All posts tagged: Todd Mazer

Boston’s “Underground Mural Project” Opens With 11 Artists

October 31, 2017 Artists

“I love transforming a raw space for everyone to discover. It’s the best feeling to see people enjoying themselves in front of my art,” says artist Cey Adams in Boston as he finishes his “LOVE” mural in a letter style recalling the funky late 70s.

Cey Adams. Urban Art Park. Beantown, Boston. September 2017. (photo © Todd Mazer)

At the start of September Adams and 10 other artists joined the Underground Mural Project to transform 150,000 square feet of walls and pavement in a park here, curated by Street Theory Gallery, a creative studio founded by Liza and Victor ‘Marka27’ Quiñonez. The 8-acre public underpass located between Boston’s South End and South Boston neighborhoods has been leased to a privately owned company that has turned it into “an active urban park, cultural attraction and parking amenity”, now named Underground Ink Block.

Ewok-MSK. Urban Art Park. Beantown, Boston. September 2017. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Our thanks to photographer Todd Mazer who shares some of his images with BSA readers today from the event. Todd also conducted an interview with painter, muralist and graffiti artist Rob “Problak” Gibbs, a native of Roxbury, a neighborhood in the southern part of Boston. As participant in the project, community arts advocate, and a lifetime Boston citizen who believes strongly in the power of public art, graffiti, and HipHop culture, Poblak offers a unique perspective to the Underground Mural Project.

Todd Mazer: In your origins as a writer you have spoken about the importance of outdoor classrooms like Peters Park what are your hopes that a place like the Underground at Ink Block can be a catalyst for?
Problak: I hope that the Underground at Ink Block can be a catalyst for the next generation of graffiti writers, muralist and landscape artist to be inspired to take what we contributed to the space and add on to the practice. If our times are documented the stories can be told better through a variety of disciplines artist come to the table with.

When a place like the Underground exists, up and coming artist can work on creative ways to contribute towards a venue that exhibits community art for the people of greater Boston at a world wide scale. The Underground can be a bridge that takes anyone (young or old) on an adventure through the creative process of an artist that may have work in that space.

VyalOne. Urban Art Park. Beantown, Boston. September 2017. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Todd Mazer: As an artist, activist and architect/educator how have you discovered the importance to expand your skill set in order to create opportunity for your own and others artistic endeavors?
Problak: I discovered how important it is have to have a variety of ways to tell your story. Pose2 always told us “your only as good as your last piece” and Kem5 added “ and the people you place yourself around” When that whole phrase is combined positioned my mind in a place to have my skill set be in a good position to always grow.

“Walking the talk” confidently comes from paying dues. Dues that range from humble beginnings to bad experiences that I learned the greatest lessons from. Expanding my skill set opened up new doors to meet and build a variety of relationships with other artist who too are skilled and tackle tasks through creative problem solving. The more skill you have the less you’ll find yourself saying NO to a majority of the challenges you’ll get approached with.

HOXXOH. Urban Art Park. Beantown, Boston. September 2017. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Todd Mazer: As a follow up more specifically could you offer some insight from 91 til infinity… in other words how has your involvement in AFH (Artists For Humanities) shaped your actions and given you perspective on the importance of this new space?
Problak: LOL from 91 til………..

My involvement with AFH is very instrumental to what I do because the creed we practice in our studio has become the DNA to my life’s work. I grew up around a small nit of artist who are gifted and who challenged me along our journey. That small crew grew into the organizations leadership. The ethos has evolved and revolved off of our actions. We took responsibility for our own learning and shared that practice with a large amount of youth for the past 25 years.

Don Rimx . Problak . Marka27. Urban Art Park. Beantown, Boston. September 2017. (photo © Todd Mazer)

The importance of this new space is that concept of giving space and opportunity for a genre that is powered by energy in this city that is untapped. An energy that has the interest of the youth and the ability to challenge them to think, digest, seek their own truth and hopefully contribute. Sometimes you have to be exposed to or shown the examples to develop your voice. This space could serve as a megaphone to help project it. The examples are the trailblazers who show everyone in the space what’s possible.

Todd Mazer: Why is it so important to artistically reclaim overlooked spaces?
Problak: It’s important to “Add to” vs. reclaim because with all due respect to the city’s architecture, I view these spaces as a series of blank canvases embedded inside of what I would compare to the city’s respiratory system. The work we do would breathe life into these spaces so that the city would not have to hold its breath and encourage others to do the same. These spaces can be landmarks and spark the next mind to be great or be that picture worth a 1000 words that would speak to the generations to come.

The participating artists include: Vyal One, Imagine, Cey Adams, Don Rimx, Marka 27, Problak, Ewok MSK, Thy Doan, Upendo, Percy Fortini-Wright and Hoxxoh. Our thanks to Todd Mazer for sharing his photos and interview with BSA readers.

