Joshua Liner Gallery’s summer group show opens this Saturday evening. Personally, I’m most looking forward to seeing new artwork from Swoon, Dennis McNett, Mac and Kris Kuksi, but list of artists in this show is extensive and impressive: Cleon Peterson, David Kassan, Dennis McNett, Evan Hecox, Ian Francis, James Roper, Jeremy Fish, Jessica Joslin, Kenichi Yokono, Kris Kuksi, Mac, Mi Ju, Mike Davis, Oliver Vernon, Pema Rinzin, Pete Watts, Ryan Bradley, Ryan McLennan, Shawn Barber, Swoon, Tat Ito, Tiffany Bozic, Tomokazu Matsuyama and Tony Curanaj. Oh, and the Swoon piece in the above photo is actually from the gallery’s Barnstormer show earlier this year, so don’t expect to see it in this show.
The show runs from August 14th through September 2nd at Joshua Liner Gallery in NYC.
Once again, Swoon has been using her art to help those in need. Swoon and the rest of the team with The Konbit Shelter Project (including Ben Wolf and Tod Seelie) are busy working in Haiti right now. They are building super-adobe structures in the village of Barrier Jeudi in an effort to help rebuild after January’s devastating earthquake. These super-adobe buildings are extremely cost-effective, stronger than the standard homes in Haiti and are built with locally sourced materials. Their website will certainly explain the details better than my paraphrasing, so check that out.
Photographer Tod Seelie is there documenting the project and the crew’s time in Haiti. Here are some of his photos:
The best way to keep up to date with The Konbit Shelter Project is their blog, where Tod has been posting updates as the building process progresses.
The print is a 2-color screenprint on fabric measuring 19×26 inches. It’s an edition of 60 and is available for $350. What does PBS give you for a $350 donation? A tote bag and an umbrella? I’d take this print any day of the week.
Among the street and low-brow art communities, the Shred show on now at Perry Rubenstein Gallery is probably the most-talked-about exhibition currently on in New York. Shred is a show of collaged-based artwork which has been curated by Carlo McCormick. While Shred is by no means intended as a show about “street artists,” there are works by a number of street artists hanging alongside classic collage artists like Gee Vaucher. Perry Rubenstein Gallery is a major New York City gallery, and to my knowledge, this is the first time they have exhibited work in their gallery by the current generation of street artists (although there is a Faile solo show at the gallery later this year).
Gee Vaucher
After speaking with a few people about this show, but not yet having seen it in the flesh myself, I was disappointed. Most of the people that I spoke with were of the general opinion that although the show might have one or two solid pieces, it wasn’t really worth stopping by and it was generally not as good as anyone had expected. Luckily, I didn’t listen to those friends and stopped by the gallery anyway while I was recently in New York. I can’t figure out what people were complaining about. The show has plenty of solid pieces along with some of the best work I have seen from Judith Supine and Shepard Fairey.
This piece by Judith Supine is one of my favorites that he has ever done (I always seem to say that when I see his work in the flesh, but he just keeps getting better). Unfortunately, this photo just doesn’t do the work justice. The varnish that Supine often coats his paintings with has been lapped on extra thick and reflective here and the green specks throughout the piece are actually fake nails embedded into the varnish. I’ve heard complaints that the work is too reflective, but I have to disagree. Besides, most any frame that the work’s owner might put on the piece would be reflective as well unless they decided to spend extra money on non-reflective glass. New Yorkers really need to go see this one in person. It’s a real beauty.
Judith Supine
And Shepard Fairey’s piece is a retired stencil; in fact, it’s one of the best retired stencils I’ve seen from Fairey.
Shepard Fairey
Shred marks the start of something new for Brian Adam Douglas (did you know that Vandalog recently interviewed Brian?), with his collages moving from portraits to a new narrative subject matter:
Brian Adam Douglas
Finally, there is Swoon’s contribution to Shred. While I’m not really liking this new image that she’s been using recently (the man’s head looks like more of a caricature than her typical portraits which bring out the inner beauty of her subjects), the collaged details are what makes this piece so interesting. It’s definitely not a typical Swoon. For this work, Swoon has taken to doing Fairey-like collages of newspaper artists and tiny screenprints in the background of the work. Unfortunately, I don’t have an image that really shows these off well, but the small screenprinted designs towards the bottom of the work are stunning.
Swoon
Shred runs at Perry Rubenstein Gallery in New York City through August 27th, and I urge you to go have a look in person.
Photos courtesy of the artists and Perry Rubenstein Gallery
This Os Gêmeos work was made using unused parts of Swoon's installation
The urban art event of the summer took place over the weekend at the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego (MCASD). Viva La Revolucion is a massive show. On Vandalog, we’ve been covering the outdoorparts of the show, but there’s a major indoor component as well.
Calma
Of course, our friends at Arrested Motion were at MCASD with cameras. Elisa Carmichael was in the space a bit early and caught some of the artists working, and AM’s San Diego correspondents made sure to take plenty of photos on the opening evening. From what I hear though, these photographs still don’t capture the entire indoor show. There’s an entire room full of Banksy prints, and probably some more things that I haven’t heard about yet.
Looks like JR has replicated his installation that was at Lazarides a while back. It’s a room covered in posters of his contact sheets, with a film about his flavela project playing:
Swoon’s installation is another iteration of her Konbit Shelter project, which will culminate in her building shelters in Haiti:
I know I mentioned this show in the Invasion of San Diego post, but I figured I would go into a little more depth with it, since it is opening July 18th to the public.
The Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego (MCASD) will be hosting one of the first street art museum exhibits in the middle of July. Citing the cultural influence of art in cities, “Viva La Revolucion” brings together some of the most high profile street artists today that have made an impact on city spaces with their socio-political works. Not only will the exhibit be one of the broadest street art museum displays ever curated, but the city of San Diego will also pay host to several public works created in currently unknown locations by some of the featured artists. Invader’s pieces are just one of the public works, with more pieces surly to follow by the likes of Shepard Fairey, Os Gemeos, and Blu and David Ellis, and possibly Banksy. I cannot wait to see what comes of this.
Os Gemeos. Photo by apwbATTACK
Here is a complete list of the artists participating:
Akay
Banksy
Blu
Mark Bradford
William Cordova
Date Farmers
Stephan Doitschinoff
Dr. Lakra
Dzine
David Ellis
FAILE
Shepard Fairey
Invader
JR
Barry McGee
Ryan McGinness
Moris
Os Gemeos
Swoon
Vhils
A couple new things have been popping up as of late. Overunder is back in town, along with a couple new lovely pieces from Swoon alongside some fresh Imminent Disaster up in the mix. Mint and Serf have been engaged in a campaign to reset some street spots in an effort to challenge people to “just put better work out there.” Whatever that means, I was not spared from the apparent critique.
Looks like this piece by Swoon is finally going to hit the auction block at Phillips de Pury next week. Last March, the exact same artwork was pulled from an auction there less than 24 hours before it was due to be sold. For that first auction, PdP had estimated the artwork at just £2,000-3,000, a shockingly low number. This time though, the piece is being estimated at £10,000-15,000, which is pretty much what you would expect.
In March, Swoon, Matt Small, Mike Snelle and I spent about a week in Zambia, primarily working with the Shitima School. I’ve written about the experience before and Mike Snelle recently explained the trip to Arrested Motion in a much more eloquent fashion. Now, here’s a video about our time in Zambia:
A few days ago, Gaia wrote about Ad Hoc Art’s Welling Court Mural Project. Here’s a quick update with more of the finished artwork. Becki Fuller and Luna Park have a bunch more photos of the event over at their blog, The Street Spot.
Last week I mentioned that Swoon’s first monograph has been published in the states. On Saturday May 8th, she’ll be signing copies of her new book at Urban Art Projects in New York. She’ll be there from 6-9pm.
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