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Don’t Panic and Channel 4’s design competition

The UK’s Don’t Panic and Channel 4 have teamed up for a design competition celebrating Channel 4’s Street Summer, a summer line up of street culture related shows, including the UK TV premiere of Exit Through the Gift Shop and a documentary about Robbo, a graffiti writer at war with Banksy. Don’t Panic is asking for artists and designers to submit ideas to this website, which will then be voted on by the public and judged by guest artist judges like Faunagrafic. There will be 7 winning designs, one from each region of the UK. Each of those designs will then be rendered by the guest artist from the winning designer’s region and put up for two weeks outdoors. In addition, and for me this is the highlight, the winning designs will be featured in one of Don’t Panic’s trademark posters. In the past, artists like Eine and Banksy have done posters for Don’t Panic. Winners also get £300, their work on a postcard to be put in Don’t Panic pack and to be featured in a short film.

I don’t usually post about design competitions, but Don’t Panic packs and the posters inside are quintessentially London, so this opportunity for young artists and designers immediately caught my eye. Plus, I can’t wait to see how Channel 4’s film about Robbo comes out.

You can enter the competition and get more details here. Hurry though if you are looking to enter because voting begins on July 4th and the competition closes on the 17th. Also on that page, each of the regional artist judges have made a video about their local scene as well as what they are looking for in this competition.

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Shepard Fairey Hits Manhattan’s Lower East Side

A few days ago, the Obey crew began hitting NYC. This afternoon Shepard and his assistants were busy on the Bowery and Rivington.

The Obey crew @ work
Shepard affixing his stencil
The almost-completed piece on the Bowery and Rivington

Photos by Lenny Collado

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New Paintings from Old School Legend Fab 5 Freddy @ Gallery 151 on the Bowery

One of NYC’s most active train bombers in the late 70’s and early 80’s, Fred Brathwaite aka Fab 5 Freddy is probably best-known for his work as a film producer, director and co-host of Yo MTV Raps.  He was also, as Jeffrey Deitch reminds us, one of the leading forces behind the movement that brought graffiti into galleries and helped link the distinct uptown and downtown cultures. With a painting on exhibit at MoCA’s Art in the Streets and a solo exhibit of recent work at Gallery 151 at 350 Bowery, this hip-hop pioneer is once again gaining recognition for his visual art. Last night I stopped by the gallery to check out “New York: New Work” that opened earlier in the month (and closes this Friday). There’s a range of mixed-media paintings on exhibit including images of boxers and exotic dancers. My favorite pieces, though, are those that celebrate the bold flavor and brash spirit of old school graffiti. Here are a few:
Photo by Lois Stavsky
Photo by Lois Stavsky
Metro Movement, an allusion to the New York City subway car Fab 5 Freddy covered with Campbell’s soup cans in 1980, Image courtesy Gallery 151

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Barry McGee solo show opens tomorrow in London

From Barry McGee's show at Modern Art in 2005

Barry McGee’s first exhibition in London in 6 years opens this Thursday evening at Stuart Shave/Modern Art. Do. Not. Miss. This. Show. The private view is Thursday from 6-8pm, and the show will be open through August 13th. We’ve got no idea what to expect, but it’s McGee, so it’s fair to expect something pretty damn interesting. His Street installation with Steve Powers and Todd James is a definite highlight of Art in the Streets right now at MOCA in LA. See you there. And if you’re not in London, I plan to take plenty of photos so check back later this week for those.

Photo by What What

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Return of the Vandalog street art tour

Pablo Delgado

Since I’m back in London for the summer, the Vandalog street art tours are back on. Over two years ago, I began showing art fans all of the best street art in and around Shoreditch. Of course, there was a break this past few months while I’ve been away at university, but now the Steph and I are back at it. Starting this Saturday (July 2nd), we’ll be starting the tours every Saturday at 2pm outside of Old Street Station’s exit #4. I hope you’ll join us. There’s more details here. Just email me (rj at vandalog dot com) to reserve a spot.

Photo by RJ Rushmore

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Roa’s first Berlin solo show + some walls

Roa in Berlin. Photo by URBAN ARTefakte

Roa‘s work has made it to the walls around Berlin before, but next month at Skalitzers Contemporary Art he will have his first solo show in the city. Titled Transit, the show will double as the launch of a new book that Roa has made called ROA: An Introduction To Animal Representation, published by Mammal Press. Transit opens on July 9th and runs through August 6th.

While the above piece in Berlin was painted about two years ago, here are some more recent walls from him…

In LA for the LA Freewalls Project. Photo courtesy of Roa
In LA for the LA Freewalls Project. Photo courtesy of Roa
In Chicago thanks to Pawn Works. Photo courtesy of Roa

Photo by URBAN ARTefakte and courtesy of Roa

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More from Ad Hoc Art’s Welling Court Mural Project

I made it over to Welling Court this afternoon — and was greeted by dozens of freshly-painted walls. Some shutters were closed and a few of the spaces were inaccessible, but there was still much to see and document. I also discovered some new artists.

El Kamino, photo by Lois Stavsky
A Memorial Wall by Caleb Neelon and Katie Yamasaki, photo by Lois Stavsky
Joe Iurato, photo by Lois Stavsky
Roa, OverUnder, Veng and Sofia Maldonado, photo by Lois Stavsky
Hellbent, photo by Lenny Collado

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Atlanta in Berlin

Evereman

The perennially positive and southern homie Ola bad, whose smiles glint like the sun, just sent me these nice works he put up in Berlin for his people back in Atlanta. Ola bad explains the rest:

“I was recently blessed to have a trip to Berlin for a group Exhibition at Retramp Gallery as a part of a 48 hour festival in the neighborhood of Neukölln. I got this exhibition from the owner seeing the dreamcatcher project on vandalog which was kinda crazy. I was toying around with the idea of being an “international artist” and how meaningless it is. There are people who put up way more awesome work more frequently than i do so i decided that i was going to take my city with me. I called pretty much every street artist in atlanta and started collecting work so everyone could be an “international artist” Here are the results. ”

The artists included are Ola bad, Paper Twins, Scatterbrained, Evereman and Sherman. Summer is here and Living Walls is approaching! I’ll see you guys in a couple months! more photos after the jump.

Ola bad

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