Marka27. Urban Art Park. Beantown, Boston. September 2017. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Ewok-MSK . Thy Doan. Urban Art Park. Beantown, Boston. September 2017. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Thy Doan. Urban Art Park. Beantown, Boston. September 2017. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Perci Fortini-Wright. Urban Art Park. Beantown, Boston. September 2017. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Imagine876. Urban Art Park. Beantown, Boston. September 2017. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Upendo. Urban Art Park. Beantown, Boston. September 2017. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Problak . Vyal . Marka27. Urban Art Park. Beantown, Boston. September 2017. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Having fun at the block party. Urban Art Park. Beantown, Boston. September 2017. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Underground at Ink Block from National Development on Vimeo.

BSA Film Friday: 02.10.17

February 10, 2017 Artists

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

Now screening :
1. Kahbahbloom: The Art and Story Telling of Ed Emberley
2. Fintan Magee / The Exile
3. Amuse.126.Big Walls
4. EWOK – MSK

BSA Special Feature: Kahbahbloom: The Art and Storytelling of Ed Emberley by Todd Mazer

“How he sustained himself artistically was by being restless and trying all these new styles and new ways and not getting stuck in the same thing,” says Caleb Neelon about the children’s book illustrator Ed Emberley with 60 years of storytelling through art– and really it is a lesson well learned by most artists.

On the other hand, it often is helpful if you have one style that you are known for, particularly when you are trying to cut through the clutter and capture people’s attention. Perhaps the best lesson is to be restless and to embrace change.

Special props to Todd Mazer for intuitive use of editing, sharp observation, and unobtrusive storytelling of his own; making this video resonate with viewers.

Fintan Magee / The Exile

“Inspired by the youth inside the Azraq refugee camp artist Fintan Magee transported the image of one young Syran girl to East Amman,” says the descriptor at the bottom of the screen. This brief glimpse gives you an idea of the scale of displacement of people in this country.

Amuse.126.Big Walls

“Large scale mural work is very powerful and captivating to its audience. To allow me to come in and to paint a predominantly graffiti-based approach and to literally plaster my name onto a side of a building is amazing,” says Chicago based Amuse.

EWOK – MSK

Ewok shows his considerable illustration skills in this commercial for an art supply manufacturer.

A Quick Look at Wynwood Walls of Change 2015

December 8, 2015 Artists

Among the various events at this years’ Miami madness called Basel were the multiple projects that intersect with Street Art in the Wynwood District. Walls of Change brought new large scale murals and installations from fourteen international artists who have all done art in the streets at some stage of their career and represent some of the better known as well as a few up-and-comers.

Case Ma’Claim. Detail. “Walls of Change” at Wynwood Walls 2015. Miami, Florida. (photo © Todd Mazer)

The corporate sponsored program curated by real estate CEO Jessica Goldman Srebnick of Goldman Properties also debuted The Wynwood Walls Garden, a new space that cleverly added instant height to the scene by stacking shipping containers on top of each other.

Our thanks to Todd Mazer for sharing these fresh images for BSA readers to see what new pieces captured his eye at the installation. The invited list of artists includes Case (Germany), Crash (USA), Cryptik (USA), el Seed (France), Ernest Zacharevic (Singapore), Fafi (France), Hueman (USA), INTI (Chile), The London Police (UK), Logan Hicks (USA). Pichi & Avo (Spain), Magnus Sodamin (USA), and Alexis Diaz (Puerto Rico).

Case Ma’Claim. Detail. “Walls of Change” at Wynwood Walls 2015. Miami, Florida. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Case Ma’Claim. Detail. “Walls For Change” at Wynwood Walls 2015. Miami, Florida. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Pichi & Avo. Detail. “Walls of Change” at Wynwood Walls 2015. Miami, Florida. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Logan Hicks. Detail. “Walls of Change” at Wynwood Walls 2015. Miami, Florida. (photo © Todd Mazer)

El Seed. Detail. “Walls of Change” at Wynwood Walls 2015. Miami, Florida. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Hueman. Detail. “Walls of Change” at Wynwood Walls 2015. Miami, Florida. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Cryptik at work. “Walls of Change” at Wynwood Walls 2015. Miami, Florida. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Cryptik. Detail. “Walls of Change” at Wynwood Walls 2015. Miami, Florida. (photo © Todd Mazer)

