All posts tagged: Sticker Maul

BSA Images Of The Week 11.06.24

November 3, 2024 Artists, BSA Images Of The Week

Welcome to BSA Images of the Week! Set your clocks back one hour today.

A chilly but warm NYC welcome to the 50,000+ marathon runners from around the globe as they journey through the dirty, potholed streets of all five boroughs in this rudely friendly, alluring, and romantically gritty city. We’ve already forgotten that we lost the World Series this week and are concentrating instead on welcoming our haplessly plodding runners on the street—with raucous cheers in Queens, impromptu bands in Brooklyn, and dancing in the Bronx, the city becomes a big block party today.

Make sure to check out our graffiti and street art on the way!

Also, early voting is in effect in NYC. The new president of the US will be selected, possibly by you.

Here’s our weekly conversation with the street, this week featuring: City Kitty, Homesick, CRKSHNK, Degrupo, Modomatic, Sticker Maul, Leon Keer, Dot Dot Dot, Raddington Falls, D7606, SacSix, Muebon, Werds, RX Skulls, C3, EXR, OSK, She Posse, Outersource, Semz, Silkmoth, Glenn Ligon, Isa De Prez, and All Over Grey.

Unidentified artist (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Glenn Ligon gets to the heart of the electorate today (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Leon Keer. “Common Ground” Salina, Kansas. (photo © courtesy of the artist)

“Although different views and opinions are important for a healthy society, we can experience a greater increase in polarization in recent decades, which severely limits bridging or interactions.

In this work I would like to express that we are all connected despite differences in opinion. I see communication with positive sentiment and respect as a good carrier for social connection.” -Leon Keer

DotDotDot. “Liberty Warning The World”. Nuart Festival 2024. Stavanger, Norway. (photo © courtesy of Nuart Festival)

“The idea for the original Statue of Liberty was conceived in 1865, when the French historian and abolitionist Édouard de Laboulaye proposed a monument to commemorate the upcoming centennial of U.S. independence (1876), the perseverance of American democracy and the liberation of the nation’s slaves

Liberty holds a torch above her head with her right hand, and in her left-hand carries a tabula ansata inscribed JULY IV MDCCLXXVI (July 4, 1776, in Roman numerals), the date of the U.S. Declaration of Independence. With her left foot, she steps on a broken chain and shackle commemorating the national abolition of slavery following the American Civil War. After its dedication, the statue became an icon of freedom being subsequently seen as a symbol of welcome to immigrants arriving by sea.

In Dotdotdot’s version, just a few days before the upcoming election, much of whose campaign has been marred by racist and anti-immigrant rhetoric, the torch is replaced by a distress flare. A warning to us all.” ~ Nuart Festival, Stavanger, Norway

Check out the Project 2025 page on the Heritage Foundation’s website. The Heritage Foundation initiated Project 2025, which aims to prepare a conservative agenda and policy framework for the next presidential administration in 2025.

City Kitty, Muebon, RX Skulls, d7606, C3, and Silkmoth. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Sack Six presents Old Dirty Bastard and Frank Sinatra (photo © Jaime Rojo)

WERDS, DEGRUPO, HOMESICK,EXR. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

BSA Images Of The Week: 07.16.23

July 16, 2023 Artists, BSA Images Of The Week

Welcome to BSA Images of the Week! And how beautiful this city is, even when the heat is on. The amount of talent on our streets is so overwhelming, thank you New York.

Here’s our weekly interview with the street, this week featuring: Homesick, Mort Art, Optimo NYC, Savior El Mundo, Neckface, Lungebox, DEK2DX, Hektad, Paolo Tolentino, Jappy Agoncillo, SMURFO, Mike King, Mat Lakas, Lasak Art, Snith Node, Big808, Talia Lempert, Individual Activist.

