Coming soon: 2501 at Soze Gallery

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2501 has his first LA solo show opening later this month at Soze Gallery in Los Angeles. 2501 has very quickly become a must-have artist on the global mural festival circuit, and so I’m sure we’ll be seeing a lot of new work from him this summer, but his indoor work is equally breathtaking. The show, See you on the other side, opens DATE. Soze Gallery will follow up 2501’s show with a solo show from his friend Pixelpancho in June.

2501 also sent me this text to serve as an introduction to the show. It is written from the perspective of Gargamella, the villain from The Smurfs:

How many lines (circles) (shapes) did I paint (draw), altogether?

The question seems plain. Indeed, actual numbers are often given. But they disagree and – other than variants of “many”- most of them are meaningless because they give equal weight to flea-rabbit and horse-elephant.

The circle shape (form) and its content (lines or void or macchie) discourage the search for a single numerical answer.

With minimal aesthetic of the monotone use of color (variations of black and white with glance of gold and fluo steam) 2.501 questions the deeper meaning of a propensity toward abstraction and toward infinity.

Playing hide and seek with lines and into circles, 2501 creates a vast moving image pervaded by dialectic between seriality –(reality) and disruption, between repetition and variation. (Roughness and smoothness)

Lines highlight the dynamics of graphic influences trough a constant evocative crescendo of juxtaposing and layering; video, tools, images and sounds trace a living path that weaves between explosions and silence, devastation and contemplation, (rise and fall).

Acting as a portal to somewhere else and as a threshold to the exhibition, the circles reveal a process of hidden connections and cuts, became a bridge without linear shape through which the comprehension of the ways of seeing are challenged. Evolving (animated) surface suggest vertiginous ways of experiencing / seeing/ visualizing, according to the point of view that sight is continually active, continually moving, continually holding things in a circle around itself, constituting what is present to people as they are.

How many circle (lines) (shape) will I paint (draw), altogether? I don’t know but I keep looking for (looking at- we only see what we look at) an infinite (we never look at just one thing) numerical answer. Because the relation between what we see and what we know is never settled. And the aim has been to start a process of questioning.

(to look is an act of choice and a process)

Photo courtesy of 2501

Weekend link-o-rama

Trustocorp
Trustocorp

Today I’m finishing my exams and packing up my dorm. Sunday, it’s off to London. Can’t wait. Here’s what I’ve been distracting myself with this week:

Photo courtesy of Trustocorp

Banksy’s “Slave Labour” street piece is back at auction

The piece in question. Photo courtesy of Banksy.
The piece in question

Banksy‘s Slave Labour mural is back at auction. It and another piece (Wet Dog) were up for sale at an art auction in Miami back in February, but both pieces were withdrawn at the last minute after intense media attention, outcries from the local community where the piece used to be located, and speculation as to the legality of the wall’s removal. For more background on the original sale, read this post from February.

This time, Business Insider (your news site for all things Banksy) is reporting that the Slave Labour wall is being sold at a private event scheduled for June 2nd at the London Film Museum. While Business Insider claims that the piece could sell for as much as £450,000, I think that’s a bit high. Yes, street pieces might one day be valuable, but so far Banksy’s street pieces have failed to reach anywhere near the price that his gallery work has sold for, presumably at least in part because Pest Control refuses to authenticate street pieces. For £450,000, you could get a really iconic and authenticated Banksy painting.

Alan Strickland, a local politician representing the area where the piece was originally located, credits his efforts and the efforts of his community for the piece being withdrawn back in February and hopes to stop the sale of the piece this time as well.

It’s still not clear who owns the wall at the moment, but my money is on the owners of the building where it was painted. Otherwise, would they run to the police and report the wall as stolen property?

Also, isn’t this whole business of naming Banksy’s street pieces a bit funny? These aren’t names that Banksy came up with. They are just names that the media and us fans use to identify the works, but we treat them like official titles.