The London Police at work. “Walls of Change” at Wynwood Walls 2015. Miami, Florida. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Ernest Zacharevic’s Miami collaboration with photographer Martha Cooper. Mr. Zacharevic recreated Pablo Picasso’s 1958 sculpture “Bull” and placed it a scene from Ms. Cooper’s photo of children at play taken in 1978 in The Lower East Side of Manhattan. Detail. “Walls of Change” at Wynwood Walls 2015. Miami, Florida. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Ernest Zacharevic. Detail. “Walls of Change” at Wynwood Walls 2015. Miami, Florida. (photo © Todd Mazer)

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El Mac Brings Electricity to Creativity at Northeastern University

May 27, 2015 Artists

El Mac, the LA based aerosol Caravaggio has just illuminated a university wall in Boston with a portrait of his wife as alchemist, a glowing vision completed on the side of Northeastern’s Meserve Hall this month in time for Spring graduation.

brooklyn-street-art-el-mac-todd-mazer-northeastern-universty-boston-05-15-web-1

El Mac (photo © Todd Mazer)

“The meeting of art and sciences is key to this campus,” says Todd Mazer, who lives in the city and who spent a lot of time with the artist while he painted, shooting incredible photos of the process. The image based on a photo of Kim presents a perfect marriage of symbols for the university, but also may refer directly to the artists’ personal lineage, he confides.

El Mac (photo © Todd Mazer)

“Mac’s father went to Northeastern and studied Engineering where he met Mac’s mother, who was an artist going to MassArt at the time,” he explains, “so the lightning, which is science, and the brush, which is art, just may represent his parents. In his distinctive style that includes scientifically chilling paint cans in a cooler with ice, El Mac renders an heroic, comely, and gentle figure even on this rough surface using a circular patterning that appears alternately mechanically digitized or smooth as a Vermeer, depending on your angle and distance from the work.

Even the starry sky may be a reference to his father, we learn, because of his father’s history with things astronomical. “Also the stars above could be of significance too because although Mac was born in LA he moved to Phoenix because his father was pursuing a career in the space program.”

El Mac (photo © Todd Mazer)

On breaks from plowing through 150 or so cans of paint, El Mac also took time to see art at his dad’s Alma Matter, poking inside the Museum of Fine Arts, Todd tells us. “He mostly painted but since he was just across the street from the MFA it was on his mind and when he got some small windows of time he would head over there,” says Mazer.

“It was nice to see him get off the lift and put down the iced out cans and catch some inspiration from a different surface. I remember him with a pencil and a sketchbook in front of a sculpture and just like earlier in the day at the wall I got a sense he was somewhere he belongs.”

Our sincere thanks to Todd for sharing these images with BSA readers.

El Mac (photo © Todd Mazer)

Northeastern University (photo © Todd Mazer)

El Mac (photo © Todd Mazer)

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Jaybo Monk’s Maiden Voyage to The East Coast

July 8, 2014 Artists

Today we go to Boston to see a show at the Museum of Fine Arts, where painter and artist Jaybo Monk is painting live for the summer party benefit. The Berlin based Monk has deep roots in Street Art and graffiti but now describes himself primarily as a painter who loves the process even more than the end result. An artist who is not afraid of changing his style, many of his paintings feature a shattering and fragmenting of reality, placing his dis-formed figures on planes and pulling them apart and recombining them, evoking for us the work of artists such as Francis Bacon, Anthony Lister, and even Egon Schiele.

Jaybo Monk. Working at a SoWa Studio in Boston. (photo © Todd Mazer)

While in Massachussetts he coordinated/collaborated/ worked with photographer Todd Mazer, who organized for him and El Mac to paint live at the fundraiser and both artists, along with Augustine Kofie, contributed works to be auctioned for MFA’s benefit. You may recall the collaborative Conversations show that Monk did with Kofie in 2012 which truly enhanced the work of both artists.

While visiting The City on a Hill Monk also had a solo show Traces of Nothing at The Boston Button Factory and practiced his collaborative in-the-moment style with hosts and other artists on the scene for a couple of other events. “Since I moved to Boston it’s been very important to me to create a dialog here with artists I met in Los Angeles,” explains Mazer, who shares with BSA readers some images he shot of Jaybo’s visit and tells us about some of the activities and people on the scene.

“This was Jaybo’s first visit to the East Coast and I had been talking to him about coming out here and he was into it,” says Mazer. “It was also really important to us both that he got a chance to link up with the Boston art community so we got to spend time with artists like Caleb Neelon, Kems, and Dana Woulfe – and I was glad that he got a chance to collaborate with Kenji Nakayama.”

Jaybo Monk. Working at a SoWa Studio in Boston. (photo © Todd Mazer)

In addition to taking part in SOWA First Fridays, where people got a chance to see a room full of unfinished works in an open studio environment, Mazer helped organize a well attended pop-up solo show at Liquid Art House entitled Sole Delay. Mazer says Jaybo exhibited a few new works from his studio in Berlin as “quite a few pieces made completely in Boston.”