Optimo NYC continues the organic and self-curated takeover of the Houston Wall. We’re not sure what The End refers to, but as we appear to be on the precipice of so many things as a society and as a nation, you can choose. Based on the sunny yellow, we prefer to think of it positively, like a high school graduation. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Here it is again! It seems that Sticker Maul took to heart Optimo’s THE END message above. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

But if this unidentified artist’s message proves correct, the end will be sooner than we’d like. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mort Art adds to the conversation, especially after the dangerous air quality of the last few weeks due to the wildfires in Canada. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

This news makes me HOMESICK. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

A bit of love from HekTad proves to be restorative. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Savior El Mundo tribute to Jean-Michel Basquiat on the facade of his old studio which was owned by Andy Warhol but leased to JMB. During a very busy week news-wise, it was announced that Angelina Jolie signed an eight-year lease to run a sustainable atelier from the building. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Crown Heights, Brooklyn, and Queensbridge represent! Nas by Paolo Tolentino (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Talia Lempert. Individual Activist. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Looks like we are going to have to do a lot more of this. Mike King (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jappy Agoncillo does a great tribute to Mac Miller(photo © Jaime Rojo)

A message from Neckface. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Untitled. Summer 2023. NYC. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

BSA Images Of The Week: 02.26.23

February 26, 2023 Artists, BSA Images Of The Week

Welcome to BSA Images of the Week! Optimo NYC on the Houston wall yo! Born and bred, a true New Yorker, and deserving of this wall after paying dues for years. Why does this wall sometimes look better when curated by the street? The holy chaos that reigns here is the pure DNA of the city, unbossed and unbought.

This week the street art is fresh! Never mind the proxy wars, the exploding trains, the 30% YOY drop in 401Ks, the transitory inflation that wasn’t, the Chinese spy balloons that weren’t, the Nordstream 2, the effort to privatize Social Security, the polarization that is encouraged by the media, and the increasing difficulty of New Yorkers to pay the bills… we still have a lot of extraordinary artists, and they are profligate! Also, we have Flaco, the Central Park owl fugitive, and his adorable ear tufts.

Here’s our weekly interview with the street, this week featuring: Shepard Fairey, Sticker Maul, Modomatic, Bad Brains, NYC Kush Co, Optimo NYC, Pest AC, Valentin Vewer, Holly Sims, Eternal Possessions, Cloudy is Here, and Gosup.

Shepard Fairey’s tribute to Bad Brains from a photograph by Glen F. Friedman in collaboration with The L.I.S.A. Project NYC. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

War Is Hell – Sticker Maul

January 19, 2023 Artists

Street artist Sticker Maul doesn’t need a large canvas to create art that makes an impact on the street. A recent piece we found in the Lower East Side of Manhattan keeps us thinking…

War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning, is a book by Chris Hedges, where he argues that war seduces society and creates the fiction needed to gain its support.

“In the beginning, war looks and feels like love. But unlike love, it gives nothing in return but an ever-deepening dependence, like all narcotics, on the road to self-destruction. It does not affirm but places upon us greater and greater demands. It destroys the outside world until it is hard to live outside war’s grip. It takes a higher and higher dose to achieve any thrill. Finally, one ingests war only to remain numb.”

― Chris Hedges

__________________

“I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones.”
― Albert Einstein

__________________

According to The Watson Institute at Brown University, which conducted a project to determine the costs of war post 9/11 called Costs of War Project:

At least 929,000 people have died due to direct war violence, including armed forces on all sides of the conflicts, contractors, civilians, journalists, and humanitarian workers.
Many times more have died indirectly in these wars, due to ripple effects like malnutrition, damaged infrastructure, and environmental degradation.
Over 387,000 civilians have been killed in direct violence by all parties to these conflicts.
The cost of the post-9/11 wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Syria, and elsewhere totals about $8 trillion. This does not include future interest costs on borrowing for the wars.

What’s The Word On The Street?

October 22, 2022 Artists

Oh, Word? Word.

