Stavanger’s Nuart festival is well under way right now with some huge walls finished or in progress. This year’s Nuart is called The “Landmark” Series, and artists are not taking the challenge lightly. While in Stavanger last year, I thought that the city had been pretty transformed by street art, but now things are getting bigger than ever. A few weeks ago, Elisa posted here about Dotmasters’ Toy piece, but that’s just the start of what’s been going on.
Vhils in progressEVOL didn't actually go huge, but he made a bunch of these (check out the Know Hope tag that was already on the box)Alexandros Vasmoulakis
And I mentioned this piece by Blu and Ericailcane a while back, but didn’t actually post photos, so here are some photos of it:
Roa’s been doing a lot of traveling recently. There’s his work at Nuart, Infart, Critica Urbana and here are a few of the pieces he did at Popup! 2010 in Ancona (click the images to see them large).
Check out the work by Blu and Ericailcane in the background
Check out more from Roa and others at Popup! on Unurth.
I meant to write about this show weeks ago, but I kept debating whether to stay true to my snarky self and write what I really think about Buff Monster’s latest solo show at Corey Helford Gallery. Finally, and by my peers’ encouragement, I sad “screw it” and am just going to be honest. The work is terrible. Not to hate on cute cartoon art because some artists do it pretty well at times, but Buff Monster’s one dimensional childish monsters remind me of scratch and sniff stickers or the sadistic product of Lisa Frank and Hello Kitty. On the streets, the characters look cutesy, colorful and fun, but within gallery walls they translate as shallow and not genuine.
The following pictures are several works featured in the current show. Inspired by what looks like complete anarchy in Candy Land, an emo Spongebob on hallucinogenic drugs, and a futuristic mythical anime world, the pieces display little design concept and thought. The whole show further saddens me about the art world, since many outlets praised the works with no critical eye. Those reviews are fluff, just like Buff Monster’s art.
Ultimately, in my opinion, Corey Helford made a huge mistake with this show. After forging a name internationally for their curatorial work in collaboration with the Bristol Museum with Art from the New World (one of the best urban art group shows to date), this show confuses me as to why they would plan and host such an atrocity. As a gallery well known for marketing and branding of their artists and exhibits, Buff Monster seems like the perfect choice for just that, since all he stands on is those aspects.
There is a major debate raging in the art world whether street art can translate inside gallery walls, but Buff Monster’s show gives another point to the doubters. Maybe if there was an installation, sculptures, or even a giant mountain of his plush toy in the gallery, I may not be so harsh. But Buff Monster’s work is so commercial that it has to be branded as such, because fine art surely is not it. Maybe, next time Buff.
A couple of weeks ago, I briefly mentioned that Herakut have a show opening on September 18th (this Saturday) at LeBasse Projects in LA. Now, there’s a bit more to say about the show. Hope’s Reply will include 10 new paintings, and it sounds like they will all be on canvas. It’s also being said by LeBasse Projects that the canvases will be displayed in a more traditional gallery setting and without Herakut’s usual installations. Although I’m disappointed about the show not having an installation component, it will definitely be interesting to see how Herakut’s art is received in a white-walled gallery setting (of course they’ve been in galleries before, but there is usually some sort of installation or painting on the gallery walls or whatever). So many street artists have a hard time making that transition and maybe use installations and indoor murals as a crutch (though an interesting to look at crutch), but it seems like from all I’ve seen of Herakut that this transition shouldn’t be a problem.
I know this post may be a little late, since the show opened the 11th, but Vandalog was given some great photos of Ron English’s prep work for the pieces exhibited. Taking place at The Opera Galleryin New York City currently, the site hosts a rare exhibition of new and old favorites of English (and yes, his Ronald McDonald makes multiple appearances. Thank God for that). Known for hosting a fellow pop “artist’s” solo exhibition a little while back (please do not make me say his name. I actually begin to taste vomit in my mouth when I think of that sad excuse of an “artist”), Opera decided to take it up a notch and put on a real show this time around pulling out all the stops for English. Paying homage to Keith Haring’s cultural commodity store (or maybe even just a simple play on the “pop” word), The Pop Up Shop, the show is sure to be an incredible display of creative talent. Most street artists experience that harsh epiphany when they realize that that most of their work refuses to translate into the white cube, but English surpasses the dilemma with his sarcastic, and sometimes sadistic, play on popular culture. Exhibiting works in several mediums- painting, mixed media and sculpture, the Status Factory is sure to be a widely talked spectacle of the fall art season.
Below are some of the works included in the show. You can see pictures of most of the works here.
Back in July (and actually again in August), I had the pleasure of visiting the studio that John Fekner and Don Leicht share. John and Don are two artists from one of the earliest generations of street art. John made his first piece of street art in the late 1960’s, and really got involved in the late 1970’s as one of the pioneers of text art and stencil art. Don is probably best-known as the original space invader. In the early 1980’s, Don was spray painting stenciled space invader characters around New York City and making space invader sculptures.
