Logan Hicks has sent me images of some new paintings that will be in a show opening May 19th at Opera Gallery in New York. The style is a bit different for him, but something that I’m looking forward to seeing more of.
The show at Opera is a 3-person show and one of the other artists is Anthony Lister, so I’m looking forward to seeing his work as well.
Last weekend, dozens of artists were in Brighton to paint at The Beautiful and The Canned. Here are two of my favorite walls from the event.
Photos by Guy Harris
The Kosmopolite Street Art Festival (Brussels edition) kicked off a few days ago, and it looks like they’re painting some massive walls. Can’t wait to see the finished work. The festival runs through May 15th.
Photos by From Tia and Julius – Laid Back
This piece by Os Gêmeos was painted during their most recent visit to New York City.
Photo by Sabeth718
Adam Neate has at least one painting at Hong Kong International Art Fair. His artwork will be at Schoeni Art Gallery‘s booth. The fair runs from May 26th-30th.
So far as I can remember, Neate hasn’t really shown original paintings outside of London, so this is should be an interesting next stop for his career. Hopefully the Hong Kong collectors aren’t following the results of London auctions too carefully, as a good Adam Neate painting recently went unsold at that disastrous Dreweatts Urban Contemporary auction.
In an interview of Shepard Fairey by Iggy Pop for Interview Magazine, Fairey addressed his legal issues with the Associated Press. While it was good to hear exactly what Fairey’s argument is for fair use in this case and also his thoughts on copyright law in general (a topic I’m nearly as passionate about as art), the real bombshell is this quote from Fairey:
I think it’s fair use, but the Associated Press thinks it’s copyright infringement, and they’re really going after me. It would bankrupt me entirely if they won, so I’m hoping, for the sake of creative expression and political speech, that that doesn’t happen.
The best of luck to Fairey in his legal battle. The man has worked for two decades and could potentially see so much of what he has built up essentially thrown in the toilet all because American copyright laws are seriously screwed up.
For all those Shepard Fairey haters out there who are just hoping that he loses this case, think about the wider issues here. Here’s another quote from Fairey taken from the same interview:
The problem with copyright enforcement is that when the parameters aren’t incredibly well defined, it means big corporations, who have deeper pockets and better lawyers, can bully people. I don’t want to start making enemies in the corporate world, but there are plenty of cases. For example, there is a tradition of certain fairy tales being reinterpreted, and now, all of a sudden, a big corporation that has a mouse on its logo decides it’s going to copyright these fairy tales, which ends the cycle of these things being reinterpreted. What happens with these big entertainment companies is that they start to get a monopoly on the creation of culture. But I think that the more people participate in the creation of culture, the richer the culture becomes.
This case isn’t just about Fairey and OBEY. If he wins, it would be a real victory for artists and content creators in America. Though if he loses, maybe it will spur a change in the country’s copyright laws. After all, the National Portrait gallery has a HOPE painting as an official portrait of President Obama.
And just because it’s remotely relevant, here’s the song “Talkin All That Jazz” by Stetsasonic:
This is the latest in Elfo‘s contextual faces series. I really enjoy these because they are simple, but they provide so much joy. People who see this work, whether they are aged 2 or 92, can appreciate a simple face in an unexpected place. And of course, the location of this face is perfect.
Photo by Elfo
Yesterday, Vandalog was infected with some sort of malicious code. If you visited this site on a PC and were redirected to a “virus scanner,” that’s what the code did. From what I understand, if you didn’t actually install the fake virus scanner, your computer won’t have been infected. Nonetheless, I’m very sorry if anybody was effected by this attack. Anybody else who runs a WordPress blog should read this article to make sure their their site is not attacked as well. Sounds like this malicious code has been inserted into WordPress blogs on a massive scale this past week. Luckily, removing the code from Vandalog was a relatively quick solution, so now the site should be free of viruses and malicious code. Again, I’m sorry if this caused anybody any problems, and if it did, please let me know.
…was installed by Eilidh Short.
The piece, titled Blue Plaque is a project organized by Dirty Square Gallery, the group that organizes artists to put work in that wooden frame on the left-hand side of the photo.
The plaque is a parody of the plaques installed throughout London by English Heritage.
Photo courtesy of Dirty Square Gallery
This should be an interesting show. Mighty Tanaka presents Babel Code: Osmotic Transmissions, a two-man show with AVOID pi and infinity. Babel Code opens May 21st.
As Brooklyn Street Art notes, AVOID and infinity are two smart guys. For me, a lot of the art AVOID pi and infinity make for galleries seems like it could, at first glance, be something drawn in a bored high school student’s notebooks during class, but the end result is much more considered and meaningful. It’s always seemed to me that there is much more going on in their artwork than what I can figure out, and that is part of while I enjoy it so much (kind of like this guy, but he’s even more out there).
The press release:
Thought provoking Street Artists AVOID pi & infinity team up for their first duo show together entitled Babel Code. Peering through a semiotic Petri dish intermixed with sub-conscious communication, Babel Code uses primitive and mystical sources as well as runic references, which charges the works of art with a power and energy beyond the objects themselves.
Babel Code challenges the viewer to reconsider the basic notions of communication and cultural mutation, while providing a closer look into the artist’s own techniques of non-verbal interactions. Building upon a symbolic language shared by both artists, their influences range from a resonance of mixed signals and errant transmissions.
Their symbolism ranges from introverted Platonic deliberation and chemical structures to numerology and DNA; anything and everything from hobo marks and astronomy to grammar diagrams and physics equations.
Here’s some of the artwork for the show:
And here’s a collaborative piece with both infinity and AVOID pi:
And lastly, AVOID pi has made this video teaser:
