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Legal mural by Revok, Os G, Retna and others partially buffed in LA

This is the start of a story about what happens when the buff men starts acting like graffiti writers and painting anywhere they wish…

LA TACO and Revok have the full story on their blogs (at least, what is known and has happened so far), but here’s the short version of this sad and seriously screwed up story: This legal mural in LA, painted last summer by Retna, Rime, Revok, Norm, Os Gêmeos and Saber, was partially buffed by a private graffiti removal company without the property owner’s permission or knowledge and entering the property required that the graffiti removal company break a fence on the property. This sucks and just shows, if this was done legally, how screwed up the legal system is when it comes to murals. I know there are some cities (such as, I think, NYC) where the city can buff pretty much whatever they want regardless of what the property owner would like to do. Of course, I’m not sure what’s more ironic: that the graffiti removal company basically graffiti-ed this mural themselves by buffing it without permission, or that people throughout the blogosphere (including me) are complaining about it. After all, the mural was painted by a bunch of writers… But I’m pretty sure that what the buff squad did is more ironic and screwed up. Luckily, the property owner was alerted to the damage and was able to stop the buff squad before the entire mural was lost.

Expect more on this in the next few days.

Photo by LA TACO

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Shepard Fairey Joins Forces with NYC Teens

When Shepard Fairey was in New York City last spring for his solo exhibit at Deitch Projects, he collaborated with Manhattan teens on a huge mural. Panels from this mural are currently on exhibit at Chelsea’s Icosahedron Gallery at 606 W. 26th Street. An April 28th auction is planned with all proceeds going to the non-profit youth organization, CityKids Foundation. I stopped by earlier this week and liked what I saw, as the works exude an arresting raw energy and spirit.

Photos by Lois Stavsky

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Art in the Streets Book

Since we haven’t posted about Art in the Streets in a few days, we thought now would be the best time to release some photos of the accompanying exhibit book for the show. Put together by the curators of the show, Roger Gastman, Aaron Rose and of course, Jeffrey Deitch, the book acts as an international retrospective of art, or as much as can be packed into the pages.

Also, here are some more names featured in the show (and book) as well. These could have been guessed, but now they are confirmed: Jean-Michel Basquiat, Stelios Faitakis, Futura, Phil Frost, Os Gemeos, Keith Haring, Todd James, Margaret Kilgallen, Lady Pink, Barry McGee, Steve “ESPO” Powers, Lee Quinones, Retna, Kenny Scharf, Swoon, Ed Templeton

Again, some were known, but now we are starting to get more of an idea what the show is shaping up to be. I’m still surprised what a well-kept secret it is thus far.

 

All photos via FreshlySerious

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Buff Monster in London

God help us all. On April 28, Stolenspace Gallery in London will play host to one of Los Angeles’ most hyped up street artists: Buff Monster. The show is entitled The Reign of Pink. I cannot wait to put on my Harajuko outfit and show up to the opening smiling and all the cutesy and colorful crap that Buff has to offer. If he paints a wall or wheatpastes in London, well I doubt the paint would be dry before someone rips it down/covers it up/throws up on it.

I don’t normally copy and past press releases, but this one is now a personal favorite of mine to describe this upcoming bastardization of urban art:

Buff Monster lives in Hollywood and cites heavy metal music ice cream and Japanese culture as major influences. The colour pink, a symbol of confidence, individuality and happiness is present in everything he creates. Buff Monster’s creative endeavors began by putting up thousands of hand-silkscreened posters across Los Angeles and in far-away places. His frequent poster missions developed into a productive street art career and he now works on fine art paintings, collectible toys and select design projects. He paints on wood, taking great care to create his images as flat as possible, and his work has been shown in galleries worldwide, often accompanied by large installations. Buff Monster works tirelessly day and night to spread happiness, joy and a love of pink.

I was going to try and retype a press release that would be even more affable than the actual one, but I just couldn’t think of anything funnier than the aforementioned. Ok, I will try to be nice here and give Buff credit where credit is due. He is standing up for all of the real men who wear pink, like Hello Kitty and wish anime characters were real women. Those are causes that definitely need to be artistically expressed. Spread the pink!

Eh, at least he makes decent toys.

Photo courtesy of Stolenspace

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Flogging a Dead Horse: The Aftermath

"F-U" and "The White Album"

I tried to ignore Steal From Work‘s recent Flogging a Dead Horse Show in Bristol last month for awhile, but I just can’t anymore. Originally, I found the concept to be really clever. The marketing and hype by curators who wouldn’t release the name of the artists titillated an audience who know most show schedules months in advance. Not until after the show’s opening did I realize the entire point of the exhibit was to poke fun at successful street artists by recreating their works in a “humorous” manner. Some pictures made me laugh (I admit I did not attend the exhibition), like the Banksy balloon girl spread over five canvasses, but the overall effort was quite poor.

