This interview Acclaim Magazine did with Swoon while she was in Melbourne is great. I always love a good Swoon interview.
ACCLAIMmag.com | SWOON INTERVIEW from ACCLAIM Magazine on Vimeo.
Skewville’s Fame, Fortune & Desire – When Ad met Butterfly
I feel I’ve gone rather Skewville crazy recently since Ad landed in London about 3 weeks ago. But personally I believe this is justified, as amongst the increasing flood of street art, the twins are still producing work that is not only unique but is constantly evolving, adapting and pushing boundaries.
Before his show at High Roller Society, Butterfly caught up with Ad, sat him down in front of some rather hot gallery lights and grilled him about his art. The video she has produced is great and well worth watching!
SKEWVILLE – SLOW YOUR ROLL from Butterfly on Vimeo.
Weekend link-o-rama
Well, I’m just gonna brag for a second. Haverford College just got way cooler. M1 from Dead Prez is doing a residency here. Gonna go see him perform tonight in our tiny music venue. And yes, I am aware of the apparent hypocrisy of being a white male at a private educational institution and getting excited to see M1 perform. Anyway. Back to the art.
- This group show in Oakland, CA which includes Deuce 7 looks pretty cool.
- Over on the Vandalog tumblr, Steph posted about the album art that Ron English has made for Chris Brown. I’ve got to agree with her, it’s pretty bad. Maybe Ron was too busy curating this show of South Park themed art, which sounds like it could go either way.
- Loving this photo by Jake Dobkin of a mural by Anthony Lister.
- Here’s a video from the opening of the Street Art Pop Up Store in LA.
- I’m starting to really like Linelinedot.
- Next week, Londoners can pick up some free paintings at Mutate Britain.
- I love it when a street art or graffiti ethos goes digital.
- Some interesting Chinese graffiti in this online zine.
- Colbert sold that portrait of himself that Shepard Fairey and others “made into art” at Philips de Pury and the video is hilarious.
- Slick has done the best artwork to support Japan that I’ve seen so far.
- Zevs made a t-shirt. Not sure if I love or hate it.
- You may have seen this new piece by OverUnder around other blogs, but you definitely should check out his blog to read the full story.
Photo by Luna Park
Printing Banksy – two short films about his 2006 LA print series
Printing Banksy: Modern Multiples Creates the LA Prints is a short film/interview with Richard Duardo about the prints that he made for Banksy at Modern Multiples back in 2006 for Banksy’s Barely Legal show in LA. The interview was done soon after the prints were made, but the film was just put online last month. It’s just about the closest thing to a behind-the-scene looks as anyone has ever gotten when it comes to Banksy.
As for that whole story in the video about Richard Duardo destroying the screens and test prints and whatnot, there’s more documentation of that on another little-seen YouTube video (and you can spot Mr. Brainwash filming there too).
Printing Banksy via Melrose&Fairfax
Weekend link-o-rama
This week is spring break, so I’ve been enjoying some relaxation and watching too many films on Netflix, but in the mean time, there were of course some stories that slipped by me. Here are some of them:
- Some of my favorite photographers in the UK have put together a graffiti zine.
- So apparently, the name Banksy written on a piece of cardboard automatically adds exactly $68,500 of value to said piece of cardboard.
- Speaking of Banksy, this post raises some questions about what really separates Banksy from the crowd.
- Todd James, Steve Powers and Barry McGee, the three artists behind the legendary Street Market show are reuniting at LA MOCA’s Art In The Streets exhibit next month.
- Mark Dean Veca is going to be doing a live painting event in New York for most of next week.
- Stik’s show in London is at possibly the coolest indoor gallery venue imaginable.
- Becca has some new work up.
- This piece by Snyder has fantastic placement.
- That cool-looking film about the guys who illegally buff graffiti, Vigilante Vigilante, is almost done but needs a bit more money for editing, so they’ve got a Kickstarter campaign started.