“Jaybo worked in the SOWA art studio of artist Adrienne Schlow who along with Matt Greer, Kenji Nakayama and my sister Allison Mazer helped make the day-to-day tasks, challenges and missions possible,” says Mazer. Listening to his descriptions and seeing the rhythmic poetry of the lighting and composition of his photos, you know that Mazer was at ease with his subject, perhaps because the subject is at ease with himself.

Jaybo Monk. Working at a SoWa Studio in Boston. (photo © Todd Mazer)

The pop-up show had a relatively short timeline for preparation and the team was working up until the opening bell to prepare the space. Luckily, Boston crowds are fashionably late to an opening so they could catch their breath. “It felt a little quiet and I was thinking ‘maybe I rushed things too much’ but then people kept coming and coming and coming and I was like ‘Yeah Boston!’” says Mazer.

The shows were a big success, but for Mazer, it was the collaborative open-studio environment that really showcased the qualities of this artist that he relished the most. “Witnessing Jaybo’s process has so often left me mesmerized, anguished and inspired by his fleeting envelopements, so it was really special to create an environment where others got to experience how much of a razors edge his work lives on,” he says.

Jaybo Monk. Working at a SoWa Studio in Boston. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Jaybo Monk. Solo exhibition “Traces of Nothing”. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Jaybo Monk. Live painting at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts Summer Gala. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Jaybo Monk solo exhibition “Traces of Nothing” is currently on view at the Boston Button Company and will be up until July 14.

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Chris “Daze” Ellis in Dialogue with the Collection at The Addison

May 19, 2014 Artists

The NYC Graffiti Artist joins Whistler, Homer and Pollock at The Addison

Currently the Addison Gallery of American Art in Massachusetts is hosting New York 1970s graffiti writer DAZE in Street Talk: Chris Daze Ellis in Dialogue with the Collection. At the exhibit opening a few weeks ago, a number of New Yorkers, including other writers and bombers from that period, friends, family, a few historians and curators took the trip to Andover to see Mr. Ellis receive recognition for his contribution to the graffiti art canon as well as to give witness to how his evolution as studio artist continues. Today photographer, writer, poet, and alchemist Todd Mazer takes BSA readers to the show and talks to Daze about his personal route through NYC to this station in MA. Daze (photo © Todd Mazer)

Inside a historic museum which houses one of the most significant collections of American Art a wide range of patrons gather. Some are still learning how to tie their shoes while others have likely built a lifetime of things with out the aid of an internet tutorial look on at works that seem to speak universally. What they are gazing upon is Street Talk: Chris “Daze” Ellis’s exhibition featuring his recent work in a dialogue with the Addison Gallery of American Arts expansive collection.

Daze (photo © Todd Mazer)

One observer is Maria Muller, Deputy Director of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. “I feel like the practical need to work quickly on the trains in his early career seems to be reflected in the dynamic style and sense of motion and speed in his images.”

As Daze gets mobbed up for photo ops in front of his piece entitled “View to the Other Side”, he reflects upon his identity and the initial spark that has led up to this moment. “People don’t realize when I was painting trains that it wasn’t a cool thing to do and it wasn’t socially acceptable,” he says.

“I began painting in 1976 after meeting a bunch of writers at The High School of Art and Design in New York. I was learning things in school but this was something outside of art school that was completely unconventional that I found incredibly creative and exciting. It is something that still fascinates me to this day. There is something very addictive about it.”

Daze (photo © Todd Mazer)

This graffiti addiction seems to be spreading to museums as well. Since 2011’s “Art in the Streets” exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Arts in Los Angeles, which was billed as “the first major U.S. museum survey of graffiti and street art”, more museums have begun to embrace this movement. Current exhibitions like “City as Canvas: The Martin Wong Graffiti Collection” at the Museum of the City of New York and the Addison’s “Loisaida: New York’s Lower East Side in the 80’s” also both prominently feature the work of Daze, for example.

Allison Kemmerer, The Addison’s Curator of Photography and Art after 1950, explains what is bringing these two worlds together. “One of the strengths of the Addison’s collection is its wealth of urban imagery from all periods and in all media.”

“Daze’s drawing from the vocabulary of both the contemporary world of graffiti and street art and the tradition of urban realism, this is exactly what attracts the Addison to him. We are always mindful of the continuum that exists between historic and contemporary art and the way objects speak back and forth to each other across media and time.”

Daze (photo © Todd Mazer)

Daze. Detail. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Daze’s journey to lead up to this point has clearly been an evolving process. “Almost all my paintings now are a mixture of mediums, each medium has it own characteristics and its own kind of history attached to it and you have to be patient to be able to deal with and find a way for them to all coexist in one picture frame. I had to work with them for a long time separately before I felt like I could combine them and come up with something that looked new.

