Damn. It’s almost May! Sorry this is so late but it’s worth the wait. March was another action packed month in Melbourne.

Starting off with Baby Guerrilla‘s show in Footscray. Baby Guerrilla’s paste ups have been adorning Melbourne’s walls for a few years now, and they are some of my favourites, her gallery work was new for me and I loved seeing a different side of the artist.

Adnate was 1 of 3 Melbourne graffiti/street artists that entered the renowned Archibald prize. From the Archibald website “The Archibald Prize is awarded annually to the best portrait, ‘preferentially of some man or woman distinguished in art, letters, science or politics, painted by any artist resident in Australasia’.” It’s great to see some more modern painting techniques making it into this more conventional competition. Adnate painted a portrait of Samantha Harris; an Australian indigenous model. Also make sure you check out the video by Michael Danischewski below.

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Category: Events, Gallery/Museum Shows, Interview, Photos, Random, Videos | Tags: 2013, Adnate, Archibald Prize, AWOL, AWOL Crew, Baby Guerrilla, backwoods gallery, Be Free, blo, cdh, Collingwood, DaMentalVaporz, David Russell, Dean Sunshine, DMV, DVATE, E.L.K, Fitzroy, futura, GENT, Hancock and RAD, Hennessey, Invurt, jaw, Kaffeine, Luke Cornish, Luke McManus, lush, MArch, Melbourne, Melbourne Monthly Madness, Melbourne Monthly Madness March, Michael Danischewski, Samantha Harris, SDM, SDM crew, Shane from AllThoseShapes, Shida, slicer, Sulman prize, Think, vhils, Will Coles

Pinched this post from Invurt, an absolute MUST see documentary on Melbourne’s graffiti and street art culture. From our awesome train graffiti to street art and gallery art; this documentary gives a great insight into the city I love and the amazing graffiti and street art that I’ve loved since I 1st got on a train as a kid. The movie features friends, favourite artists and familiar places so that makes it even more special.

From Invurt: “Created by Alex MacBeth and Miriam Hison, the documentary ‘Charts the development of the Melbourne street art scene,’ Children of the Iron Snake looks at the last thirty years and tracks the journey of graffiti from railway junctions at night to festivals, abandoned factories, rooftops, drains and galleries. Comprising interviews with over 15 artists, as well as criminologists, anti-graffiti activists, and politicians, the film offers a in-depth look at one of the biggest art movements of our time.”

Category: Featured Posts, Videos | Tags: Alex MacBeth, Children of The Iron Snake, Documentary, graffiti, Invurt, Luke McManus, Melbourne, Miriam Hison, street art

Adnate‘s work is some of my absolute favourite in Melbourne right now and has been for a while. He has been hitting the streets hard lately, both solo and in multiple collaborations with AWOL Crew and others. Adnate started out painting graffiti and letters over 10 years ago. More recently he has moved into painting beautifully detailed characters, which also still incorporate some of his tags and lettering, which I love. His characters are not only amazingly detailed, most of them also have a story, which make them even more special. Last year Adnate had his solo show “Lost Culture” at RTIST Gallery and exhibited alongside the rest of the AWOL crew at their collective show “Fabric”. Adnate has also traveled the world painting and exhibiting in cities such as Barcelona, Mumbai, New York, Paris and Berlin.

I sat down with Adnate recently and this is what we talked about.

LM: I mentioned above that many of your characters have a story, which I learned by talking to you at some of your shows and while watching you paint. Tell us about some of them? 

Adnate: Most of the subjects in my paintings are of people that I have met and personally photographed. It’s important that I know the subjects as I am always trying to communicate certain emotions and stories through my portraits.

With the aboriginal portraits, which I feel are my strongest, I spent the last years getting to know local and national Indigenous Australians. It has been a crazy journey meeting and learning about these incredible people, particularly the current and past climate of their survival.

LM: Apart from your solo and AWOL group shows, give us a recap of what you got up to in 2012? 

Adnate: Last year was the first year that I went bigger and higher with my portraits. It’s a great feeling being elevated that high in the air whilst painting and although I only managed two walls on this scale for 2012 they were definitely a highlight. When painting on the ground you get all sorts of distractions but being up high it’s just you and a few birds (one almost flew into my head recently).

I had some great opportunities to travel around Australia too. I got to travel through the western desert and met some of the oldest indigenous Australians alive. You wouldn’t believe what’s out there, that’s what you call “real country”.

