Surge, Gaia, Stormie, Remi/Rough and in The Underbelly Project

UPDATE – LOCATION CHANGE: The Underbelly Show has moved to 78 NW 25th Street in Wynwood, Miami to accommodate the large scale of the artwork in this show.

The Underbelly Project is back. Last year, I posted a lot about the project where 103 artists from around the world secretly painted an abandoned/half-completed New York City subway station. After that initial burst of press here and around the web, The Underbelly Project organizers stayed silent. With only occasional vague tweets from a mysterious twitter account and the appearance on Amazon of an upcoming book about the project. Yesterday though, The Underbelly Project announced that they will be participating in this year’s Basel Miami Week madness with a pop-up gallery in South Beach Wynwood.

The organizers of The Underbelly Project and The Underbelly Show, Workhorse and PAC, have this to say about the show:

Workhorse: The New York Underbelly was an important chapter for us, but the story hadn’t been comprehensively told. The Underbelly Miami show gives us a chance to present the broad scope of documentation – Videos, photos, time-lapses and first hand accounts. The project is about more than just artwork. This show gives us a chance to show the people and the environment behind the artwork.

PAC: While the experience each artist had in their expedition underground can never be captured, it is my hope that this show will highlight some of the trials and tribulations associated with urban art taking place in the remote corners of our cities. Too often the practice of making art in unconventional venues remains shrouded in mystery and I hope this exhibition will shine a faint light on those artists who risk their safety to find alternative ways to create and be a part of the cities they live in.

35 of the 103 artists from The Underbelly Project will be exhibiting art in The Underbelly Show, plus video and still footage of the artists at work in the tunnel. Here’s the full line-up: Faile, Dabs & Myla, TrustoCorp, Aiko, Rone, Revok, Ron English, Jeff Soto, Mark Jenkins, Anthony Lister, Logan Hicks, Lucy McLauchlan, M-City, Kid Zoom, Haze, Saber, Meggs, Jim & Tina Darling, The London Police, Sheone, Skewville, Jeff Stark, Jordan Seiler, Jason Eppink and I AM, Dan Witz, Specter, Ripo, MoMo, Remi/Rough, Stormie Mills, Swoon, Know Hope, Skullphone, L’Atlas, Roa, Surge, Gaia, Michael De Feo, Joe Iurato, Love Me, Adam 5100, and Chris Stain.

For this show, the space will be transformed into an environment imitating the tunnel where The Underbelly Project took place, right down to playing sounds recorded in the station while The Underbelly Project was happening.

If you absolutely cannot wait until February to get We Own The Night, the book documenting The Underbelly Project, a limited number will be available at The Underbelly Show in a box set with 9 photographic prints and the book all contained in a handcrafted oak box. Additionally, you will be able to your book signed by the artists participating in The Underbelly Show.

The Underbelly Show will take place at 2200 Collins Avenue, South Beach, Miami 78 NW 25th Street, Wynwood, Miami. There will be a private opening on November 30th, and the space will be open to the general public December 2nd-5th, with a general opening on the 2nd from 8-10pm.

Photo by RJ Rushmore

We visited Opera Gallery earlier today just a few hours before the official opening of “Abstractions,” a retrospective of the abstract movement that features artists who’ve used the streets as their canvas, alongside such “fine” artists as Miro and Matta. Here are a few images:

David Ellis

Ron English

Futura

Saber

Sixeart, close-up

While some people would argue that LA has one of the most vibrant mural, street art and graffiti scenes in the world, there’s something holding it back: The legal impossibility of painting murals with permission. Because the city of LA essentially considers all murals commercial signage, getting permission from the property owner is not enough. Without permission from the city government (which sounds nearly impossible to get), even murals painted with the building owner’s permission are illegal in the eyes of the city.

Today, Saber decided to fight back against the city by hiring 5 skywriters to write messages in support of art and his friends across the skies of LA. Additionally, Saber has a blog post explaining his opposition to the city’s mural moratorium and cataloging instances where good art has been impacted by the absurd enforcement of a law that was intended to impact public advertising.

Saber has also started a petition urging the city to end its mural moratorium. You can sign that here.

