The New York Times and Public Ad Campaign have some news abut Poster Boy that, in hindsight, is not so shocking. The Poster Boy arrested on Friday might not actually be Poster Boy, or he might be one of many Poster Boys, or the guy who got arrested (Henry Matyjewicz) may have just been a willing stand-in for that night.
Photo from Posterboy's flickr
The New York Times has the more “news-y” story, and Public Ad Campaign has an interview with Poster Boy about what happened. Fans of Poster Boy should give them both a read.
UPDATE – 11:48pm February 4th: The Huffington Post has an article which says the AP is accusing Shepard Fairey of stealing one of their photographs for his Obama posters. Shepard Fairey admits he used their image and is claiming fair use. Even though I may wish Shepard Fairey would properly credit sources, I’m also a big fan of fair use. It will be interesting to see what happens.
Vallen makes a strong case that Fairey appropriates, without attribution, the images and designs of other artists. He posts multiple examples, including art from the Czechoslvakian Prague Spring, art from the Industrial Workers of the World, Cuban poster art of the 60s and this example (left) directly copying the art nouveau drawing of Koloman Moser (1868-1918) (right).
Fairey seems at ease with his borrowing. In the 450-page catalog for the ICA show, he responds: “This guy Mark Vallen found every reference in every poster and every t-shirt that I’ve ever used. Out of hundreds of images, there’s a dozen or so that were based on things from historical posters. First of all, I’m always assuming that these posters are known by people, so my referencing is not a big secret. These aren’t obscure images… Usually I’m using an image as an intentional reference.” But his art itself makes no mention of its sources or derivative nature, and, contrary to Fairley’s assertions, much of the art he copies (like Moser’s) is not famous enough to be well-known to most of his audience.
Work by Posterboy, Ellis G., and Aakash Nihalani. Photo by Jim Kiernan
Yesterday The Gothamist reported that Posterboy was arrested on Friday night. Jim Kiernan, who was supposed to be photographing Posterboy on Friday, has been kind enough to give us his take on what happened.
The back story is that I started as a writer way back in the day. I dropped that a long time ago but never lost interest in all things street-related. I’m fully digging the Street Art movement that’s popped up in earnest over the last few years. I have many favorite artists but Poster Boy just really struck a chord with me. In my opinion he’s the latest branch of the family tree that begat Keith Haring and Jean-Michel Basquiat. For real, I think he’s that talented.
Anyway I’m always documenting the underground. For many years I videotaped bands (mainly Punk Rock stuff but other genres as well). Mayor Guilani effectively snuffed out many of the venues that I used to shoot in and the NYC real estate market killed most of the rest. So what to do? Well, I picked up a still camera and have made that my thing for the last several years. Of course I’m still all about the underground, the offbeat, the artistic. So I decided to start shooting street art. Not all that original but fun and visual and very satisfying. I started seeing Poster Boy’s stuff underground and didn’t know who he was. After researching a bit I figured out who he was and started following him.
Long story short I contacted him and asked him if he was down for me to tag along and shoot while he did his thing. I sent him a few shots from a session I did with Chico L.E.S., an old school Lower East Side NYC graf muralist. He dug my stuff and we were supposed to hook up some time in February. Yesterday afternoon at around 3:30 my phone rings. I usually always screen everybody but I manage a literary fiction author on the side named Mike Guinzburg and I thought the number was Mike’s. He goes “you know who this is, right?” and I said yeah, Mike. “Nope, it’s Poster Boy man. I’m doing a collaboration with Ellis G., (the chalk artist) and Aakash for a ‘friendswelove.com‘ benefit. Can you grab your cameras and get down here in about an hour?”
Well, the bad news was that I was at work and my cameras were at home. I told him I’m try to borrow a camera and get down there. He gave me the cross streets and told me to call him when I was in the area. I couldn’t get my hands on a decent camera so I said fuck, bailed from work, bolted home and grabbed my gear. By the time I got downtown it was about 6:30 give or take. I tried calling him but got voice mail. Left a message, said fuck it and started walking around shooting street art (I was one block from where Banksy just put up on of his three big NYC full building pieces and there’s a ton of good spots that get hit). I walked around shooting for about an hour, called him again, left another message and then kept on shooting on the streets.
About half an hour later, I was freezing my ass off and my cell phone battery was about to die. I ducked into an ATM on the corner to get warm and to call him one last time. Again, voice mail. I told him I was going to bail and that we’d have to hook up next time. BUT, when I walked outside and there were a bunch of Ellis G. pieces on the sidewalk, including the exact address of the event (which I hadn’t known). While I was on the phone leaving Poster Boy a message telling him I was bailing, Ellis G. was hitting the sidewalk. If that’s not a sign I don’t know what is. Streets are talking, indeed.
So I went to this loft space on the 5th floor. There were collaborations and other pieces on the walls and a DJ spinning. I grabbed a drink and started shooting. Ellis G. came up to me to ask me who I was shooting for and I told him I was supposed to meet up with Poster Boy, etc. That’s when I found out he got popped. The cops had been trying to track him down for a while I guess and his name was on the benefit flyer and said he would be in attendance. They had a plainclothes cop on the street and that’s who nabbed him. Talk about bullshit. We’ve got major shit going down on the streets in NYC every day and THIS is what the cops are spending their time on? Unreal. It was definitely a bummer but Ellis and Aakash got right to work throwing up a tribute collabo for Poster Boy.
I was talking with PB’s cousin for much of the night and there was no update on his case or his bail or anything. I offered to personally post bail on him but we couldn’t get any info. I still don’t know what’s going on but I’m sure that all of this is just a speed bump. No way are the cops going to keep Poster Boy down. He’s got all of the right ideas and some of the purest artistic intentions I’ve seen so I’m sure we’ll be hearing from him again soon.