We may take them for granted, but these can be the most powerful, impactful things that we can do during our lifetime. That is why we follow the street scribes and listen to what is said and how. Because of the effort that it takes an artist or a poet, or a preacher to prepare these texts for us to read in the public sphere, we give them a little more respect. Perhaps you find them inspiring, puzzling, angering, or a waste of time.

If well chosen and well placed, the written word has the power to move mountains.

“Words are free. It’s how you use them that may cost you.” -KushandWizdom

“…But the human tongue is a beast that few can master. It strains constantly to break out of its cage, and if it is not tamed, it will run wild and cause you grief.” -Unknown

Failure Is Not An Option. Sticker Maul. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

“Words have energy and power with the ability to help, to heal, to hinder, to hurt, to harm, to humiliate, and to humble.” -Yehuda Berg

“My task, which I am trying to achieve is, by the power of the written word, to make you hear, to make you feel–it is, before all, to make you see.” -Joseph Conrad

“Don’t mix bad words with your bad mood. You’ll have many opportunities to change a mood, but you’ll never get the opportunity to replace the words you spoke.” -Unknown

“No matter what anybody tells you, words and ideas can change the world.” -John Keating

“If we understood the power of our thoughts, we would guard them more closely. If we understood the awesome power of our words, we would prefer silence to almost anything negative. In our thoughts and words, we create our own weaknesses and our own strengths. Our limitations and joys begin in our hearts. We can always replace negative with positive.” -Betty Eadie

BSA Images Of The Week: 07.31.22

July 31, 2022 Artists, BSA Images Of The Week

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Welcome to BSA Images of the Week!

The city is now under a Monkeypox state of emergency thanks to a declaration by our state governor as of yesterday. Also jujitsu triumphs over random public punching, New York City children would still want to play Nintendo and Gameboy in the event of a nuclear attack, and we actually have a lower crime rate than the 80s/90s – contrary to narratives of bedlam and hoopla in the streets of Gotham.

However, there do appear to be more sharks around this summer – and not just your cousin Melvin and his buddies at the pool hall. Ah, New York, your grizzled, gritty exterior hides such a fascinating crushed-velvet heart beating inside…

We’re mainly happy that it’s not a thousand degrees on the streets this weekend, a welcome relief to the heatwave. Ice cream, anyone?

Here’s our weekly interview with the street, this week featuring: Faile, Stikman, Sticker Maul, Degrupo, Homesick, Cone, and Ked.

Houston/Bowery Wall continues its organic summer show… definitely not on a hiatus folks. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Beavis Trump with a little splash of self-tanner by Degrupo (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Rapper Birdman is transforming into the superhero by Degrupo (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Degrupo goes geometric. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mr. Met and the Ked (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Stop All Wars ~please! (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Untitled. Summer 2022. NYC (photo © Jaime Rojo)

BSA Images Of The Week: 05.08.22

May 8, 2022 Artists, BSA Images Of The Week

Welcome to BSA Images of the Week!

Constant rain for days, but the street art is blooming, baby! As are the riotous news waves about the Supreme Court, abortion laws, the efficacy of the vaccine, the ridiculous/tone deaf Met Ball, the new electric bikes just released by Citi, a rise in anti-semitism in New York, the legalization of weed, the 60 Collective 3 show in Dumbo, Swoon’s new “Sanctuary” Project, Elon Musk buying Twitter, a virtual unknown winning the Kentucky Derby, and Meghan McCain selling only 244 copies of her new book. Who is she again?

Nevermind, we’re back on the streets where we belong, tracking the exciting new directions it is taking us.

Here’s our weekly interview with the street, this week featuring: Jason Naylor, INSA, Sticker Maul, Stikman, Degrupo, Diva Dogla, Mike Raz, Corn Queen, Jorit, Eric John Eigner, Smet Sky Art, Bad Boi, O. Grey, Steven Paul Judd, Katie Merz, and Delphinoto.

