What Is Pure Evil?

UPDATE: I had an error in this article. Pure Evil tells me that Lister bought a comic or two featuring The Joker right before hearing of Ledger’s death. Not a tabloid magazine. The photo that Lister used for his painting was found at a different time.

Bunny Fingers by Pure Evil at Saints and Sinners. Photo by RJ
Bunny Fingers by Pure Evil at Saints and Sinners. Photo by RJ

Here’s the second of my artist profiles based on the Saints and Sinners show at the St. Martin’s Lane Hotel.

Walking around Shoreditch and Hackney, Pure Evil’s work is almost impossible to ignore. He is undoubtedly one of London’s most prolific street artists, both in how much of his work is on the streets, and how varied the work can be.

PE’s work stems from a fear that something is just going wrong is the world. “I just kinda have this sense of a shit-storm coming, you know, all the time,” he said. In part due to this sense of impending doom, he spends much time researching its potential causes: from the power of multi-national corporations to Milton Friedman’s economic theories and groups like the Illuminati. When his reactions to his research emerge in his work, PE says they often get mixed up and come out as a sort of hodgepodge of fears.

Much of PE’s work parodies or plays on pop culture gone wrong. “I’m trying to summon the dark side of popular culture,” he said.

The PE persona comes from some of his early childhood experiences. When he was young, he would spend time with his cousins in the countryside. PE’s cousins had a lot of guns, and he used to walk around the countryside with guns strapped to his body. One day, his cousins gave him a shotgun and let him go out hunting for small game. While he was out, he “saw some rabbits and shot them,” said PE. “I didn’t think anything of it and then walked over and there was actually a rabbit that had been shot, and it’s that kind of thing where you go ‘what does that actually gain?’” Killing the rabbit made PE realize that death is real and that it can come so easily from something as simple as a gun. “[The Pure Evil tag is] the idea that this rabbit that I killed is now sort of undead and coming back to haunt me.” Continue reading “What Is Pure Evil?”

Asbestos Exposure

Sorry of the lack of posts this week. I’m at a conference in St. Louis (which means that YES, I’m missing the Adam Neate treasure hunt). To make up for the lack of posts, I’ve got two really special posts this week. This is the first of two profiles based on artrepublic’s Saints and Sinners exhibition at the St. Martin’s Lane Hotel. Check back tomorrow for the next one (with Pure Evil).

Asbestos is one of Dublin’s premier street artists, and his portraiture and “Lost” series wheatpastes can be seen all over the world. He’s also been displayed in galleries across the world. Most recently, he was involved in a show at the Carmichael Gallery in LA, and the Saints and Sinners show in London.

Chess Thinking at the Old Truman Brewery. Photo from Asbestos
Chess Thinking at the Old Truman Brewery. Photo from Asbestos

Continue reading “Asbestos Exposure”

Mike Marcus’ Isolitude

Photo by RJ
Photo by RJ

Over the past year or so, Mike Marcus has been pasting up countless copies of one image. His gas mask wearing mannequin can be found across London. Sometimes, she is hidden and just a few inches tall, other times, she is larger-than-life and in your face.

This Thursday marks the opening of Isolitude at Jealous Gallery, Marcus’ joint installation with sound artist Amie Slavin, which centers on his photograph. I spoke with Marcus recently about photography, street art, and Isolitude.

Marcus was born in London, and moved he to Tel Aviv as an adult. He’s worked in photography for over a decade making both the fine art and commercial work.

Though he still does some work in film, he is done with advertising. “If you work in the advertising world, it’s just f***ing s***ty,” Marcus said.

Originally, Marcus kept his fine art photography and his street work separate, but recently they have been merging closer together. Isolitude is the first show where Marcus is exhibiting his work for the street in a gallery setting. The installation will be full of larger-than-life cutouts of his gasmask mannequin. Continue reading “Mike Marcus’ Isolitude”

Know Hope Video Interview

One of my favorite artists, Know Hope, made it on Wooster Collective today for his video interview with Zach Nielson. Check out the video below. The audio quality isn’t great at parts, but the video is worth watching for the images alone, and what can be heard properly is just a bonus insight into Know Hope’s work. For more on Know Hope, check out the interview I recently did with him.

Know Hope Interview from Zack Nielsen on Vimeo.

Interview with Damon Ginandes

Yesterday, I had a chance to chat with artist Damon Ginandes. He has a few works for sale at Presciption Art’s Outside In show, which opens tonight in Shoreditch at the Truman Brewery. I’ve made comments in the past questioning why Ginandes is associated with street art, but I really love his work. It’s got a refined quality that’s lacking in a lot of street art, and the wire relief creates an awesome effect.

Degraw Street Mural. Photo from damonginandes.com
Degraw Street Mural. Photo from damonginandes.com

Although Ginandes did some graffiti in his teens, he first got involved in street art in 2007 when he painted a mural in Brooklyn. Wooster Collective posted photos of the mural, and since then, he’s been associated with street art. Ginandes doesn’t necessarily see himself as a street artist. “Street art is a good jumping off point, but it boxes people in,” Ginandes said.