Thanks to Jim Kiernan for his help and for the photo at the top of this post. Hopefully Posterboy will be back out on the streets soon.
Last night before a benefit he was scheduled to participate in at a loft in Soho, the street artist known as Poster Boy was arrested by an undercover cop. Poster Boy was listed on a flyer for the event, a festival put on for Friends We Love, a series of videos documenting the process of a dozen different artists, including Poster Boy, who talked with us just last week.
Photographer Jim Kiernan tipped us off to the arrest. He arrived at event at Broadway and Howard Street to meet up with Poster Boy around 7 p.m., but police had already arrived after spotting the Poster Boy’s name on the flyer. Kiernan says, “There was an undercover cop on the block and they came and picked him up. As far as I know, he’s still in Central Booking right now and waiting to get in front of a judge…It’s the second time they’ve gotten him.”
Just got this news today which is very exciting for Herakut fans. The German duo will be at Phillips de Pury in March to present and discuss their work. All the info below. Hope to see you there.
14th March
Phillips de Pury & Company – Saturday Sale
AUCTION March 14th 12 pm
VIEWING March 10th – 12th
RECEPTION March 10th 6-8pm
At the sale’s opening reception on March 10 Herakut will display four works on canvas showing the level of completion of a single piece. The artists will be in the gallery to discuss their work and present their unique piece “YOU SURE?” made especially to benefit the charity War Child. The piece provides a fantastic opportunity for the public to acquire a unique work of art while contributing to an important organization: War Child, an international charity that aims to protect children living in the world’s most dangerous war zones.
“I am extremely grateful that Herakut have chosen to support War Child in this fantastic way. War Child has a strong history of support from the art world and we’re pleased this can continue with such talented and original artists. The support of Saturday@Phillips for this project has also been outstanding. The auction on this piece will raise vital funds for our work with some of the most marginalized children affected by war”. Mark Waddington, CEO War Child.
Everybody’s been talking about how the recession is going to destroy every part of our economy, and yeah, it probably will, but it’s not all bad new… street art might actually get a boost in the long run thanks to this economic downturn.
Here are three possible advantages for street art in this recession:
1. The not very talented artists who have found their way into galleries are going to be put in their place.
So many people have been buying street art either for the name of the artist, or just because it is street art. This year, some collectors are concerned that even great artists won’t sell much work. People have stopped buying for name or genre recognition. Collectors are buying those “special pieces” that they feel are particularly great. At the end of this recession, there are going to be a lot fewer crap street artists because their work is going to stop selling. Nobody wants to buy a piece any more just because the Sotheby’s catalog describes it as “stencil and spray paint on found wood.” Continue reading “3 Reasons A Recession Is Good For Street Art”
So I’ve got a couple things to catch up posting on, so here’s my street art news post about all the cool stuff going on in street art and some of the awesome postings in the street art blogosphere.
1. Shepard Fairey was on The Colbert Report! Watch the video over at Hustler of Culture
C-Monster has a very good post up about the NY Post‘s recent comments about a wall in the city well-known for its graffiti/street art. Naturally, they are not too happy that it exists. I’ve not seen this wall in person, but based on the above photo by f.trainer, it looks like one of the city’s treasures.
I’m sort of squishing three posts into one here, but they’re all related.
From The Streets of Brooklyn. Photo by Stephen_W
1. From The Streets of Brooklyn opened this weekend at thinkspace gallery in LA. The show, curated by Ad Hoc Art’s Andrew Michael Ford, has taken a bunch of Brooklyn’s best and most prolific artists and put them all together to pretty much transport Bushwick/Williamsburg to LA. Looks like an absolutely fascinating show. Maybe something like it will come to London in the future (are you reading this Andrew?) Read a review here, check out more photos here, and go here to see thinkspace’s wrap up of the show.
Work and photo by veng_rwk
2. One of the artists at From The Street of Brooklyn is Veng from Robots Will Kill. He’s being doing a few pieces lately which are a bit different, so I thought I’d post one of those. Woodcuts I think. There’s also a very nice little post on him at the Curbs & Stoops blog, a blog/gallery that I’ve just found but I really like (see item #3).
3. So basically I went to the Curbs & Stoops blog to read that post on Veng (hopefully you all have too). Then I clicked around the site a bit. Turns out, they are some pretty awesome folks. They’re all about getting art to people who normally wouldn’t have access to art. They have beautiful prints for sale at low prices, a blog that highlights some great artists, and 3 projects they are working on that sound great. The first project is Mission District Portraits. This summer, they went on the street and offered to take anybody’s picture for free. Good fun for all involved I’m sure. Then there is A Dollar For Your Story where you get paid $1 to tell a story on video to show the transformation that happens when people tell stories. Eventually, the stories will be shown online. Finally, their coolest project has to be the Mobile Art Gallery. This isn’t functioning yet, but it sounds like the best idea to come out of New York since probably ever. The Mobile Art Gallery is going to literally park wherever and sell art on a sliding scale so that anybody can afford it. Yes! Art for the people!
Next Tuesday the London Art Fair opens, and the world is watching. Bloomberg, Animal New York, The Art Collectors Blog, Artbleat, and others have all been talking about Black Rat Press’ print release Tuesday evening at the private opening: Nick Walker’s latest “Morning After Series” print. this one feature’s New York city and the Empire State Building. It’s an edition of 175, for £475 each.
Nick Walker's "Empire State"
Besides just a print release, this particular print is being viewed as a sort of barometer for the state of the art market. Usually, Nick Walker prints are instant sell-out items for Black Rat, but nobody knows for sure what’s going to happen with so many collectors reluctant to spend. Continue reading “Nick Walker and Gauging The Street Art Market”