LM: I read in a recent interview on artshub your work is “Inspired by Renaissance artists such as Da Vinci and Caravaggio, Adnate taught himself classical chiaroscuro techniques to communicate drama and emotion in his subjects”. This is quite an evolution from tagging and letters, what brought about this change in style? 

Adnate: I worked on making my own style for 10 years and it was time to try something new. So I flipped my work on its head and began trying to reach a level of portrait realism that’s second to a photo. I’ve never been a big sketcher, so when I was painting letters I did so in a free flowing manner from the beginning to the end. Now with portraits I reference a photo, spending just as much time studying the photo as I do the painting. There is always a point in which I battle with the painting and the photo to make things as realistic as possible. It’s a completely different method of painting that I am used to and I think that’s what I love about it. It’s important to stay stimulated and challenge myself wherever possible.

LM: Tell me about some of the other work you do using your art? 

Adnate: Over the years I’ve done regular youth work using graffiti art as a way to sway them off drugs and hard crime. I’m currently doing most of this now in a Juvenile Prison that houses the most volatile and “at risk” young boys and girls in the state. It’s an awesome job and the best part is getting to know these guys, they all have the craziest stories to tell and its really rewarding when you get to make their day. Plus there are some really talented writers and artists in there, which is definitely inspiring.

LM: Tell me about your background. How did you get into graff? 

Adnate: Well I didn’t grow up on a train line, so my first memories were being a little gromit skater and studying all the designs on the clothes and decks. When I hit high school I begun to travel around Melbourne on the trains, in particular the Hurstbridge Line and I got to see all the WCA productions. This blew my mind and I quickly dropped off from skating and graff became my life.

LM: What does your name mean? 

Adnate: ad·nate [ad-neyt] adjective Biology: grown fast to something; congenitally attached.

I get asked this all the time and to be honest I didn’t choose it for the meaning but simply for the letter structure. I was 16 when I choose it from a dictionary and I loved it because it was a word that gave me lots of kicks and flares with my tags.

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Category: Interview | Tags: Adnate, AWOL, AWOL Crew, DaMentalVaporz, David Russell, DMV, does, Fabric, Fintan Magee, Itch, loveletters, Luke McManus, Melbourne, RTIST gallery, slicer

After meeting and developing a friendship with Roa in San Francisco earlier this year, I’ve been really looking forward to him arriving in Melbourne! I’ve always known Roa loved his animals, but have never appreciated him as much as I do until now.

Roa was invited by Healsville Sanctuary to visit and meet some of their animals and paint some walls. Healsville is a very special place and there is no doubt that experience shaped the entire trip in Melbourne and also heavily influenced the exhibition. There’s nothing like seeing an artist meet an animal, touch it, play with it, and then go off and paint it.

Roa’s inspiration for CARRION, his show that just closed at Backwoods Gallery in the Melbourne suburb of Collingwood, was a direct result of the visit to Healseville. The animals, the staff and their passion for the animals and having access to things even most Australians have never even experienced really made a difference.

So how did this impact the show? In so many ways! Firstly, all of the works were Australian native animals. But the installation, as Roa’s shows often are, was something else! The experience began even before entering the gallery, with the scent of something strange to come. Roa painted the wall in the alley way leading into Backwoods with a giant wombat skeleton. The strange smell kept luring you closer and closer, I won’t say it was a pleasant smell, far from it – soon you’ll understand why.

Upon entering Backwoods punters were greeted by a green wall with CARRION painted in red. To the right was a shed built inside the gallery, inside were several videos showing a wallaby autopsy (Roa got to watch and film this at the sanctuary). Rather confronting for those not knowing what to expect.

Fish tanks were assembled throughout the gallery with a set of pipes joining them together for air flow. Inside was the cause of the smell, native Australian animals (a possum, a wallaby, an echidna, a kookaburra and several other birds) being slowly consumed by flesh eating beetles! If you were surprised by the autopsy video this was even more of a shock to some. Bones and various other found items were also scattered throughout the gallery.

The paintings, all of native Australian animals, were beautifully painted and came in a range of sizes and complexity (in terms of how many moving parts/doors they had). My favourite pieces were the Bandicoot, the Echidna, the platypus and the Honey Possum. Read the rest of this article »

Category: Featured Posts, Gallery/Museum Shows | Tags: backwoods gallery, CARRION, Collingwood, Melbourne, roa

Roa left Melbourne a couple of days ago. What an amazing month or so it has been. After arriving in Melbourne from Puerto Rico, one of the first things he did was visit Healesville Sanctuary. Healesville Sanctuary is a not-for-profit conservation organisation dedicated to fighting wildlife extinction through breeding and recovery programs for threatened species and by working with visitors and supporters to reduce threats facing endangered wildlife. The Sanctuary is a very important part of Roa’s whole visit to Melbourne, a major part of his show at Backwoods Gallery, Carrion, which I will go into more detail about in my next post.

The first day was all about Roa meeting the animals. He got the royal treatment from the Sanctuary and all the keepers, getting to go behind the scenes and really meet the animals, touch, feel and hold most of them.

The next few days were a combination of painting some of the animals he met, and preparing for the show. He painted three pieces while at the Sanctuary, the most exciting would have to have been the Platypus (Ornithorhynchus Anatinus) on the water tower (featured in the video). I was lucky enough to be there with Roa and experience the breathtaking views, hip hop, pizza and beer. A perfect afternoon Read the rest of this article »

Category: Featured Posts, Photos, Videos | Tags: Healesville Sanctuary, Melbourne, roa

Kaff-eine is another of my favourite Melbourne street artists. Since first discovering Kaff’s characters pasted in Melbourne’s alleyways, I quickly fell in love with her work.

Kaff-eine paints using a number of different media, including aerosol, pigment ink, watercolor and acrylic paint. Her characters light up drab grey walls and alleys and bring real character to Melbourne’s streets. Her characters evoke emotion and feeling, in particular the sorrowful character cradling a dying swan is one of my favourite works!

Kaff-eine has been part of numerous group shows, and has her first ever solo show opening in November called “Boneyard” at “Just Another Project Space” in Prahran. I can’t wait!

I caught up with Kaff-eine a few weeks ago and had a great chat. Here’s some of what we talked about:

LM: Tell me about your background. How did you get into street art? 

Kaff-eine: I’d stopped drawing a decade beforehand. I was at Uni, discovering new street art all around Melbourne as I went to and from Uni, but never thinking about painting myself. Then I met a new bunch of friends who really encouraged me to get back into drawing, and a couple were into street art, so I thought about drawing again, kind of followed my street artist friends around, tried it and loved it. It changed the way I saw urban spaces, and my own artwork. I started pasting my work up, but discovered that I preferred to paint directly onto surfaces. So I’ve been doing it ever since.

LM: What does your name mean? 

Kaff-eine: Aw it’s pretty basic. Everyone who knows me knows that caffeine is my drug of choice. So I tweaked the name a bit, and used it. Without caffeine there’s no Kaff-eine! And the hyphen works too, I think in German it translates as something like ‘coffee one’. So yep, that’s suitable too.

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Category: Featured Posts, Interview | Tags: Boneyard, Just Another Project Space, Kaff-eine, Melbourne, Prahran

A note from RJ: Luke left the show before this stuff happened. If anyone knows more about what went on, let us know in the comments.

Lush a renowned “so called” graffiti artist from Melbourne, Australia, opened his show tonight at Klughaus Gallery in NYC.

As usual his work is controversial and rather obscene … Lush’s graffiti pieces combine his trademark lettering with often x-rated images of pornography and naked women posing alongside (and incorporated into) his pieces. I really like his work.

His illustrations (the feature of this show) provide a very apt commentary on the graffiti scene and all the associated traditions and beliefs.

Lush wasn’t at the show (maybe because he’s probably a wanted man haha), but, in what I thought was an innovative addition to the show, he appeared live on Skype from Melbourne (donning a bandana to cover his face) from his bathtub. This was an excellent addition to the exhibit as it allowed people at the show to interact with the artist. He was also live in twitter and @lushsux and the #lushsux hash tag were getting lots of attention. Both positive and negative.

The good thing about Lush is that he does not at all take himself seriously and his work completely “takes the piss” (an Australian saying meaning makes fun of) the whole graffiti and street art scene. A much needed viewpoint in my opinion.

The show opened tonight and runs until the 7th of September. Worth having a look at if you are in New York.