Daze. Detail. (photo © Todd Mazer)

As Daze has matured as an artist, he has also discovered there is more to being a successful artist than just painting a ruggedly pretty picture. “The art world was and still is a really hard place to navigate through and some people are able to do a better job at grasping it then others,” he explains.

“I think in a lot of cases collectors have a lot more power with museums than even artists and play a very important role in all of this, somebody like John Axelrod who is very passionate about this art form, has the ability to start dialogs with these museums and I’m grateful he’s chosen to amplify voices like mine.”

From left to right Sean Corcoran, Jayson TERROR161 Edlin, DAZE, and Charlie Ahearn (photo © Todd Mazer)

Daze (photo © Todd Mazer)

As the crowd begins to thin out, Daze expresses the magnitude of this personal milestone “Even at a young age, I was always going to the library or museums so now it’s kind of mind boggling having my work in them because I still remember what it felt like to be that kid walking through the Brooklyn Museum.”

Daze. Detail. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Daze (photo © Todd Mazer)

Daze having a word with Jackson Pollock. (photo © Todd Mazer)

Daze (photo © Todd Mazer)

Our special thanks to Todd Mazer for sharing his take on this this story with BSA readers. To learn more about Todd’s work, please click HERE and check him out on Instagram.

Street Talk: Chris Daze Ellis in Dialogue with the Collection
May 3 – July 31, 2014
Addison Gallery of American Art
Andover, Massachussetts

Street Talk: Chris Daze Ellis in Dialogue with the Collection

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Fun Friday 12.14.12

December 14, 2012 Artists

Hey bro and sis! Here are some of our favorite picks for the weekend around the global way as we head into the final holiday and New Year beauty that we hope everyone is surrounded by. Happy 7th night of Hanukkah to the Jews, and Happy ongoing holidayz to the Christmas and Kwanzaa and Solstice people.

1. 215 “Orgullecida” (Barcelona)
2. “Kids Eat For Free” at Tender Trap (BKLN)
3. Fresh Low-cost Original Silkscreens at “First Worldwar in Silkscreen” Group Show (BKLN)
4. “Graffuturism” at Soze Gallery (LA)
5. “Dark Corners, Savage Secrets”, Photography by Imminent Disaster (BKLN)
6. “Snap Back…” Rime and Toper at Klughaus (Manhattan)
7. New2 at White Walls (San Francisco)
8. Dave Kinsey “Everything at Once” at Joshua Liner (Manhattan)
9. Brett Amory at 5 Pieces (Switzerland)
10. RISK: The Skid Row Mural Project by Todd Mazer (VIDEO)
11. Swoon’s Konbit Shelter in Haiti (VIDEO)

215 “Orgullecida” (Barcelona)

French Street Artist C215 has a new solo show titled “Orgullecida” at the Montana Gallery in Barcelona, Spain. The artist has been for awhile using a lot of color with his multilayered stencil work – expanding his established vocabulary bravely in a way that most artists are too afraid to do. His portraits are placed well, are individually hand-cut, and sprayed with a sense of the humanity he’s always giving center stage. This show is now open to the general public.

A one color stencil from an earlier period by C215 on the streets of Brooklyn, NY. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

A detail from a more recent C215 (© and courtesy the gallery)

For further information regarding this show click here.

“Kids Eat For Free” at Tender Trap (BKLN)

A phrase lifted from restaurant franchises that serve food like you are livestock at a trough, “Kids Eat For Free” is a mini survey of train riders who know the back sides of the country well. Under the moniker of The Superior Bugout, curator Andrew H Shirley continues to explore fresh talent from the emerging margin, and this group exhibition features work by North Carolina’s NGC Crew. Now open, and don’t forget the kids!

For further details regarding this show click here.

Fresh Low-cost original Silkscreens at “First Worldwar in Silkscreen” Group Show (BKLN)

The best way to support your local artist is to give their stuff as a Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanza/Soltice present. No kidding. Everybody wins. Tonight a show of original silkscreens at totally reasonable prices is at Low Brow Artique in Bushwick. For tonight’s opening of their silk screen print show where you’d be able to purchase prints for $20…yes you read it right $20 bucks buys you art from 25 artists – many of them with work on the street – from Sao Paulo, Brooklyn, Buenos Aires and Berlin. Participating artists include: Selo, Markos Azufre, Hellbent, El Hase, ND’A, XOXU, Daniel Ete, Salles, Baila, Anderson Resende, DOC, SHN, XILIP, Serifire, Vero Pujol, Marquitos Sanabria, Diego Garay, Desastre, and Head Honcho.

Head Honcho. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

Salles (photo © Jaime Rojo)

For further information regarding this show click here.