Eternal Possessions (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jason Naylor. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Unidentified artist targets increasing censorial actions by social media platforms (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Degrupo lionizes Zelinsky as transformer (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Stikman embeds with Ukraine (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mike Raz & Smet Sky Art sing the praises of our beloved city (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Kiowa/Choctaw artist Steven Paul Judd hails from Oklahoma but appears to have roamed ayonder to NYC (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Street artist Jorit celebrates Italian football coach and former player Andrea Pirlo for The L.I.S.A. Project NYC. Detail. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jorit for The L.I.S.A. Project NYC. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

INSA. Our guess is that this piece was almost completed but the rain prevented him from finishing it. Still, we are happy to see this British artist in NYC. We’ll go back to see what details we are missing. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Katie Merz. You Are Not Alone for East Village Murals. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Delphinoto paints @Pontifex “in solidarity with Pope Francis’s Laudato Si Action Platform – the Vatican’s response to the ecological & economic crisis.” (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Untitled. Spring 2022. NYC. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

BSA Images Of The Week: 04.03.22

April 3, 2022 Artists, BSA Images Of The Week

Welcome to BSA Images of the Week!

“Ramadan Kareem” to everyone celebrating it this month. Also in April the Jews will be celebrating Passover and the Christians will be celebrating Easter and the Hindus are celebrating Chaitra Navratri. New York has the most diverse assembly of amazing and beautiful neighbors and we are all richer as a result.

In Hollywood and elsewhere people are celebrating/mourning the events surrounding Will Smith. In street art style, his infamous act shows up on a wall this week already (below).

It’s been cold in NYC this week! Fingers are cold, noses are cold, and migrating geese are humming the Clash’s “Should I Stay or Should I Go”. The Cyclone at Luna Park in Coney Island, opened yesterday and assures New Yorkers that Spring is already here even if you don’t feel it yet.

We’re excited to see the new exhibition Jean-Michel Basquiat: King Pleasure opens here this week. Congratulations to his family for bringing this enormous undertaking to fruition, especially Jean-Michel’s sisters Lisane Basquiat and Jeanine Heriveaux and his stepmother Nora Fitzpatrick.

Also, don’t sleep on the Whitney Biennial, opening Wednesday! Curators David Breslin and Adrienne Edwards say they have had a guiding principle; “It’s got to be buck wild.” That’s enough for us. Hopefully, some people will be buck naked at the show. A special shout-out to Biennial artist Jane Dixon. Her paintings and photographs of New York in the 80s captured its electricity and unpolished promise – during the time when she lived with filmmaker Charlie Ahearn in an apartment overlooking the tawdry excitement of Times Square. She say the city was, “burning, broke, and dangerous.”

Gentle people, start your stopwatch! Let’s see how long it takes for news items and pundits to begin likening our new Staten Island Amazon warehouse union workers to terrorists.

We’ve allowed companies to become richer than nations, so you can imagine what resources they can summon; the most comprehensive campaign to malign, discredit, impugn the character of workers, and thugs to intimidate them. This is the biggest victory for organized labor in a generation, born in a time of unprecedented income disparity across the city and country. Most citizens would be pleased if corporate behemoths simply paid their fair share of taxes.

The street is still one of the best exhibition spaces, never to be recreated fully.

Here’s our weekly interview with the street, this week featuring: AJ LaVilla, Clown Soldier, Little Ricky, Sticker Maul, Michael Alan, Dragon76, Diva Dogla, CP Won, Savior El Mundo, Acro, Jennifer Pod is Dead, and Masnah.

Savior El Mundo in collaboration with AJ LaVilla (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Dragon76 for East Village Walls. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Little Ricky and Diva Dogla (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jennifer Pod Is Dead (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Memorial Wall for Nick. RIP(photo © Jaime Rojo)

BSA Images Of The Week: 03.27.22

March 27, 2022 Artists, BSA Images Of The Week

Welcome to BSA Images of the Week!

