Photo by S.Butterfly

Word to Mother’s show Essence of Adolescence opened last week at Stolenspace in London. S.Butterfly and Paul Nine-O took some photos. Here are some of my favorites, and they each larger sets on flickr.

Photo by S.Butterfly

Photo by S.Butterfly

Photo by S.Butterfly

Photo by S.Butterfly

Photo by Paul Nine-O

Photo by Paul Nine-O

Photo by Paul Nine-O

Photos by S.Butterfly and Paul Nine-O

Back again this year at Village Underground in London, the Moniker Art Fair is opening today and will be open through Sunday. In contrast to the Frieze art fair (also on this weekend in London), Moniker is free and focuses on work by street artists and low-brow artists. This year, galleries exhibiting at Moniker include Stolenspace, Scream, LeBasse Projects, Shea & Ziegler (Frankie Shea of Moniker/CampBarbossa teaming up with Tina Ziegler) and Andenken Gallery.

The program at this year’s fair is packed, so make sure to check it out before heading over, as there are a number of special events like print releases and artist talks going on. Hooked Blog is running tours of the fair and the surrounding street art on the weekend, something I had a lot of fun doing on a more informal basis last year.

In addition to gallery booths, the fair includes project spaces for individual artists. This year, Matt Small, Beejoir, Best Ever, Peeta, Dabs and Myla will be showing work in the project spaces.

Photo courtesy of Moniker Projects

Next month, Word to Mother will at Stolenspace Gallery in London for what is a bit of annual tradition by now: His solo show there. This latest show is called Essence Of Adolescence and runs from October 14th through the 30th, with an opening on the evening of October 13th. Here are a few preview images by Viktor Vauthier:

Photos by Viktor Vauthier

D*face

Stolenspace Gallery‘s summer group show opens next week, on July 7th. All the work in this show, prints and originals, will be new. The artist lineup includes D*face, Dan Witz, Eine, Miss Van, Ripo, San, Shepard Fairey, Word To Mother and a number of others. Check out the full artist list on Stolenspace’s website. Here’s a great little piece from Dan Witz that will be there:

Dan Witz

The show runs from the 7th of July (opening from 6-9pm) through July 31st.

Photos courtesy of Stolenspace Gallery

While Steph and I aren’t fans when he paints indoors, I do like Buff Monster on the street. Buff Monster is in the UK for his show at Stolenspace in London (opened this week), and he painted wall mural in Bristol.

Photos courtesy of Stolenspace Gallery

God help us all. On April 28, Stolenspace Gallery in London will play host to one of Los Angeles’ most hyped up street artists: Buff Monster. The show is entitled The Reign of Pink. I cannot wait to put on my Harajuko outfit and show up to the opening smiling and all the cutesy and colorful crap that Buff has to offer. If he paints a wall or wheatpastes in London, well I doubt the paint would be dry before someone rips it down/covers it up/throws up on it.

I don’t normally copy and past press releases, but this one is now a personal favorite of mine to describe this upcoming bastardization of urban art:

Buff Monster lives in Hollywood and cites heavy metal music ice cream and Japanese culture as major influences. The colour pink, a symbol of confidence, individuality and happiness is present in everything he creates. Buff Monster’s creative endeavors began by putting up thousands of hand-silkscreened posters across Los Angeles and in far-away places. His frequent poster missions developed into a productive street art career and he now works on fine art paintings, collectible toys and select design projects. He paints on wood, taking great care to create his images as flat as possible, and his work has been shown in galleries worldwide, often accompanied by large installations. Buff Monster works tirelessly day and night to spread happiness, joy and a love of pink.

I was going to try and retype a press release that would be even more affable than the actual one, but I just couldn’t think of anything funnier than the aforementioned. Ok, I will try to be nice here and give Buff credit where credit is due. He is standing up for all of the real men who wear pink, like Hello Kitty and wish anime characters were real women. Those are causes that definitely need to be artistically expressed. Spread the pink!

Eh, at least he makes decent toys.

Photo courtesy of Stolenspace

Rhythm is a Dancer is Kid Acne‘s latest solo show, opening next week at Stolenspace Gallery in London. The show will focus on Kid Acne’s art fag characters. While Neckface utilized the pun in a similar way earlier, Kid Acne has done some cool stuff with this series. Also, I think Neckface just did cartoons of “fags,” not “art fags.” Anyway, Kid Acne’s art fags are fun. It should be interesting to see them come indoors (especially since that’s what so-called “art fags” do, right? Bring their street art indoors and sell out?). Kid Acne definitely knows how to have a little laugh at himself, and I like that.

The show opens on the evening of March 31st and runs through April 24th. Check it out.

Photo courtesy of Stolenspace Gallery

Ronzo‘s second solo show at London’s StolenSpace Gallery, Crackney’s Finest, opens on Thursday evening, and Ronzo sent over a couple of photos of the show coming together…

While Ronzo may be best known for his sculptures, he also makes cool distopian dioramas

The show is going to include paintings, collages, prints and sculptures. While my favorite artworks from Ronzo are his diorama paintings, I think most people’s favorites are probably the giant sculptures like these…

Crackney’s Finest opens at StolenSpace on Thursday and runs through November 28th, so get there quick.

Photos by Ronzo

Yes, I know this post is a week late, but give me a break. I have photos! Well, borrowed photos (thanks Sandra!).

So last week premiered the Stolenspace opening of some amazing work by artists featured in the Don’t Panic packs that you find around London. On the walls hung pieces by Shepard Fairey, C215 and Word to Mother; pretty much a whose who of contemporary street art. I especially like the latest piece by D*Face. You cannot go wrong with a Spiderman motif.

I had to laugh though. I guess I have never seen how dedicated street art collectors are, because there was a crazy line to buy the posters. Not knowing what original you were going to receive, guys were walking out with four or five tubes under their arms after waiting in line for over an hour while trying to balance a drink. Eager beavers.

Photos courtesy of s.butterfly

Word To Mother, an artist I enjoy as much for his tags and pieces as his completely different indoor work, has a solo show opening in a few weeks at StolenSpace Gallery in London. StolenSpace actually has a show opening this week about posters that have been in Don’t Panic packs, but WTM’s show is much more interesting to me, so I’m posting about that even though it’s not the next show at the gallery.

WTM’s Blind By Stardom opens on October 7th and runs through the 24th (so I’ll unfortunately miss the opening, but be back in town to at least see the show – more on my upcoming trip back to London soon). This will be his 4th solo show at StolenSpace, with the previous shows being very warmly received. I’d say it’s common for “street art fans” and “street art collectors” to have very different ideas of what is good, but Word To Mother seems to be one that everyone agrees about. Work at his shows sells quickly and the regular Thursday-night crowd are at the gallery for the art, not just the free beer.

I vaguely remember Word To Mother saying something to me last year at FAME Festival about how he was going to be changing things up for his next solo show. While I enjoy WTM’s work, I must admit that I kind of brushed this comment aside as the typical artist plugging himself and feigning growth, but clearly I was wrong. From what I’ve seen so far, these paintings are a step forward for Word To Mother both in style and content.

The themes behind Blind By Stardom are meant to be celebrity culture and how people consume media. This is definitely something that a lot of artists deal with, but WTM doesn’t seem to be as annoying about it as so many Banksy-wannabes (and even sometimes masters like Ron English) are. I’m looking at these paintings and getting the message, but I don’t feel like I’m beaten over the head with it.

This is one show not to miss, so make sure to stop by Stolenspace between October 7th and 24th.

Blind By Stardom opens October 7th from 6-9pm.

Photos courtesy of Stolenspace Gallery