- Looks like The Leonard Street Gallery saga from a few years ago isn’t quite over.
Photo by Overunder
When street art and advertisment collide
Yesterday RJ and I got sent this video of a a mural being put up in Sydney sponsored by Lipton Iced Tea. Despite tagging over some work already put there, the mural isn’t half bad. Apparently this is part of an ongoing series sponsored by the brand to create urban art projects in Australia while showcasing their partnered artists talents.
It’s no secret that art and advertising have been hand in hand ever since graffiti style became popular in the early 1980’s. But where is the line drawn between advertising art and art for advertising? And as such, can the work stand on its own as an entity to be appreciated or is it less appealing because it has brand association?
The video led us to further question other examples of this practice in the past and how audiences reacted to the works. I can think of several just near my flat alone- Tron Legacy painted ad on Great Eastern Street and the large scale Converse painted ad that went over the Eine piece on the Village Underground. Last week Vandalog posted about the annual Supreme paste ups depicting a celebrity photographed by everyone’s favorite “alleged” model molester, Terry Richardson. This year it was Lady Gaga who graced the streets of cities and my Tumblr dashboard as the photograph went viral. An annual event though, these flyers usually get bombed on their own by artists. In their own right, these photographs are artworks and can stand next to any Rankin or Chapelle portrait. But does the added connotation of being associated with Supreme lessen its artistic value? And what about artists like Faile and Poster Boy and Aakash Nihalani who amended the Lou Reed Supreme ads? Are those also further removed from the brand because the artist chose to alter the ads of their own volition?
I just wanted to put this idea out there and would love to hear what you guys think.
Photo by Steven P. Harrington for Brooklyn Street Art
Slinkachu Video Interview
Even though this behind the scene video with Slinkachu was made a little while ago, I thought it might be a nice little compliment to his current show, Concrete Ocean, currently on at Andipa. Opening was a few weeks ago, here also are some pictures that Patrick Nguyen covered for Arrested Motion.
Funny or Die: Enter Through The Stall Door
Check out this Funny or Die parody of Exit Through The Gift Shop:
Enter Through the Stall Door – watch more funny videos
JR and his TED Prize wish/project: Inside Out
I’m still not sure how I feel about JR‘s new project, Inside Out, which was launched this week at the TED conference. Here’s a summary of the project and here’s his speech from the conference (which will not show up if you’re reading this post in certain RSS readers):
The basic premise is that JR’s studio will print out black and white photos that you take and send you the posters if you’ll post them outside. There was even a photo booth in Long Beach, California where people could get posters printed instantly, but that has closed. Perhaps I’m being a pessimist, but I am not sure that Inside Out will change the world. I just imagine a bunch of self-important wanna-be Lindsay Lohan’s printing out pictures of themselves because they think it will make them famous. That said, I can certainly see the benefits of this project in the sort of communities that JR traditionally works. The question is, will those communities have enough access to cameras and awareness of the project? And compared to previous TED Prize projects, the potential impact of Inside Out is very different. The impact of Inside Out is just so individual. Not that that’s a bad thing, it just seems odd for TED. But hey, so many more people are being exposed to JR’s projects, and that’s a good thing.
So we’ll see how Inside Out goes. While I’m not confident that it is going to be a success, I’m hopeful.
Photo by raudog
Spending Time With Felix Morelo
When filmmaker Keith Haskel emailed me about his latest video, Spending Time With Felix Morelo, I thought “Oh this is going to be boring.” Keith has made some interesting videos in the past, but he described Felix as “the dude who makes a shit-ton of chalk faces all over Union Square, Williamsburg, etc.” Maybe it’s just a silly bias that I have, but the word “chalk” made me very wary. Seems so corny. But then I actually watched the damn video and it turns out that Felix Morelo is probably pretty awesome. So that’s my story of a bias against chalk art, and here’s the video that’s making me reexamine that bias: