Germany, 2017.

Indeed the list here includes the literal interpretations to those so far dissembled as to appear purely abstract, the aerosoled, the inked, the drippy, the purely light, the monstrously brushed acrossed floors and rooftops, the molded and bent and aroused into sculpture. Here the letter form is stretched to its limits, far beyond its relevance as part of codified language, more so the malleable warm putty in the hands of the artist, molded and mounted and even mystifying in the service of energy, kineticism, emotion.

“I start with quite randomly placed fat cap tags on the white surface,” says German author/artist Hartl to describe his particular technique, “then I overpaint it like 80% with slightly transparent paint, tag the wall with markers, overpaint that layer again, then I do stickers and posters, rip parts off again, repeat all these steps again and again until I’m happy with the result.”

Said Dokins The Art Of Writing Your Name by Patrick Hartl & Christian Hundertmark. Publikat Verlags. Mainaschaff, Germany, 2017.

Without doubt many will find inspiration in these nearly 300 pages, these insightful interviews with artists like Stohead, Usugrow, Saber, Kryptic, Faust, Carlos Mare, L’Atlas, Lek & Sowat, Poesia, Tilt; the forward by Chaz Bojorquez, the singular, at times stunning, photos and supportive texts.

Made for “graffiti fanatics, hand lettering fans, street art junkies, calligraphy lovers, and type enthusiasts”, co-author Christian Hundertmark edited the respected “Art of Rebellion” series and he knows his audience and this slice of his culture. The 36 artists are not the only ones representing this evolution in calligraphy, but they are certainly some of the finest.

Lek & Sowat The Art Of Writing Your Name by Patrick Hartl & Christian Hundertmark. Publikat Verlags. Mainaschaff, Germany, 2017.

L’Atlas The Art Of Writing Your Name by Patrick Hartl & Christian Hundertmark. Publikat Verlags. Mainaschaff, Germany, 2017.

Tilt The Art Of Writing Your Name by Patrick Hartl & Christian Hundertmark. Publikat Verlags. Mainaschaff, Germany, 2017.

Carlos Mare The Art Of Writing Your Name by Patrick Hartl & Christian Hundertmark. Publikat Verlags. Mainaschaff, Germany, 2017.

Faust The Art Of Writing Your Name by Patrick Hartl & Christian Hundertmark. Publikat Verlags. Mainaschaff, Germany, 2017.


The Art Of Writing Your Name: Contemporary Urban Calligraphy and Beyond by Patrick Hartl & Christian Hundertmark. Publikat Verlags – und Handels GmbH & Co. KG. Mainaschaff, Germany, 2017.

Artists included are Chaz Bojorquez, JonOne, Niels Shoe Meulman, Poesia, Cryptik, SheOne, Said Dokins, Stohead, Usugrow, Patrick Hartl, Lek & Sowat, L’Atlas, Tanc, Mayonaize, Soklak, Mami, Tilt, Blaqk, Soemone, Jan Koke, Jun Inoue, Vincent Abdie Hafez / Zepha, Carlos Mare, Egs, Simon Silaidis, Faust, Luca Barcellona, Bisco Smith, Creepy Mouse, Defer, eL Seed, Rafael Sliks, Saber, Pokras Lampas.

Read more
“Shoe” is His Middle Name: New Book by Niels Shoe Meulman

“Shoe” is His Middle Name: New Book by Niels Shoe Meulman

“They both see words as images,” says Shoe about graffiti writers and Medieval scribes in a 2013 interview with the BBC. His latest tome extrapolates this reverence for the letterform, an obsessive repetitive family of gestures, now often abstracted, that the artist first stumbled upon as a pre-teen in the late 1970s.  Since those days he became known as graffiti artist, painter, designer, writer, calligrapher. Here is where it comes together.

Niels Shoe Meulman Shoe Is My Middle Name Lebowski Publishers, Amsterdam 2016.

“Shoe is My Middle Name” is the fourth publication by Niels Shoe Meulman and one that expands, amalgamates, solidifies his influences, mistakes, discoveries; forging a unique voice that is his own. Sometimes identified with Calligraffiti, but there is so much more to it; now the smudge and the smoke and the splatter has lead him in other directions, from supple and savvy wrist turning small scale to full-body massively immersive gestural painting.

Whether it is a push broom on a roof or a brush on mottled papyrus or the masterful swoop and turn of the squeegee, Shoe knows that there are no half steps once the liquefied pigment hits the surface. A commitment has been made.

Niels Shoe Meulman Shoe Is My Middle Name Lebowski Publishers, Amsterdam 2016.

A large coffee table book with a unifying cerulean wash / black two-tone pointillist screen motif throughout, the story of his many exploits is moderated with poetry and outtakes of reviews by or observations by the artist. In one descriptive passage about his work “The Secret Ingredient”, the Amsterdam lifer who has traveled the world says it required “a perfect mix of intuition, imagination, courage and madness.”

Carlo McCormick writes in his essay, “We honor Shoe as the great cross-pollinator who came to New York City as a kid to meet the graffiti master Dondi and brought Wild Style back to Europe, but his strength remains just how far he can still can carry this immoderate load.” Based on his path and his evolution, we’ll consider this beautiful monster to be in a mid-career retrospective and some of his most masterful work is yet to come.

Niels Shoe Meulman Shoe Is My Middle Name Lebowski Publishers, Amsterdam 2016.

“DID TUNNELS IN PARIS
THAT WALL IN BERLIN
DID ACID IN BROOKLYN
ALL WITHOUT SIN

DID ROOFTOPS IN LONDON
IN MUNICH SOME TIME
DID TRAMLINES AND STATIONS
NO LIFE WITHOUT CRIME

DID TRAINS IN THE BRONX
TAGS ON A PLANE
DID MURALS IN DELHI
ALL WITHOUT SHAME

DID LECTURES IN DUBLIN
GOT CHASED BY CHINESE
DID EXHIBITS DOWN UNDER
AND IN LOS ANGELES”

From “A Writer’s Song” by Niels Shoe Meulman

Niels Shoe Meulman Shoe Is My Middle Name Lebowski Publishers, Amsterdam 2016.

Niels Shoe Meulman Shoe Is My Middle Name Lebowski Publishers, Amsterdam 2016.

Niels Shoe Meulman Shoe Is My Middle Name Lebowski Publishers, Amsterdam 2016.

Niels Shoe Meulman Shoe Is My Middle Name Lebowski Publishers, Amsterdam 2016.

Niels Shoe Meulman Shoe Is My Middle Name Lebowski Publishers, Amsterdam 2016.

 

All photos of the book’s plates © Jaime Rojo


Niels Shoe Meulman “Shoe Is My Middle Name” is published by Lebowski Publishers / Overamstel. Amsterdam, 2016. Click HERE for more information.

Read more