I’m looking forward to what Alexandros Vasmoulakis does at Nuart, so in the meantime it’s nice to be able to share some of the other things he’s being doing lately. The piece above was commissioned by an historic concert hall in Ljubljana and painted in collaboration with Paris Koutsikos. Here they are at work:
I’ll need to ask him for a close up because I can’t see the rhinestones he mentions are on the paper. That’s a nice touch.
This second piece is located in the Dafen Painting Village and was commissioned by the Dafen Art Museum. It’s a funny place for it to be, but it’s a nice piece. Faith47, Hitnes, Sonik, Run and others also took part in this project. I’ll have to look out photos of what they did.
I just posted about Andreas’ new show on the tasj blog (which is where I am when I’m not here), but I wanted to share a sneak peek with Vandalog readers, too. I think that big piece is amazing.
It’s had like a million views at this point (and I’m not exaggerating) so you’ve probably seen this video already, but it’s still fun to watch. If you’re a fan, you can support the Poster Boy movement, the new Poster Boy book, The War of Art and the new street art/graffiti legal defence fund K.A.R.A.T.E. (about time we had one of these) in four different cities on Saturday night:
I love this wall Dotmasters recently painted at Nuart. It’s not easy to be cute without getting lame and cutesy.
- Elisa
PS If you haven’t seen the tower Blu and Ericailcane painted for the festival, check out the photos on Unurth. Then keep an eye out for updates on the Nuart twitter and blog – there are a lot of great artists still to come. I also did an interview with Martyn (the festival’s curator) for the next issue of The Art Street Journal. It was great to listen to his thoughts on the festival and its swift growth. The media has a tendency to throw the spotlight on the artists, but I believe it’s also very important to recognize the people who work tirelessly behind the scenes to make things happen. Martyn is one of those people and if you’re a reader of the journal, I hope you find our conversation as interesting as I did.
Here’s a show to check out if you live in Sydney – Stormie Mills at Richard Martin Art. His last solo there was really good so I’m looking forward to seeing what this one looks like. You can see some of the work here. The opening is on September 1 from 6-8pm.
Stormie’s a great guy and I think his personality really comes out in his work. There’s so much soul in his little characters.
Seth and I just printed the newest edition of The Art Street Journal! It’s our longest issue yet and with the move to better paper stock and four color pages inside, it’s a big step toward where we’re hoping to take things in the future.
A lot of really great people helped out with this issue, including Vandalog’s Aaron and Steph! I’ve included previews of their pages (well, one of Aaron’s, at least – his article has the double page spread in the middle of the journal).
Steph's article on Viva La Revolucion at MCASD
Half of Aaron's interview with Boogie
One thing I’m particularly happy about is that our Unurthpage has now doubled in size to a two page spread. It’s still not enough to fit all the great images Sebastian finds, but I packed in as much as I could this time around. Sebastian also did a great interview with Escif about the differences between his indoor and outdoor work. You can read an older conversation between these two here to get some context to it.
Other street artist-related articles in this issue include those on EuroTrash with Conor Harrington, Vhils, JR and Antony Micallef in LA, Herbert Baglione in Barcelona, Dan Witz in New York (although the article is actually on his last show of oil paintings), 108 in Grottaglie, Basquiat in Basel, Nina Pandolfo in Sao Paulo, M-City in LA and Ericailcane in Ancona.
Street Art New York, Dan Witz: In Plain View and Poster Boy: The War of Art all feature on the bookshelf page. I recommend you buy all three if you can and haven’t yet. I’m a bit biased, I guess, because all the authors are friends of mine, but I genuinely think they are great books and I know everyone involved worked really hard to get them out there.
If you’re not getting tasj in the mail yet and would like to, you can sign up at www.theartstreetjournal.com. It’s free, no matter where in the world you live.
If you’re in LA, we are having a release party for this new issue here at Carmichael Gallery on Saturday, August 7th. Come by for a drink, pick up a copy, see our Boogie/M-City shows (it’s the last day they’ll be up!), then head out to the other openings in Culver City – there are some fun things going on that night. Hope to see you there and spread the word if you can! Thanks!
If you’re in Brooklyn this weekend, Labrona is taking part in a 3-day event that is an art show, dance party and a whole lot more all in one. Find out more here. He was also in LA recently and did a lot of cool wheatpastes like the one above. See more of them on Unurth.
Seth and I decided to drive down to San Diego on Friday to see in person all the street art that has been appearing around the city in preparation for Viva La Revolucion at the Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego. I’ve recreated our trip in order of what we saw, which was everything that had been created as of then. Shepard just came over and said he did another couple walls yesterday afternoon – we’ll go check them out after lunch.
I’ve included the locations of everything in case you’re in San Diego (or are planning a visit) and want to check them out for yourself – which I highly recommend!