One of the first graffiti writers to name themselves after a laptop, ACER got up big on the front of the New Museum this week, which may be one of the most relevant shows they have presented in recent years. Just kidding, he’s not named after a laptop. Police will certainly be after him for this high-profile crossing of the legal line that got more press than Putin for a New York minute, but in terms of graffiti parlance, this got him major fame among peers.

Speaking of crossing the line, national embarrassment Ginni Thomas was accused this week of using her husbands’ influential seat on the Supreme Court as leverage to overturn the 2020 election. But competition for most embarrassing US citizens was very stiff this week. Did you see all those frustrated white guys grandstanding and preening before a black woman, presumably prosecuting a culture war while disrespecting her office and person? These Supreme Court hearings were especially painful for what they revealed. Ted, Josh, Dick,… Lindsay Darling, did you know the cameras were rolling? You know people can watch those for years, right?

Here in New York we have daffodils, shag mullets, and a man nesting in a tree. In street art news, its all about Ukraine and Zelensky, baby.

Here’s our weekly interview with the street, this week featuring: CRKSHNK, Sticker Maul, Sara Lynne-Leo, Stickman, David F Barthold, Savior El Mundo, Manuel Alejandro NYC, Home Sick, Georgi Collagi, The Bloom Project, and ACER.

These are the NYC official colors of all public children’s playgrounds – before the war began. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

ZL SP 1996 / George Collagi (photo © Jaime Rojo)

#acer444 tagged the facade of the New Museum in NYC. ACER painted on the third story of the building on The Bowery in Manhattan on Thursday. It’s a mystery how the writer accomplished such a feat. We were too late to catch the tag but not too late to catch the graffiti removal crew erasing the piece. See below a photo of the tagged facade taken by B4flight. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

ACER. New Museum. Bowery, NYC. (photo © b4flight)

Untitled. Spring 2022. Manhattan, NYC. (photo montage © Jaime Rojo)

BSA Images Of The Week: 03.13.22

March 13, 2022 Artists, BSA Images Of The Week

Welcome to BSA Images of the Week. The streets are reflecting this moment in New York this week as artists are showing their colors. Or Ukraine’s colors, rather. Hard to sleep through the night when you know that Gotham is on the hit list if this Russian invasion turns nuclear, hard to process the idea that a cold war is never far from a hot one, despite activists best efforts for all these decades. Hard to believe that sanctions won’t damage many more people than the intended targets. Hard to believe that money-printing is never discussed in the news as THE creator of this inflation and much more inflation to come.

Let’s do everything we can to de-escalate this war, this perpetual specter.

And thank you to the street artists who are keeping the conversations alive. Also this week, new works from F**kin REVS !

Remember to Set Your Clocks Ahead One Hour Today.

Here’s our weekly interview with the street, this week featuring: Adam Fujita, Fuckin REVS, Below Key, Sticker Maul, Sara Lynne-Leo, Hek Tad, Gold Loxe, Mike Raz, Smetsky Art, Hear Eye Am, Equalist, Liagam, and Mitya Pisliak.

Death is not the answer. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Brooklyn Bitch Bakery (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Smetsky Art & Mike Raz (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Ligama for The Bushwick Collective (photo © Jaime Rojo)

We know Spring is around the corner when The Lenten Rose, as it is commonly known, comes up from the ground. More often they go unnoticed by the people in the city, as the weather is still cold and their colors are muted – and the fact that they are very close to the ground – prevents them from screaming “here I am!”. But they are the first to announce the advent of a new season. Spring 2022. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

BSA Images Of The Week: 10.24.21

October 24, 2021 Artists, BSA Images Of The Week

Welcome to BSA Images of the Week! The streets are alive with fresh cool air, skateboarders, bicyclists, the smell of fresh street art, and of course, shootings.

Our interview with the street today includes BK Foxx, David Flores, Didirok, Drecks, Melski, Miss Me, Peat EYES Wollaeger, Rap Gang, Sticker Maul, Timmy Ache, Villarose, and Vitruvian Truth.