All photos by Lukey

Category: Gallery/Museum Shows | Tags: graffiti, Klughaus Gallery, lush, Melbourne, NYC

TwoOne, another of Melbourne’s legendary street artists, is having his 6th solo show in September (amongst countless group exhibitions) at Backwoods Gallery in Collingwood, Melbourne. Seven Samurai opens September 14th at 6pm and run through the 30th.

From the press release:

What’s right? What’s wrong? Is the sacrifice of an individual worthwhile if it benefits the many?

Using Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai as a common cultural reference point, Japan-born Melbourne street artist TwoOne explores these questions at the exhibition of the same name at Collingwood’s Backwoods Gallery from Friday 14 to Sunday 30 September.

Seven Samurai is one of the most influential films of all time, with a major impact on American films in particular – from obvious tributes like the 1960s western The Magnificent Seven, which was a remake in everything but name and setting, to George Lucas paying homage to its dialogue and shot composition across his Star Wars saga.

The film continues to inspire nearly 60 years after its release, with TwoOne again drawing on Kurosawa’s 1954 masterpiece for his first solo exhibition of 2012. Each of the seven large works in this new collection is an exploration of the psyche of the film’s seven protagonists, approaching the heroes not as warriors, but rather culturally-significant character archetypes. These archetypes represent enduring perceptions of authoritarian figures in traditional Japanese society, and TwoOne’s analysis looks at them with contemporary insight.

TwoOne aims to bring both western and eastern philosophy together in his character portrayals, which are based on his own psychoanalysis of each of the samurai while at the same time drawing visual reference from the physical energy of Bushido and judo. “Within us all there is a battle,” TwoOne says. “The form of fighting and the ferocity is what defines us.”

With Seven Samurai, he creates a visual representation of that duality; of the forces, whether perceived or real, that pull Kurosawa’s characters (and, indeed, all of humanity) in different directions psychologically and the difficult decisions that must be made.

All photos courtesy of Alex Mitchell at Backwoods Gallery

Category: Gallery/Museum Shows | Tags: backwoods gallery, Collingwood, Melbourne, twoone

Rone‘s new show “Fall From Grace” is opening next Friday at Backwoods Gallery in Collingwood. I’ve been a big fan of Rone for a long time so I’m really looking forward to this. I’m loving the evolution of his new style colours. Here’s a few preview shots after the jump…

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Category: Gallery/Museum Shows | Tags: backwoods gallery, Collingwood, Fall From Grace, Melbourne, rone

I finally got down to see Hush‘s show Sirens at Metro Gallery in Armadale yesterday. I couldn’t make it to the opening, so I’m glad I didn’t miss this show.

I’ve been a fan of Hush for a while now and seeing his work up close makes me love it even more. His pieces combine Japanese Geisha and Russian Babushka dolls, tags and torn raw surfaces and dripping paint to create a mesmerising effect. I stood and looked at the main wall piece for ages admiring the detail. Clearly the Melbourne art community also love his work, the entire show sold out in days.

From the Metro Gallery website:

Metro Gallery is proud to present ‘Sirens’, the first solo exhibition in Australia by UK artist Hush. Described as a ‘sensory assault’, Hush’s work is a visual treat, a layering of colours and a fusion of anime, pop-infused imagery, graffiti and graphic design.

Fascinated by Asian graphic novels and inspired by the likes of Mimmo Rotella, Roy Lichtenstein and Sir Peter Blake, Hush has a unique style that has led to worldwide acclamation. He was recently recognised in London Independent’s list of ‘Top 20 Up and Coming Artists’.

‘Sirens’ continues the artist’s style, effortlessly fusing traditional Eastern art with Western traditions of action painting and graffiti. Inspired by the portrayal of the female form in art, the artist depicts Eastern-like women set within backgrounds filled with layers of rich colour. Patterns, ranging from geometric repetition to florals reminiscent of delicately decorated vases, are not solely confined to the background but often take on a new dimension, forming graceful kimonos, hairstyles or headpieces. Tagging and graffiti transition from street art to the studio, to form part of these patterns.

Hush has continued to evolve his style with this new offering, creating deeper, richer pieces than anything he has produced before. “I’m stripping pieces down, over complicating others to show a complex body of work to educate the viewer and bring them deeper into the process of making the work.”

Photos by Lukey

Category: Gallery/Museum Shows | Tags: Armadale, hush, Melbourne, Metro Gallery