Waiting Guard by Damon Ginandes. Photo from damonginandes.com
Waiting Guard by Damon Ginandes. Photo from damonginandes.com

As for the work itself, Ginandes uses paints and wire to draw what he describes as “portraits of souls.” The paintings are part of his process of getting to know the souls. “[Outer] identity is defined by factors like music and clothes, not the core of the person,” Ginandes said. In his paintings, Ginandes tries to strip away those factors. Often times, the people are squished together or merged (one man’s head turning into another’s body) like pieces of a puzzle.

Loggerhead by Damon Ginandes. Photo from damonginandes.com
Loggerhead by Damon Ginandes. Photo from damonginandes.com

Although the watercolors are interesting, Ginandes’ best work is his sculpture and wire relief pieces. Loggerhead (above), a piece from his recent solo show “Dimentionals” at The Artbreak Gallery, is a great example of his sculpting. Some artists, such as Banksy, have taken great paintings of their’s and made terrible sculptures out of them. Ginandes doesn’t fall into that catagory.

Ginandes has been making his wire relief pieces for about a year and half, and they are one of the reasons I think his work is so great. The wire relief is hard to appreciate online because from photos shot straight on, you don’t realize how much of the piece encorporates wire, but his website has some videos that show what they are really like.

Ginandes has big plans for the coming year. Besides the Outside In show, he’ll have his work in shows in the USA, and he plans on doing more work on the street. Hopefully, we’ll be seeing a lot more of his murals.

Gallery Profiles: Black Rat Press – Part 2

Yesterday, I posted part one of this interview with Mike Snelle, owner of The Black Rat Press. Part one focused on Black Rat at the present. This half has more on street art in general, and what’s ahead for the gallery.

RJ: Time and time again, art critics say that street art is a fad, and other people say it shouldn’t be even be considered art, but you make a living on selling it. How do you respond to those critics?

Mike Snelle: I think when art critics make bold sweeping statements about ‘street art’ it’s an indication that they have not looked around at the huge variety of work being produced by artists who work in the streets. The very idea that there is something that unites all artists who sometimes do work in a public environment beyond the fact that they put things in the street is a false one. To say that a Swoon woodcut for instance, should not be considered art is a very strange position to hold and suggests that you probably haven’t seen one. So I think the question about whether street art can be considered art is a misguided one. And judgments about whether it a ‘good’ art or not is equally not a valuable question. Some artists who work in the streets are important artists with valuable things to say and others less so. The thing about putting things up in the street is that there are no curators, or gallery directors filtering what gets seen and making value judgments along the way. This is one of the most positive aspects of street art and why there is such a huge variety of work. Not all of it is perhaps significant as a work of art (and nor is much of it intended to be) but to say that within street art there are not great artists is just false.

The fad bit is interesting. The problem with this is the idea the grouping together of a group of artists with little in common and then labeling it as a movement called ‘street art’ and then the media writing a million articles about it. There is some danger in this that it is something fashionable and that when the public get bored of reading about it they move on to the next thing and great artists get harmed in the process. I don’t think this will happen as I feel that people and institutions recognize that there are some interesting and important artists working in the streets and these artists will still be interesting and important artists with valuable things to say even if the mainstream media get bored of ‘the next Banksy’ type article. Continue reading “Gallery Profiles: Black Rat Press – Part 2”

Gallery Profiles: Black Rat Press

Update: Part Two is now online here.

This is the first in a series of interviews with directors/curators/whatever-they-wish-to-be-called of art galleries.

To start it all off, I’ve got Mike Snelle, the owner of The Black Rat Press. BRP is one of London’s premier galleries specializing in street art. In the past year, the gallery has shown work from Swoon, Blek le Rat, Nick Walker, D*face, and many others. Located in Shoreditch, behind Cargo and next two a few Banksy pieces, BRP is a must-visit gallery for any street art fan.

On a personal note, BRP was the first gallery I ever visited that sold street art, and I did a work experience there this summer. They are some of the most fun people I know in the art world, and I certainly wouldn’t have started Vandalog without their willingness to let me spend far too much time admiring their shows.

This is part one of a two part interview. I’ll post part two tomorrow.

RJ: What sets The Black Rat Press apart from other galleries?

Mike Snelle: I think galleries are similar to artists in that those that are most interesting have their own unique voice and do not imitate others. I feel that we are developing that here at Black Rat and hope to continue to do so next year. It’s partly a matter of not being dictated to by the marketplace and what’s hot at the moment. It is more valuable and interesting to work with artists that you believe in even when sometimes other people don’t get it. You hope as a gallery that over time people will come to share your belief in an artists work.

Continue reading “Gallery Profiles: Black Rat Press”