David Flores. Detail (the lift was still in front of the mural). Houston Bowery Wall/Goldman Global Arts. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Jughead, your college advisor, suggests that you may want have a career as an orchestra conductor. Vitruvian Truth (photo © Jaime Rojo)

The Healthy Mind Movement (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Didirok and Villarose (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Magnet Wall in Wynwood, Miami. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Mid-Summer Discovery: Burgeoning Magnet Wall in Manhattan Boasts Bounty

August 16, 2021 Artists

We like findings spots that feature walls slammed with street art in a most organic way, the aesthetic signature of a current ecosystem mid-evolution. These spots are often a magnet for street artists to get up in NYC, L.A., Berlin, Lisbon, Madrid, Paris, Barcelona, Mexico City, Miami, Boston, London, and beyond. Usually illegal, they allow the artists a quick way to safely leave their imprint on the chaos of the city, a welcome to international artists on their spraycation as well as locals who relish the feeling of standing among peers. The art is usually limited to small original pieces, stickers, and posters, wheat pastes.

We call them “magnet walls” – and NYC has had its share of them. Now, however, they are increasingly endangered because of Gentrification and the voracious real estate market in the city with its apparent never-ending appetite for building new soaring soul-free glass towers. One spot is still welcoming artists to its walls: Freeman Alley. This favorite enclave, composed of two long walls along a narrow corridor in the Lower East Side, is constantly updated in an organic way with contributions by local and international artists. We have surveyed it for years, often publishing our findings in the popular “BSA Images Of The Week.”

Last week we rolled by the alley again and to our surprise, we discovered a gate ajar; one that leads the lobby of a relatively new hotel. Usually locked with a code, this secret Bowery spot instructs guests to enter through the alley. Once inside, they’re greeted with a nicely landscaped, small-scale courtyard leading to a lobby. Surprisingly, it is now bursting with new stickers, posters, stencils, paintings, collages, wild imaginings. Technically, this is a legal magnet wall – but most of the artists whose work is on display here can also be found illegally on the walls of the alley.
Here’s a fresh selection just for you:

Unidentified artist (the fire hydrant is real) (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Poor Mike. Probably feeling sad about labor conditions in sweatshops. Unidentified artist (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Make Art!
**Savior Elmundo** (photo © Jaime Rojo)

ELFO: Don’t Use This Wall!
November 19, 2024
Elfo is a graffiti writer and social commentator whose work intentionally sidesteps traditional notions of style or technical lettering. This …Read More »
BSA Images Of The Week: 11.17.24
November 17, 2024
Right out of the gate, Pres-elect Trump is telling us that one must destroy the government to save it, just …Read More »
SpY’s “ORB” Lands in Montreal: A Mirror of Street Art’s Evolution
November 14, 2024
SpY, a prominent public artist hailing from Madrid, has unveiled his latest sculptural work titled “ORB” in Montreal’s renowned Place …Read More »
Birch Bark, Rosehips, and a Family Affair: Faring Purth’s New Chapter in Mural Form
November 12, 2024
In her latest mural, Faring Purth delivers a powerful reflection on connection, continuity, and the complexity of evolving relationships—a true …Read More »
BSA Images Of The Week: 11.10.24
November 10, 2024
Well, the world ended this week—again. Yet here we are, still standing, and so are you. It turns out Donald …Read More »
Réunion Island’s Evolution: Eko and the Graffiti/Street Art Festival That’s Making Waves
November 7, 2024
A place you may not have heard of, Réunion Island has quickly become a remarkable hotspot for urban art, largely …Read More »
Transforming Tafí Viejo: Argentina’s First International Street Art Festival in Tucumán
November 5, 2024
The Circuito Mural: Encuentro Internacional de Arte Urbano just wrapped up its first run from October 1 to 5, 2024, …Read More »