Photo courtesy of Banksy, aka lifted from his website

Aryz, David Choe and Retna in LA

Vandalog_TimHans709
Aryz and David Choe

These pieces, on two buildings at 7th and Mateo in Los Angeles, were painted last week by three of the biggest names in street art and graffiti: David Choe, Retna and Aryz.

I want to give special thanks to Tim Hans for going out and shooting these photos for us, since this isn’t his usual work with Vandalog.

David Choe
Mostly David Choe
Aryz
Mostly Aryz
Aryz
Aryz, David Choe and Retna
Aryz
Aryz, David Choe and Retna
Retna
Retna and David Choe
David Choe
David Choe
Aryz
Aryz and David Choe

Photos by Tim Hans

Ever at The Painted Desert Project

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“Plastic exercise to describe the alteration of reality”

Ever, Alexis Diaz of La Pandilla and Brian Barneclo just wrapped up their visit to The Painted Desert Project, a mural project in the Navajo Nation organized by Jetsonorama. Most of the work for the project is painted on the small stands that pepper the roadside. I’ll be posting more from the project over the next couple of days, but to start with, here’s what Ever painted.

Click to view large
“The people pray to the goddess of crops.” Click to view large.
Click to view large
Click to view large

Photos courtesy of Jetsonorama

Martin Whatson in Stavanger

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Norwegian artist Martin Whatson just painted these two pieces in Stavanger, Norway to coincide with his solo show at Reed Projects. Martyn Reed, of Reed Projects and Nuart, describes Martin’s work in a way that I really love: “Having seen street art dogged, tagged and generally disabused, Martin Whatson gets in ahead of the crowd by tagging his own stencils to bits.”

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Photos courtesy of Martyn Reed

Thinkspace invades Philadelphia

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LA’s Thinkspace Gallery was just in Philadelphia guest-curating a show at Gallery 309. Looks like the opening was absolutely packed, and with good reason. The show, LAX/PHL, includes installation from NoseGo and work by La Pandilla, Pixelpancho and many more. It’s open now through June 21st. I can’t wait to stop by myself as soon as I finish my exams.

La Pandilla
Alexis Diaz of La Pandilla
NoseGo
NoseGo
Pixelpancho
Pixelpancho

Photos by Daniel Weintraub

Vhils, Vexta, and more in Very Nearly Almost

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Longtime readers will know that I am a big fan of Very Nearly Almost, a British art magazine for street art, graffiti, illustration and the like. Their latest issue has been a very welcome reprieve for me as I’ve turned to it in between writing essays upon essays for my final exams. Issue 22 features interviews with Vhils, Vexta, Cranio, Moneyless, Husk Mit Navn and more.

The Vhils and Husk Mit Navn interviews in particular make this issue worth seeking out. Vhils talks about his early career as a graffiti writer and suggests that he’s still active today, although the work isn’t traceable back to his career as a fine artist or muralist. This certainly isn’t unheard of for street artists who have “gone legit,” but it’s still a bit surprising to hear him talk about it, and about how graffiti still informs his work today. And Husk Mit Navn is an absolutely fantastic and underrated artist (check out some of his work here) who also has a lot to say about how his work is perceived in galleries, on the street, and online. Good stuff.

Although he is interviewed, the one thing this issue doesn’t answer for me is what people see in Cranio’s work. Seems to me like Nunca + Os Gêmeos – awesomeness/originality = Cranio, but people seem to go nuts over it. Is he a really nice guy? Is it just that people are so in love with what Os Gêmeos and Nunca are doing that they’ll accept a substitute when the masters aren’t available? This isn’t one of those times where I’m gonna say a grey wall would be better than Cranio’s work. There’s plenty of street art in the world that’s better than a grey wall but still doesn’t need to be celebrated like it’s the next big thing, and Cranio seems to me to fall into that category. If you have an answer or an opinion, I’d love to read it in the comments. Anyway…

You can pick up a copy of VNA 22 here.

Photo courtesy of Very Nearly Almost