“Graffuturism” at Soze Gallery (LA)

This is like an exclamation point for the end of the year. No kidding.

POESIA, founder of Graffuturism, the term and website, continues to explore the depths of “Progressive Graffiti” or, as it was previously known, “Abstract Graffiti”. With great intelligence, passion and an acute eye for detail, POESIA brings to the forefront the importance and beauty of this emergent new direction that is impacting the Street Art and graffiti scene (with ramifications for others).

“Graffuturism” opening tonight at Soze Gallery in Los Angeles and promises a smart-headed visual feast of shapes, patterns and color from a mini-galaxy of talent from all over the world. Perhaps more significantly, it’s a bit of a decentralized movement that has been centralized for you. The artists list includes: 2501, Aaron De La Cruz, Augustine Kofie, Boris “Delta” Tellegen, Carl Raushenbach, Carlos Mare, Clemens Behr, Derek Bruno, Doze Green, Duncan Jago, DVS 1, El Mac, Eric Haze, Erosie, Franco “Jaz” Fasoli, Futura, Gilbert 1, Greg “Sp One” Lamarche, Graphic Surgery, Hense, Hendrik “ECB” Beikirch, Jaybo Monk, Joker, Jurne, Kema, Kenor, Lek, Marco “Pho” Grassi, Matt W. Moore, Moneyless, O.Two, Part2ism, Poesia, Rae Martini, Remi Rough, Samuel Rodriguez, Sat One, Sever, Shok-1, Sowat, Steve More, West and Will BarrasSoze Gallery in Los Angeles .

Also New York chronicler and enthusiastic lover of the graff/street art scene Daniel Feral will be there with a special edition of the Feral Diagram in glicee prints, and a couple other formats (salivate). An ambitious exhibition like this is rare and not easy to come by so if you are in Los Angeles you must go.

El Mac on the streets of NYC. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

For further information regarding this show and to read a great essay for the show written by Daniel Feral click here.

“Dark Corners, Savage Secrets”, Photography by Imminent Disaster (BKLN)

Self-appointed moral custodians (mostly white men) have traditionally hampered the exploration of sexuality in formal art history and the academic canon of what gets celebrated and revered continues to evolve more quickly now. The sea change that modern social liberation that was once revolutionary is now a given, but the debate of the appropriate role of sex and sexuality in the arts is far from over. We may have just quashed one Trojan horse of social conservatism in the White House, but the radical right wing has pulled the center pretty far in the last decade and some have even said there was a war on women launched legislatively throughout 2012. So we are pleased to tell you about fine artist and Street Artist Robyn Hasty AKA Imminent Disaster, who has a new show in collaboration with Alex Pergament entitled “Dark Corners, Savage Secrets”. Furthering her exploration of photography Ms. Hasty has semi-retired her now well known hand cut paper pieces and lino prints on the street and traded the cutting knife for the camera. With this show of photographs, sculptures and performance art she’s aiming to tear apart the inhibitions associated with the sexual act. “Dark Corners, Savage Secrets” opens tomorrow at Weldon Arts Gallery in Brooklyn.

Imminent Disaster and Alex Pergament (exclusive photo for BSA © courtesy of the artist)

For further information regarding this show click here.

“Snap Back…” Rime and Toper at Klughaus (Manhattan)

Freshly snapping back to New York from their successful truck trip to Miami, Klughaus Gallery brings Brooklyn natives RIME and TOPER for their new exhibition titled “Snap Back – Dangerous Drawings About New York”. The storytelling show features illustration and painting inspired by personal stories. Says RIME. “This show aims to tap into our life experience coming up in New York.” Show opens Saturday.

Rime and Toper shown here with Dceve in NYC. (photo © Jaime Rojo)

For further information regarding this show click here.

New2 at White Walls (San Francisco)

The White Walls Gallery in San Francisco are fortunate to host Australian artist New2 with his solo show titled “In One Hand a Ghost, The Other an Atom”. New2’s work on the streets is complex and dynamic with aerosol, but his handcut collage work for the gallery is moreso somehow – maybe because of a painstaking process of arranging thousands of hand cut pieces of paper. This show opens on Saturday.

New2. Detail of one of his hand cut paper pieces. (photo © courtesy of the gallery)

New2 on the streets of San Francisco. (photo © courtesy of the gallery)

For further information regarding this show click here.

Also happening this weekend:

Dave Kinsey with “Everything at Once” at the Joshua Liner Gallery in Manhattan. This show is now open to the general public. Click here for more details.

Brett Amory at the 5 Pieces Gallery in Berne, Switzerland opens on Sunday with his solo show “Lil’ Homies”. Click here for more details.