Detailed view
For me, the best part of visiting the studio is that Don and John still own what is perhaps their most important and powerful indoor work. Your Space Has Been Invaded. Our Children are Fighting a Terrible War. Whole Families are being led to the Battlescreen was made in 1982, and it takes pride of place in the studio. With this artwork, the duo actually predicted something that has since become very true: Soldiers are being trained by video games (although the effectiveness of that training may be in doubt).
I feel like an idiot for not getting a detailed shot of the wooden and metal space invaders on this wall. Don’s invader sculptures have some beautiful details.
Canvases by Don
Many of their paintings are on a pretty large scale; there are probably a few stacks of these canvases (mostly by Don, a few collaborations) 10 deep around the studio.
John told a funny story about the above piece. At one point, he was putting up stencils that said things like NY+DK or DK, so when DKNY was launched, friends called to ask if John had started a fashion line!
These little Pac Man ghosts were some of my favorite pieces in the studio. At first they look like cute little characters, but then you realize that the word “WAR” is written on them all, and the reality of the art sinks in.
The painting on the left says "The Loss of Life is Meaning Less"Techno Plaques by John
The Techno Plaques are collages made of CDs.
Detail of a Techno Plaque
The studio visit was a really amazing experience, but John’s place in art history comes from his street art. At some point, I’m sure I’ll do a post here with a “best-of” selection from John’s amazing career, but for now, you can check out his website. After seeing the studio, John actually took me to see some of his street art. Throughout his art career, John has been painting at a park in New York that he has nicknamed Itchycoo Park. It was the site of his earliest street art and he curated an outdoor show there in 1978 with artist like Gordon Matta-Clark. I wanted to see one of the birthplaces of street art, so I was excited to visit the park, but John surprised me when we arrived by showing me some of his more recent stencils at the site!
Back in 1983, John painted the word “Memory” on a handball court at the same site, now he’s come back to reflect.
I cannot thank Don Leicht and John Fekner enough for the opportunity to see their studio. They are two of the original street artists, and with street art reaching such popularity these days, it’s important to not forget where it started.
I think it’s fair to say that while Boris Hoppek has done some street art, it’s not what he is known for. Luckily, didn’t stop Angelo from inviting him to this year’s FAME Festival where he has just painted some nice walls. Check out some more of these photos from Boris’ trip on the FAME blog.
Here’s something from Mathieu Tremblin. It’s sort of similar to that famous Wild Style piece or that guy who painted the flickr logo on walls (sorry I can’t find a link), but I like this nonetheless. It’s called Tag Cloud, as in an online tag cloud of tags. As a computer geek, I can’t help but laugh.
I’m guessing that with college only getting busier (although, as Stickboy pointed out on Twitter, freshman year isn’t exactly the busiest), I think I’ll finally have to resort to a semi-weekly link post. So Things to look at this weekend… will probably become a weekly feature on Vandalog (but maybe with more exciting name). So here’s what I’ve been reading recently:
Street Art: Contemporary Prints from the V&A is pretty much what the surprising title says. Turns out, the V&A museum has a pretty solid collection of urban art prints by artists like Swoon, D*Face and Blek le Rat. This show opens at a museum in Coventry, England on October 9th and UK Street Art has more info.
Tristan Manco‘s latest book, Street Sketchbook: Journeys, will be released at the end of September. Tristan is one of the people that I most respect in the street art community. Besides curating Cans Festival, he has been writing quality street art books for about a decade. He probably knows more about the artists he is writing about than just about anyone else, but he keeps everything accessible to a mass audience. Originally, I was skeptical of the concept of this book, but I’ve since been convinced that it will be at least worth checking out, and will probably be the best street art book of the year in terms of mass appeal (although other books will likely top it for street art fanatics). For me, the most exciting part of this book is going to be the exhibition that Tristan is curating at Pictures on Walls for next month. You’ll probably hear more about it on Vandalog in the coming weeks, but basically all the artists from his new book will be in the show. WallKandy has more info.
Bast has a solo show at Lazarides’ Rathbone Place. Most day’s I’m pretty indifferent to Bast indoors (credit to him for always getting up though), but I’m liking some of this work, and the Bast fans I’ve spoken with think this is some of his best work yet. Arrested Motion has photos.
It’s not a new idea and this video has been appearing all across the web, but if you haven’t checked out this “birds as CCTVs” project yet, it’s about time you do. I ignored it at first because I thought the idea was tired, but this version brings the idea to new levels and the video is very well-made.
One of my favorite art blogs is Street Art is Dead. If you haven’t read it before, it’s basically a no-holds-barred street art blog. Basically, I guess the writer of the blog is anonymous or just really doesn’t care what people think, so he/she really says it like it is and reveals juicy tidbits of gossip before anybody else. Today I want to link to two recent posts from Street Art is Dead. This one , on a topic that will not be discussed on Vandalog because I don’t want to play into the hype-machine, and this 100%-spot-on post about the latest Dolk prints and SPQR’s upcoming show at Signal Gallery. SAiD took the words right out of my mouth about SPQR and Dolk before I could post that here.