Here’s a bit more of what Saber had his skywriters put up:

Photos by Saber

A recent and very timely Banksy

Normally I’d like to avoid doing a link-o-rama post in the middle of the week, but there have been a number of big stories to break in the last 24 hours or so, and since I’m in the middle of moving house, there’s no way I was going to be able to otherwise cover them in a timely manner. So here we go…

• The artist Ai Weiwei has been released on bail from a Chinese prison, but one of his friends that the Chinese also detained has still not been heard from.
• Banksy has reacted to Tox’s conviction for graffiti (and likely prison sentence) with this piece of street art in Camden. Banksy’s old pal Ben Eine testified on Tox’s behalf at the trial, claiming that just about anyone could be imitating Tox’s tags and pieces because they are so simple, and that the man on trial may have been the victim of imitators rather than still being a graffiti writer, as the prosecutors argued. The prosecutor also told the jury that Tox “is no Banksy. He doesn’t have the artistic skills, so he has to get his tag up as much as possible.” Banksy has actually referenced Tox in his work before. Not all that surprisingly, the Banksy piece is already being covered in plexiglass to protect it (UPDATE: actually it’s been boarded up). To my knowledge, no one has ever covered a Tox tag in plexiglass, although perhaps now they should…
• Liu Bolin, aka that artist who paints himself into landscapes and photographs himself sort of disappearing, has collaborated with Kenny Scharf on his latest piece at Kenny’s mural in NYC. Wooster Collective has that story.
• Although Art in the Streets was supposed to move from MOCA in LA to the Brooklyn Museum next year, the Brooklyn museum has cancelled their iteration of the street art and graffiti show. They cite financial difficulties, but the show is set to break attendance records in LA, so that’s probably some BS to cover their asses. The show has already caused controversy in NYC, and there is speculation that the cancellation is due to political pressure and fears about that controversy. Hopefully a museum with some balls will pick up the show and it will still make it to NYC.
• That controversy in NYC about Art in the Streets cited this article which has been floating around for a while about why the show is so evil. Saber has just written the best response to that article that I’ve read so far.

Photo by Mark J P

Rich Simmons "Homeless Superman"

I normally am not this much of an ass, but this was too good to pass up and not post. I have heard about this show at Opera Gallery for awhile now, as I am sure most of you have as well. I may have been able to overlook the ridiculous name of the show, The Street Art Show, because of the incredible line-up: Keith Haring, Jean-Michael Basquiat, Banksy, Blek Le Rat, Seen, Ron English, Logan Hicks, Crash, The London Police, Nick Walker, How & Nosm, Saber, ROA, D*Face, Sweet Toof, Mr. Jago, b., Swoon, Kid Zoom, ALEXONE, Anthony Lister, Alexandrous Vasmoulakis and Rich Simmons, but then I remembered that this is still a show put on by Opera Gallery, the home of the beloved Mr. Brainwash. They do put on good show as well as some really shit ones, and I really do want this to be good, but that association still leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Plus I cannot help, but feel a bit suspicious since the show is launching on the heels of Art in the Streets.

The Street Art Show seems to be more for the collectors’ benefit who are still salivating over the interest in the LAMOCA show and want to buy more/start buying some pieces for their own collections. Well, at least Mr. Brainwash isn’t an option this time around, although i am sure he will be again soon enough.

The show opens June 17th at Opera Gallery in London.

Photo courtesy of Opera Gallery

TresOhUno

While I should probably be studying for final exams right now, I’m spending just as much time getting ready for Up Close and Personal, which opens next week in NYC. Check out a preview on Brooklyn Street Art. Here’s some stuff I would have liked to have covered this week:

• Saber has a solo show open now in New York.
• If you haven’t seen NohJColey’s flickrstream in a while, he’s been making some interactive sculptures.
• Faile have a new prayer wheel in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.
• This article does a good job of showing just how messed up the current legal system is when looking at graffiti.
• A reminder that street art and graffiti can have a real impact.
• Check out Nuria Mora.
• A Keith Haring show in NYC.
• Peter Kennard is showing at Black Rat Projects.
• New questions about if Banksy’s This Looks a Bit Like an Elephant piece left a man homeless.
• Banksy is selling a poster on Saturday at the Bristol Anarchist Bookfair, and all the proceeds are going to charity. Just £5 per poster. The design is a “Tesco Petrol Bomb,” referencing the recent riots in Bristol over the construction of a new Tesco supermarket.
• Herakut get up in LA.
• Melrose&Fairfax have an article about Jeffrey Deitch’s continued ties to The Hole, the gallery that his right-hand woman Kathy Grayson set up after Deitch Project closed and Deitch became the director of MOCA in LA. Most of what they mention was already well-known or expected and a lot less explosive than Melrose&Fairfax make it out to be, but I’d still be curious to hear what The Association of Art Museum Directors think about this.

Photo by TresOhUno

Chaz Bojórquez

Street Cred: Graffiti Art from Concrete to Canvas is a show opening this month at the Pasadena Museum of California Art focusing on the graffiti writers and street artists who have come out of the LA scenes. Artists in the show include Chaz Bojórquez, Craola, Kofie One, Risk, Jeff Soto, Retna, Revok and Saber. Perhaps just as important, the show will include photographs of graffiti by Steve Grody, because any graffiti art exhibit would definitely be incomplete without documentation out actual graffiti outdoors. Additionally, Retna will be painting a mural on the outside of the museum.