RISK: The Skid Row Mural Project by Todd Mazer (VIDEO)

Art in the Streets from MoCAtv

Swoon’s Konbit Shelter in Haiti (VIDEO)

Street Artist Swoon is looking to return to Haiti to build more shelters for people in the rural part of the country. This video gives a great look at the families and community who are helped. You also can participate by donating to the Kickstarter campaign to help Swoon make it happen.

Size Matters: INSA Kills Biggest L.A. Free Wall

May 17, 2012 Artists, California, L.A., Los Angeles, On the Street

The great thing about a California King Size mattress is you can fit six people on it comfortably. Five if you need to accommodate beer, corn chips, coffee cake, and a bong.

The point is California is a quintessential long-ass big-ass state that rivals many entire countries in terms of the size of the overall economy, the miles of beach, quantity of Mexicans, and metric tons of silicone injections. That’s why it hardly surprises us when Daniel Lahoda reports that recently his LA Freewalls project crossed the 100th wall mark and that INSA just completed the biggest project so far. Clocking in at 9,300 square feet, the Street Artist covered more space with paint than the Kardashian sisters use preparing for a poolside photo shoot. But these results are spectacular and the scale is quite fitting for this city.

Our thanks to collaborator and photographer Todd Mazer, who doesn’t just capture the action here. He rhapsodizes with it before revealing the full project at the end. Enjoy the largesse.

INSA had a mission to complete on the walls of this building. He also has a philosophy and a work ethic when doing his craft. Click on the link below to read how he came about to see this project completed:

http://www.insaland.com/blog/mission-to-la/

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Shots from LALA Opening – LA Freewalls Moves Inside

April 28, 2012 Artists, California, Gallery, Los Angeles

LALA Gallery in downtown Los Angeles had a well attended inaugural show last week to realize physically something that had up to this point been a dream for Street Art fan and champion Daniel LaHoda. With names like How & Nosm, Cryptik, Cern, Shepard Fairey, and Dan Witz among others on display (and in the flesh) the gallery welcomed many of the LA Freewalls crowd inside and off the street where they were less likely to wander into traffic – A good move considering the refreshments that many of the clamoring crowd appeared to enjoy as they milled around the gargantuan outdoor rooftop gazing upon the glowing orbs of Cern One punctuating the LA night.

Talented photographer and BSA collaborator Todd Mazer was on hand during the opening and sends some original inside photos for BSA readers to get a sense of the raw industrial space and environment.

Cern One Balloons (Photo Todd Mazer)

Cern One (Photo Todd Mazer)

Dale VN Marshall (Photo Todd Mazer)

How & Nosm (Photo Todd Mazer)

Cryptik (Photo Todd Mazer)

Askew ONE (Photo Todd Mazer)

LA + Auckland Honor Askew One, Graffiti and Street Artist

April 23, 2012 Artists, Auckland, California, Features, L.A., Los Angeles, New Zeland, On the Street

It’s not often that a major city gives a spotlight to a graffiti / Street Artist and issues a formal proclamation about it, but that is exactly what happened Saturday in Los Angeles. AskewOne, a native of one of LA’s sister cities, Auckland, New Zealand , was honored by the City as his new mural “Under the Influence” was unveiled as part of the LA Freewalls Project.

“It’s much more likely in this city that a graffiti artist will be arrested than be recognized for positive contributions to the community”, as LA Taco reports, but really when you consider the major inroads that the LA Freewalls Project has made into the dialogue around the value of Street Art in LA’s local politics, it can’t be entirely surprising. It probably helps that the image itself incorporates the American flag into the composition– sort of disarms that whole negative rant that some politicos use when lumping Street Artists together with other social scourges like drug addiction, domestic terrorism, and the Ice Capades, doesn’t it?

“AskewOne is one of the world’s preeminent public artists, and one of the most accomplished contemporary graffiti writers,” says Daniel LaHoda, who spearheads LA Freewalls and who also hosted the inauguration of the new LALA gallery Saturday night with many of today’s best known Street Artist’s work on the walls. According to an official press release, the now famous LA mural moratorium will soon be lifted and “Kamilla Blanche, Senior Deputy for Arts and Culture, and the Director for Sister Cities, is excited about the possibilities to expand Los Angeles’ place as the national epicenter of public art.”

BSA is very pleased to be able to share with you these images of the new piece as shot by photographer Todd Mazer.

To learn more about Los Angeles Sister Cities Program click here.

“Wrinkles” Revisted, Revealed : JR New Mini-Doc

February 7, 2012 Artists, California, Los Angeles, On the Street

A year ago on BSA and Huffington Post we brought you the new installation by French Street Artist JR on the streets of Los Angeles called “Wrinkles in the City”.

