While most of us in New York were sitting in our homes fearing the snowstorm, the Bronx Documentary Center gathered some of the city’s legendary writers and documentarians for a panel. One of a series of events, Steel Canvases brought together Bio and Nicer of Tats Cru, Henry Chalfant, Eric Deal, and Crash to discuss trains. Of particular interest is the groups discussion on the proliferation of imagery and styles pre-internet. Thanks to Ricky Flores, those of us who couldn’t make it for fear of snow or not can see an edited video of the panel’s highlights.
Occasionally I write pieces for Complex.com. This week, they published piece of mine called 10 artists using the internet like the street. List posts can be entertaining, but I wouldn’t normally say that I’m proud of my list posts. This particular piece is different though. It’s a list of visionary artists doing game-changing work that blurs or even completely ignores any lines that exist between the street and the internet. These are the artists I’m writing about right now in the book that I’ve mentioned here from time to time. So consider this post a little teaser of what I’ve been thinking about lately, and what I’ll be writing about in great detailing in the future.
Please check out the post, because I think these artists are doing really important work, and I’d love to get your thoughts on what they are doing. Maybe I’m onto something here, or maybe you think I’m on the completely wrong path. Either way, I’d like your input. So, go check out 10 artists using the internet like the street and let me know what you think by leaving a comment on this post or over at Complex.com, emailing me, or tweeting me.
Back to school on Tuesday. Actually, I’m okay with that. And of course, it means more time blogging because it means more time procrastinating. Here’s some of what we missed this week while Caroline and I were on vacation:
Here’s a little video of Space Invader putting up some of his tile pieces around Paris, directed by Raphael Haddad of Extermitent Production and music by Toby Screamer. My initial impression of this was “…cooler than Kidult.”
From the great minds of The Heavy Projects and Public Ad Campaign, Re+Public has emerged as the collaborative effort to revision and “democratize” public space through the use of their Augmented Reality app. Two new videos have recently been released which show this technology in full effect: (above) the app reacts to preexisting murals by How & Nosm, Aiko, Retna, and Ryan McGinness at Miami’s Wynwood Walls by turning the murals into giant 3D animations, and (below) the app unveils the timeline of New York City’s Bowery and Houston wall, including the work of Keith Haring, Faile, Barry McGee, Aiko and others who have historically left their mark on the wall.
Faile are working on a huge project with the New York City Ballet. It sounds like a bit of a strange collaboration at first, but I’m excited to see the results. It seems like this has given Faile an opportunity to develop new work in a direction that they would have otherwise never gone, and the results that have been teased so far look strong.
I might have asked this question before, but can someone please explain the appeal of Barry McGee’s recent Brooklyn mural to me? The first of the videos here has some info about it, but I need more. McGee has previously stated his objections to painting so-call beautifying murals. The only time in recent memory that I can recall seeing anything similar to the Brooklyn mural is the one he painted a few years ago in Miami, but even that piece included a fair bit of traditional graffiti. Plus, the Brooklyn mural was painted by the billboard painting company Colossal. I’ve got no problem with artist assistants or anything like that, but the whole thing strikes me as McGee just saying “Sure, if Cadillac wants to pay me a bunch of money to license one of my images and hire someone else to paint it on a building, I’ll take that paycheck.” And hey, more power to the guy if he can get Cadillac to pay him for that, but is that all that’s going on here or am I missing something? Has McGee’s philosophy about public art changed?
Faith47 has a show running now at David Krut Projects in Johannesburg, and it looks like an absolutely must-visit. Of course, not all of us are in Johannesburg, so Faith47 has provided plenty of photos and a video. Fragments of a Burnt History was open last year, but the show has been extended and will be open again January 15th through February 9th.
Back in September of 2011, WK Interact installed a large series of wheatpastes in New York City that paid tribute to the first responders of 9/11. He called this Project Brave. Just this week, a video has gone online with WK and others explaining the project plus some shots of it coming together.