Sounds like Street Cred will be a good compliment to Art in the Streets at MOCA. A number of people I’ve been speaking with recently have argued that LA graffiti has not been given its due in the wider history of graffiti, so maybe Street Cred will help to correct that.

Street Cred opens May 14th and runs through September 4th.

Photo by Lord Jim

This is the start of a story about what happens when the buff men starts acting like graffiti writers and painting anywhere they wish…

LA TACO and Revok have the full story on their blogs (at least, what is known and has happened so far), but here’s the short version of this sad and seriously screwed up story: This legal mural in LA, painted last summer by Retna, Rime, Revok, Norm, Os Gêmeos and Saber, was partially buffed by a private graffiti removal company without the property owner’s permission or knowledge and entering the property required that the graffiti removal company break a fence on the property. This sucks and just shows, if this was done legally, how screwed up the legal system is when it comes to murals. I know there are some cities (such as, I think, NYC) where the city can buff pretty much whatever they want regardless of what the property owner would like to do. Of course, I’m not sure what’s more ironic: that the graffiti removal company basically graffiti-ed this mural themselves by buffing it without permission, or that people throughout the blogosphere (including me) are complaining about it. After all, the mural was painted by a bunch of writers… But I’m pretty sure that what the buff squad did is more ironic and screwed up. Luckily, the property owner was alerted to the damage and was able to stop the buff squad before the entire mural was lost.

Expect more on this in the next few days.

Photo by LA TACO

Patti Astor at Keith Haring's Fun Gallery show, 1983, Photo by Eric Kroll

If you’re the Jeffrey Deitch or museum-hating type, the next few weeks are not going to be your favorite weeks, at least not when it comes to Vandalog posts. I’m gonna be talking a lot about this topic. I could hardly be more excited for MOCA‘s upcoming Art In The Streets show, and some substantive information about the show is finally starting to come out:

• First of all, what lots of people have been asking for: a solid and confirmed opening date. Art In The Streets opens on April 17th.
• There will be 50 artist installations including Futura, Margaret Kilgallen, Swoon, Shepard Fairey and Os Gêmeos. Arrested Motion has some photos of Shepard’s installation process.
• The MOCA iteration includes a lot of West Coast stuff like Cholo graffiti and writers like Revok and Saber.
• Oh, clarification on the last point: The show movies to The Brooklyn Museum next March. Presumably the show will be refocused a bit NYC graffiti for that iteration.
• The show will include some mini-shows within it including a space dedicated to The Fun Gallery, a RAMELLZEE installation and Todd James, Barry McGee, and Steve Powers’ new iteration of their legendary Street Market show.
• Because MOCA is looking at skateboarding as art on the streets too, there will be a custom skate ramp in the museum and Nike’s skateboarding team will be skating there throughout the run of the show.
• There will be a film festival component to the show.

So yeah. Sounds good. Can’t wait for the opening. If this show succeeds, it could be the American equivalent of Banksy Versus The Bristol Museum in terms of impact.

Here’s some more preview images:

Chaz Bojorquez, Señor Suerte tag with ‘veterano/veterana’ roll calls, Arroyo Seco River, Los Angeles, 1975, photo by Blades Bojorquez

RAMMELLZEE, Battle Station, New York City, 2005, photo by Charlie Ahearn

Photos courtesy of MOCA

One thing I’ve noticed through my lack of productivity as of late is that there are a ton of graffiti orientated films and documentaries out there. For the most part many of them are really great to watch and INFAMY is one such bi product of documenting the graffiti scene that really caught my attention. Whilst it may not be all that new to some of you, I was so impressed by the documentary I felt compelled to post something about it here.

INFAMY is an intense journey into the dangerous lives and obsessed minds of six of America’s most prolific graffiti artists. The movie takes you deep into the world of street legends SABER, TOOMER, JASE, CLAW, EARSNOT, and ENEM. With brutal honesty, humor and charisma, these artists reveal why they are so willing to risk everything to spray paint their cities with “tags,” “throwups,” and full-color murals.  From the streets of the South Bronx to the solitude of a San Francisco tunnel, from high atop a Hollywood billboard to North Philadelphia for a lesson in “Philly-style tags,” from the Mexican border to a Cleveland train yard, INFAMY doesn’t analyze or glorify graffiti – it takes you there and brings it to life.

Check out the 10 minute clip above (The rest can be found on Youtube if you look hard enough!).

For more info visit Infamythemovie.com