At the time the installation was still unveiling on walls across a swath of LA, greeting morning commuters and puzzling image-conscious plastic surgeons in the city of angelic youthfulness. The city was anticipating the soon-opening “Art in the Streets” exhibit at The Museum of Contemporary Art, and the artist himself had just garnered a TED prize.

Today we get a look at the new mini-documentary about the “Wrinkles” series and learn much more about the people featured in the gargantuan images plastered on walls everywhere. A sensitive portrayal of the subjects, the pacing of the doc allows stories to unfold before you. Following the video are images of the LA street show by Todd Mazer and Jaime Rojo.

JR Los Angeles (photo @ Jaime Rojo)

See our article of JR “Wrinkles in the City” with great photos by Todd Mazer on the Huffington Post HERE

Anthony Lister Talks to BSA : Analysis and Constant Consideration

September 29, 2011 Artists, Brooklyn, California, Features, Florida, Interview, Los Angeles, Manhattan, Miami, NYC, On the Street, San Francisco, Street Talker Interview, Venice Beach

“I’m like a hairdresser I guess.”

Painter Anthony Lister is also a Street Artist. His surreal pop and celebrity culture-infused abstractions are candy encrusted apples which may have something sharp inside. Many are figurative studies and wire frames bending wildly into characters who cavort and mock with blunt swipes of color, overlaid by costumed sexual role play… or is that a personal projection? Did I mention elegance, defiance, wit? Wait, there is so much here! Truth is, his work can be a cock-eyed psychological tempest, jarring to the head, strangely sweet.

A decade of discovery under his superhero belt, Mr. Lister continues to analyze and build his creative practice and it always includes work inside the gallery and outside on the street. He’s currently preparing for his solo show in Sydney called “Bogan Paradise” at Gallery A.S. At the same time he’s part of a group show with a gaggle of his Aussie expats on view at 941 Geary in San Francisco for “Young and Free”, including Kid Zoom, Dabs & Myla, Dmote, New2, Ben Frost, Meggs, Ha-Ha, Reka, Rone, Sofles and Vexta. Not to mention his participation in our show last month in Los Angeles at C.A.V.E. with Thinkspace, “Street Art Saved My Life : 39 New York Stories“.

The artist took some time recently to talk to Brooklyn Street Art about his practice;

Brooklyn Street Art: How much of one of your painted portraits is autobiographical? In other words, what portion of Mr. Lister is super hero, super model, furtive schoolboy, or Homer Simpson?
Anthony Lister: I don’t really think about myself when I paint. My figurative works are more like reflections of characteristics I absorb from real life day to day.

Brooklyn Street Art: If you were to wear colored glasses, which color do you think you would most likely screen the world through?
Anthony Lister: Pink, like John Lennon.

Brooklyn Street Art: Francis Bacon said, “The creative process is a cocktail of instinct, skill, culture and a highly creative feverishness.” Would you drink that cocktail?
Anthony Lister: Nice words. I agree.

Brooklyn Street Art: What role does analysis play in your creative process when bringing a painting to fruition?
Anthony Lister: Analysis is the outcome of considered processing. Constant consideration is crucial.

Brooklyn Street Art: A big piece you did on Metropolitan in Brooklyn – you reworked that face a couple of times over a period of months, producing what appeared as a slowly morphing image. Were you covering up tags, or were you unhappy with the original, or maybe combating the effects of age with a little nip and tuck?
Anthony Lister: When I re-work street paintings I think of it like I am a hairdresser. When something is in the public it has a different existence to something living privately in a residence. I’m like a hairdresser I guess.

Brooklyn Street Art: You have spoken about your work as reality, or a reaction to realities. What realities are you depicting these days?
Anthony Lister: I just finished a body of work for a solo show in Sydney. This next body of work is about contemporary Australian culture. The exhibition is titled “Bogan Paradise.”

Brooklyn Street Art: When you consider the Street Art scene that evolved around Melbourne, how would you characterize its nature in a way that differentiates it from the work in other cities around the world?
Anthony Lister: No different. This whole street art thing has sprung up post the turn of the digital revolution so it is on the Internet quick and the artists who inspire others and the ones who are easily inspired are constantly swimming in the same aesthetic pools of consciousness. Not to mention that most of the prominent artists travel lots so it is easy to see work of the same artist in multiple cities around the world at the same time.

Brooklyn Street Art: The titles you give your gallery pieces are entertaining, instructive, illustrative. Do you ever want to place a placard near a piece you’ve done on the street – just to make sure the message gets across?
Anthony Lister: No. My street practice is less thoughtful and therefore needs less commentary.

Brooklyn Street Art: When is a painting complete?
Anthony Lister: When it tells me so.

Want to see more work? Just “Lister” it.

www.anthonylister.com

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