In December, we posted about artist Lush, who put on a similar concept show making fun of street artists, except his art was so much stronger. It felt like/was a real show driven by witty sarcasm, not bitterness and jealousy of more successful artists.  Actually, come to think of it, the Flogging show is a lot like a certain street art blog a lot of us are familiar with, also driven by a nihilistic view of street art today.

Failed "Lost Promise"

Don’t get me wrong. I still love the concept of the show. I just think the execution was an overall sad effort. I feel that this would have been much better played as a pop-up show where the “art” could be sold as commercially viable items, i.e. t-shirts, mugs, etc. since that what artists like Invader, Mr. Brainwash and Nick Walker have become. It could also have worked as a purely outdoor show, with these work put up illegally in a city to get their point across. That would have been a more clever joke and one that a lot more people would have enjoyed.

The Banksy Color Range

A later addition that I discovered the other day is a link to an E-bay listing of the Obey/Ebay for a print edition. Since the work at this show was sold and is now being flipped, it seems there was no true subversive statement being made at all. Just maybe, the curators were trying to make a quick buck over the controversy over the commercialization of street art. If you want to purchase the print, don’t worry, you won’t be paying big bucks for it. There are no bids thus far and it is only 99 p. Plus you get three Banksy color strips thrown in! What a deal.

For the entire photoset of the show visit Laptop Lunch Box’s Flickr

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PublicAdCampaign’s Madrid takeover

Jordan Seiler. Translation - Make love to your city, caress and hold her tightly.

On March 30th, Jordan Seiler and some Madrid-based helpers disrupted bus-shelter advertisements throughout Madrid for PublicAdCampaign‘s latest takeover, MaSAT (Madrid Street Advertising Takeover). Over 100 artists and everyday people from around the world contributed to MaSAT by supplying text which was then printed on the posters that Jordan and his crew installed. Here are a few of my favorites:

TrustoCorp
Charlie Todd of Improv Everywhere. Translation - advertisement for a bad movie
Joe Iurato
Logan Hicks

And the MaSAT project is particularly interesting to me because Jordan is participating in the Street Communications panel that I am moderating this weekend at Haverford College and because both the Schillers and I (Marc and Sara will also be on the panel) participated in MaSAT by sending some text:

Marc and Sara Schiller of Wooster Collective
RJ (me). Translation - Hi Carmen. I hope you’ll smile today!

Photos courtesy of PublicAdCampaign

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Dreweatts Urban Contemporary Sale

Dreweatts is holding their next Urban Contemporary sale on Wednesday, April 6. Whilst I continue to struggle to understand why works by artists such as Lucien Freud, Russell Young and Damien Hirst are included in a sale with the aforementioned title, there are certainly a few lots that are both worth taking a look at and actually fit the sale’s theme. These include eight Banksy prints and one of his Family Target canvases from 2003 (est. 30-50k GBP),  a cool Martha Cooper photograph of Shy 147 precariously balanced between two train cars as he paints (est. 1200-1800 GBP), a haunting Guy Denning canvas (est. 3-5k GBP), a Jonathan Yeo Leaf Study (est. 4-6k GBP) and a really beautiful Adam Neate Self Portrait on cardboard (est. 8-12k GBP). The Neate is probably the highlight of the auction, at least in my opinion. It’s my birthday on Friday if a Vandalog reader out there is feeling generous. I’ll take you out for a drink next time you’re in LA to show my gratitude.

One of the more interesting aspects of this sale, however, is the final group of works, which will be auctioned in aid of Haven House Children’s Hospice. The twenty-five lots that comprise this section were curated by 15 year old, London-based Liam Patel. I don’t normally reprint press releases, but the text below sums up Liam’s endeavors fairly well so I recommend reading it. Stand-out works include those by Mantis, Herakut (pictured above), Remi/Rough and Matt Small.

Liam Patel has been collecting Urban Art since he was 12; now at the ripe old age of 15 he has brought together an extraordinary group of 25 cutting-edge lots to be sold at Dreweatts’ Urban Contemporary sale on Wednesday 6th April, to raise money for the Haven House Children’s Hospice.

Unable to do physical charity work for his Duke of Edinburgh Award because he had a broken arm and shoulder, Liam decided to ask some of his favourite artists to donate their work to raise £10,000 for the Children’s Hospice, which offers vital support to children with life-limiting conditions and their parents. Liam then approached Dreweatts to host the sale in their central London branch at 24 Maddox Street W1 and they were only too happy to help by offering the venue, and any extra expertise.

‘I came up with the idea to curate an Urban Art charity auction as the Haven House Children’s Hospice needs to raise around £2m each year to provide fantastic support for children and their families.  Even though I won’t be able to raise that amount, every little helps.’ Each piece comes with a certificate of authenticity from the artist and estimates range from £100 to £1,200.  The group to be sold for the charity includes works by the likes of Matt Small, Schoony, Handiedan, Mantis, Nick Gentry, Herakut and Arkiv Vilmansa all of whom were delighted to be able to help by donating the proceeds of their pictures.

– Elisa

Image via Dreweatts‘ Urban Contemporary catalogue.