First stop: osgemeos – Horton Plaza mall, Downtown, G St at 2nd Ave
It was a little weird to see osgemeos on a Westfield parking structure with a Nordstrom next to it, but it’s a good high wall and gets a lot of attention from passing pedestrians. It’s a fun piece – see some detail shots of the little guys below (close up of my favorite, the wedgie dude, at the top of this post).
The guy at the bottom must be really strong!
Second stop: MCASD and more osgemeos (the actual artists this time)
I’ll post pictures later of what we saw inside the museum when we previewed the show, but as we were about to go in the door, we saw the Date Farmers sitting outside and, around the corner, osgemeos painting a van (yes, that is a cameo from me in the background…) We also saw one of the two Vhils pieces, but we forgot to take a picture of it. Oops. Sorry.
Third stop: Vhils and Dr. Lakra – Downtown, 11th Ave and Broadway
Dr. Lakra’s piece obviously isn’t finished so it’s hard to judge it, but I really like the Vhils (and I personally think it’s a lot nicer than the one we forgot to get the picture of). These two share a wall in the museum, too. I’m not sure who the person doing the wild style on the right is. Please leave a comment if you recognize it!
Fourth stop: JR and Barry McGee – Downtown, Everything $5 Clothing Store, corner of 5th Ave and C St (JR) and California Theatre, 4th Ave and C St (Barry McGee)
The JR just blows away everything else on the street, in my opinion. It’s also very easy to miss if you’re not looking closely – it blends amazingly well into its environment.
The Barry McGee, on the other hand, really isn’t so special, unfortunately. I’m not an expert on wildstyle, but I do know when I like it. I also couldn’t understand why there was no work by him inside the museum - I love him so much and was looking forward to seeing it. Don’t you think that’s a bit strange?
Fifth stop: Invader – Downtown, The Art Center, Park Blvd and G St
Apparently this is the biggest Invader in North America. It’s really quite impressive. There are also about twenty small ones scattered on various streets - we saw quite a few of them. For the museum, Invader made a video showing his travels around the city putting them up – the path he took makes one giant Invader. If you feel like a long walk, you can recreate this path, too – I believe the museum can give you a map.
Note: Shepard just told me that he and Amanda used to live in San Diego and that this building used to be their office!
Sixth stop: Swoon - Downtown, E St between 13th and 14th Ave
I love this image so it was nice to finally see it in person. The colors and texture are amazing. It’s one of my favorite Swoons to date. Her piece inside the museum is also gorgeous - definitely one of the highlights of the show.
If you like Shepard, you’ll probably like this wall – it combines a lot of his most iconic images. You can see the Obey Eye peeking out as you drive down the street toward the wall – it looks really cool.
Eighth stop: Shepard Fairey Number 2 – South Park, 30th Ave and Ivy St
We were really curious to see this wall as Shepard and Dan (Shepard’s assistant) told us it was all hand-painted! It is very impressive in person. Nick, another member of Shepard’s friendly, hard-working team, and Sonja were hanging out (and randomly just walked into the lobby as I write this).
Ninth Stop: Stephan Doitchinoff (aka Calma) – Downtown, 16th Ave and J St
Stephan just told me that this piece isn’t finished yet, but I think it already looks really nice. (And yes, everyone is staying in the same hotel – you’d think there was only one in this town! osgemeos, the Date Farmers, David Ellis, Dr. Lakra, Shepard and his team, Pedro Alonzo and probably everyone else involved in the show is here.) I was going to post a picture of myself standing next to the wall as the tights and sunglasses I was wearing that day were practically the same shade of blue/green as the background color in the piece, but I’ve decided that would be a little too weird of me…
And now I’m going outside – I’m sick of sitting in this lobby and watching everyone come and go without me. The opening for the show is tonight (Saturday) and will probably be quite busy, but I’ll try to post some of my pictures from the press preview in the morning.
Two of my favorite street art bloggers, Jaime Rojo and Steven P. Harrington from BrooklynStreetArt.com, will be signing copies of their new book, Street Art New York, next Thursday, July 22nd, at one of my favorite bookshops, Spoonbill and Sugartown on Bedford in Williamsburg. If you’re in the neighborhood, make sure to stop by for a drink, pick up a copy of Street Art New York and have a chat with the authors.
Incidentally, Spoonbill recently held a signing for another great street art book – Dan Witz: In Plain View. I’m not sure if they still have copies left, though; if not, you can visit Dan’s site.
Find out more about the Street Art New York event here.
Just when it seemed as though Aakash Nihalani couldn’t get any more inventive with his medium, he decided to start juggling it. He made the video whilst in Bordeaux for Les Grandes Traversees.
Get new posts by Email
