Installation Underway for PANTHEON: A history of art from the streets of NYC

As I passed by the former Donnell Library at 20 W. 53rd Street earlier today, the installation for tomorrow’s 5pm opening of PANTHEON: A history of art from the streets of NYC was underway. Huge pieces by Royce Bannon and Celso were beginning to capture the attention of the crowds across the street lined up for MoMA’s free Fridays. Joyce Manalo who curated the exhibit with Daniel Feral shared images of other featured artwork. Among these are the following pieces by Faro and Cake, photographed by Kat Amchentseva. This 24/7 windows exhibition of New York City street art — past and present — will continue through April 17.

Photo by Lois Stavsky
Faro, close up, photo by Kat Amchentseva
Cake, close-up, photo by Kat Amchentseva

Death Warmed Over

Chris RWK

Five staples of New York street art (Veng RWK, Chris RWK, Cake, Luna Park and Becki Fuller) have gotten together for their show Death Warmed Over, which opens Friday evening at Fresthetic in Brooklyn. Veng, Chris and Cake will be showing their paintings, while Luna Park and Becki Fuller will have prints of their photos. Naturally, the show’s theme is death. If you’re thinking of checking out this show, best to go down on Friday (7-10pm). Although Death Warmed Over will be on until July 20th, the opening events will include live painting and a DJ set by Royce Bannon. Check out The Street Spot for more info.

Photo by Chris RWK

Eames Foundation In Urban Art Hot Seat

Elbow Toe

20 of today’s most celebrated street artists recently teamed up with the prolific Eames Foundation to create their very own personalized and re-imagined designs on the seat of the iconic and timeless Eames Molded Plywood Dining Chair. Artists such as Aakash Nihalani, Elbow-Toe, Skewville, Darkcloud, Cake and Peru Ana Ana Peru are a few of the names who were able to add their own urban aesthetic to what is often referred to as “the cornerstone of modern furniture design” by utilizing the chair as their canvas. But what exactly is all this for I hear you ask? Well, the creation of these one of a kind chairs is all part of an online charity auction in aid of Operation Design. Whilst these chairs do look very tempting they are definitely pieces not to be sat on! So get off your ass and take a look at a few of our favorite creations below!

Dark Cloud
Matt Siren
Skewville

See more at Operation Design

Papergirl Project Open Call

Just got an email this morning about an amazingly cool project that has been going on for the past few years in Berlin. Papergirl distributes packages of art on the street once a year. Sort of like Adam Neate, but Papergirl is open to any artists who send in work, and the art is passed out by bike, sort of kids on a newspaper route. Each package contains a number of works by different artists, so each recipient gets a unique combination of artwork. Check out a video from last year’s Papergirl:

Summer is fast approaching, so the Papergirl team is once again looking for artists to send in work. Last year, a number of artists from across the world participated including Various & Gould and Cake.

Details and PR spiel after the jump…

Continue reading “Papergirl Project Open Call”

Great In ’08: Cake Says…

As part of Vandalog’s “Great in ’08” series, which will be running every day for the rest of the month. Check out previous posts here. Street artists from across the world have been offered one post to “gift” to one artist that they feel has been doing great work recently. Today it’s Cake‘s turn.

Who is one artist doing really great work right now?

Cake: My answer would be Know Hope.  Complete openness and honesty presented in a vulnerable and humble form so that we can all relate to it and not be scared off by it. Know Hope creates from a place of sensitivity and openness and he is one of my favorite artists right now without a doubt because I can actually experience his work beyond its form and I am able to feel it’s emotions.  And I always end up feeling good and at peace.

See more of Know Hope’s work after the jump… or read an interview with Know Hope here. Continue reading “Great In ’08: Cake Says…”

Great In ’08: Street Artists Pick Their Favorites

Update: Check out the other posts in this series here.

Unless you live in a strange world where time does not exist, we’re coming to the end of 2008. As my contribution to street art’s end-of-year/Christmas/Hanukkah/winter solstice activities, I’ve organized a series of posts which will run from tomorrow until the end of the year.

What’s so special about these posts? I’ve asked a number of street artists one question: “Who is one artist doing really great work right now?” and given them the chance to respond and “gift” a post to the artist or artists that they’ve chosen.

Starting tomorrow, and continuing for the rest of the month (or at least until Boxing Day), I’ll be posting one of these responses every day, along with photos of work by chosen the artists.

Here’s a small selection of the artists who will be sharing some of their favorite artists with Vandalog readers in the coming weeks:

Gaia

Zeus

Cake

Posterboy

©opy®ight

Cake and The Community

The Mongrel has an interesting interview up with Cake. Cake is a New York wheatpaster, and she was recently in Prescription Art‘s Outside In show. Regardless of whether you’re a fan of Cake or not, the interview has some interesting stuff about the etiquette of pasting.

Cake and Peru Anna Anna Peru. Photo by Ω ohm Ω
Cake and Peru Anna Anna Peru. Photo by Ω ohm Ω

Here’s a short excerpt

“It is strange for me to see long time pasters still go out and paste blindly- with no regard to what lives on the surface before they get to it. Its complete disrespect. It also says something important about the paster- that they are unaware of the environment in which they are adding to/ working with. Which is also strange- I once put a sticker over Naks and then posted a photo of myself doing it. It wasn’t until the community pointed it out that I realized it. I hadn’t even noticed the tag when I was there. My practice changed immediately after that. Now I am hyper aware of where I place my work. I go out with respect.”

Cake isn’t the first artist that I’ve heard say something like that. Maybe it’s a pattern. Wheatpaste artists start out just pasting anywhere, and then, after a big mistake or two, they get conscientious of the rest of the scene and learn to respect it even more.

Wheatpaste and photo by Cake
Wheatpaste and photo by Cake