This is sort of a different show for Signal Gallery. Beyond Punk will consist of artwork by punk musicians (plus Jamie Reid, Shepard Fairey and Dale Grimshaw). Personally, I’m most looking forward to Jamie Reid, Gee Vaucher and Shepard Fairey. Oh and I’m curious to see what Steve Ignorant comes up with. Crass were some of the early UK stencil artists, and they used their albums to help promote the making of political stencils, but (if I’m not mistaken) Gee and Steve weren’t as involved in making stencils as some of their other band mates.
Beyond Punk opens August 12th at Signal Gallery in London (yes the flier says it opens on the 13th, but the private view is on the 12th).
Photographer and street artist JR will be in Shanghai in October during the Shanghai Biennial for a project called Wrinkles of the City. I think this marks the first large-scale series of street pieces in this series. The photographs for Wrinkles of the City (some of which it seems have been used elsewhere indoors and outdoors for other projects) are all portraits of elderly people from cities around the world. In trademark JR style, those portraits are then blown up and wheatpasted in the cities where the photos were taken. JR says that in this series, the older generation represent the memory of a changing urban environment. Wrinkles of the City will take place in Shanghai from October 23rd through December 11th, with a gallery exhibition with Galerie Magda Danysz opening on October 26th.
So I know I have not been writing for a little while, but I have been terribly busy getting ready to move to England. So I apologize, but you do have Aaron and RJ to keep you company and I am pretty sure they know more than I do. Anyways, so Mr. Vandalog himself brought to my attention a gallery show happening currently entitled, “Relationships.” Taking place at Christoffer Egelund in Copenhagen, the show features an array of sculptures, mixed media, prints, and paintings by artists including Victor Castillo, Miss Van, Mike Swaney, and Tim Biskup. As a huge Miss Van fan, I am obsessed with the “S.A.L.M. 2” print. I saw pictures of the original at her show at Stolenspace in the fall, but the prints look just as amazing.
This is definitely one to check out. Here’s the press release:
Mint&Serf SGU (Special Graffiti Unit) is an exhibition at Lyons Wier Gallery, curated by Derrick B. Harden, featuring new work by New York visual artists Mint&Serf. By adapting the visual styling of “Law & Order” as a point of departure, the exhibition pays homage to the longest running television program filmed entirely in New York City. Mint&Serf SGU is a multi-disciplinary exhibition incorporating painting, photography and video that is an interpretation of theartists’ personal encounters with the law in New York City and within their community.
Mint&Serf SGU (Special Graffiti Unit) cleverly captures Mint&Serf and company in their habitat by placing them in their own adapted version of Law & Order. By appropriating this iconic television drama, Mint&Serf: SGU turns photographed moments of vandalism, street-art and nightlife into a series of silk-screened vignettes captured on canvas. In Mint&Serf: SGU, the two artists portray themselves as part of the “Special Graffiti Unit,” an elite graffiti squad.
Most recently, Mint&Serf created and curated original artwork for the Ace Hotel in New York City. However, for the past ten years, Mint&Serf have been collaboratively producing artwork generating a vast range of large-scale murals, paintings, photographs, sculpture and street art throughout New York City and around the world.
Retna has a sick looking installation opening for one night only on July 29th in LA. Rivera & Rivera are saying goodbye to their current location in South Park by letting Retna paint the entire thing. This is definite something to see. Such a shame that the show is only on for one night. The gallery will be open on Thursday from 8-11pm. Remember to rsvp at by emailing rsvp@riveraandrivera.com.
Last week, C215 opened his latest solo show at Signal Gallery in London. Midnght Dreams is his second solo show at the gallery, and possibly third in London (Nolionsinengland seems to recall a solo show at Pure Evil Gallery). I’ve been a fan of C215 since seeing his art at Cans Festival, only months after I first got interested in street art, and an interview with C215 was one of the first things that I posted on Vandalog. In my house, we have a few pieces by C215. That said, Midnight Dreams isn’t at all what I was hoping for.
Photo by Nolionsinengland
C215 has two primary styles that he cuts his stencils. The first, the one that I prefer, is what he does for 1-layer stencils. To oversimplify things, I guess you could say that the definition in those images comes from C215 cutting lines that look like cracks running throughout the piece. This style is the one that’s so heavily influenced by Artiste Ouvrier.
And then there are C215’s multi-layered and often more colorful images. These stencils look like the above and below images from Midnight Dreams. I just don’t like looking at these pieces nearly as much as the 1-layer stencils and the subject matter is less interesting to me as well.
Photo by Nolionsinengland
My favorite pieces by C215 have always been those 1-layer pieces, maybe with a bit of color thrown into the background. C215’s street pieces tend to use those 1-layer stencils. That’s why, I’m loving these two pieces that C215 has put up in London recently:
Photo by C215Photo by C215
You may also notice that the people C215 is making portraits of is different indoors and outdoors. To me, somebody who first found C215 from his street art, he will always be intimately connected with the streets. I tend to prefer C215’s paintings when the subject matter reflects his relationship to the streets. With Midnight Dreams, C215 has tried to distance his gallery art from his street art. It’s a move that a lot of street artists attempt and I think C215 has good reasons to separate the two worlds, but that just results in me becoming uninterested in his gallery art. I’m sorry to say that Midnight Dreams has disappointed me so much, but at least he’s still active outdoors and has been refreshing London with his artwork, since a lot of his work has been buffed since he last painted there.
So now that I’ve gone on dissing C215 for a few hundred words, I’d like to remind readers that there are other opinions out there. Nolionsinengland, one of the art bloggers and photographers that I most respect, enjoyed Midnight Dreams and has reviewed it on Graffoto (and he’s actually seen the show in person instead of just through jpegs).
Midnight Dreams runs through August 7th at London’s Signal Gallery.
This Friday, Barcelona’s Montana Gallery will be opening Escif‘s second solo show. In April, Escif was at Pictures on Walls for Around The Wall. Continuing on that theme, this new show is titled Against The Wall. His show at POW was a big hit, and I think we can expect more awesomeness from Escif this week in Barcelona.
Here’s a teaser of some of the work at Against The Wall:
One thing that surprised me at Around The Wall was Escif’s conceptual video art. Looks like there will be more of those videos in Barcelona, as he’s posted this video on YouTube as a teaser for Against The Wall:
PRISM, that crazy-awesome gallery in LA, has what might be their best show yet opening on Thursday. Come As You Are features work from artists like Clare Rojas, Os Gêmeos, Ed Templeton and Dennis Hopper. The New Image Art blog has some photos of two new Os Gêmeos artworks that will be in the show.
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
A few weeks ago, Lydia Fong (aka Barry McGee) and Todd James opened their Brush Strokes show V1 Gallery in Copenhagen. Finally, I’ve gotten around to checking out images of the show and I feel like an idiot for waiting this long. Phluids has a great set of images from Brush Strokeson his flickr which McGee/James fans should check out, but here are a few of my favorite pieces:
