The Boneyard Project at the Pima Art & Space Museum in Tucson looks absolutely fantastic. Saner, Faile, Bast, Aiko, Shepard Fairey, Tristan Eaton, Nunca, Futura, Retna and many other artists have been brought together by Eric Firestone Gallery to paint old airplanes and airplane parts. Of course, the full-sized planes look to be the most impressive parts of the show. Just imagine watching Nunca’s plane, shown above, landing at your local airport. The Boneyard Project is on display at the museum through May 31st. For more photos of the show, check Arrested Motion and TheFlopBox
It’s 2012, but trailblazing abstract graffiti artist Futura 2000 is still going strong. His latest solo show, Futura 2012 – Expansions, has just opened at Galerie Jérôme de Noirmont in Paris and runs through the end of February. Looks like a big hit. Arrested Motion has plenty of photos from the star-studded opening (and photos of the art too!).
Happy almost new year to everyone. It’s been quite a year, but I’m on vacation, so there’s no end-of-year round up from Vandalog. Instead, just the usually weekly round up (which includes some end-of-year round ups of course). Also, thank you to everyone who read the 7000+ words thisweek about Artists 4 Israel. I know politics is not the usual topic of this blog, but I think those posts are among the most important items on Vandalog all year, as are the founder of Artist 4 Israel’s comments on each post. Anyway, here’s what’s up recently:
We visited Opera Gallery earlier today just a few hours before the official opening of “Abstractions,” a retrospective of the abstract movement that features artists who’ve used the streets as their canvas, alongside such “fine” artists as Miro and Matta. Here are a few images:
David Ellis
Ron English
Futura
SaberSixeart, close-up
The exhibit continues through October 16 at 115 Spring Street in SoHo.
Shepard Fairey had quite an ordeal in Copenhagen. On the whole, I’ve got to agree with Shepard on this one. He made a mistake and tried to make it right, but people still beat him up and newspapers still sensationalized their stories in inaccurate ways. Uncool. That said, it’s worth pointing out that right in the midst of Shepard complaining about newspapers getting their facts straight and being ethical, he writes “I adhere to my ethical beliefs in all areas of my artistic and business practice.” I hate to kick a guy while he’s down, but it needs to be mentioned that Shepard didattempt to falsify evidence during his lawsuit with the AP, so those ethics aren’t always adhered to. Anyway, sucks that Shepard and Obey Clothing’s Romeo Trinidad were beat up.
I’m baking alive here in Atlanta for Living Walls, but damn things are coming along nicely. Nanook and Gaia have finished a couple of walls, including this one. But Living Walls is a busy event, so I’ve been missing out on a lot this week, including some big news from Banksy. Check all that out here…
The schedule for Living Walls is up and finalized. Festivities start tonight. If you’re in Atlanta, I hope to see you there.
Channel4 in the UK has two films of note being shown this weekend: Banksy’s tv special Antics Roadshow (it’s about people behaving badly in public) and Graffiti Wars, which is that Robbo (get well soon man) documentary that people have been talking about for a while.
Brooklyn Street Art and Thinkspace Art Gallery have put together a huge group show called Street Art Saved My Life: 39 New York Stories. It opens next Friday, August 12th at C.A.V.E. Gallery in Venice, CA (not Thinkspace). The 40+ artists (39 names, but some are duos) come from around the world, but mainly New York. There’s a great range of artists from up-and-coming guys like Radical! to legends like Futura.
A group show with a unique and possibly interesting twist is opening today at Eric Firestone Gallery in East Hampton, New York. Curated by Carlo McCormick, Nose Job featured a variety of artists working on old airplane parts, primarily nose cones. The line up includes street artists like Swoon and Shepard Fairey, graffiti artists like Futura and Mare139 and more mainstream artists like Richard Price and Raymond Pettibon. Here’s the full line up… Aiko, Dan Colen, Peter Dayton, Viejas Del Mercado, Jane Dickson, Shepard Fairey, Futura, How & Nosm, Juan James, Ryan McGinness, Tara McPherson, Raymond Pettibon, Richard Prince, Lee Quinones, Carlos (MARE 139) Rodriguez, Retna, Saner, Kenny Scharf, Shelter Serra, Swoon, JJ Veronis and Aaron Young.
Nose Job opens today and runs through August 21st. Here’s a little preview of what to expect…
So I got the latest issue of Juxtapoz in my inbox today (I have a digital subscription), and realized that I still haven’t read the last issue yet. D’oh. So while I get on that, here are a few links to keep you busy.
This is perhaps a controversial statement, but Faile’s print show in LA looks great. I barely mentioned the show here before it opened because I didn’t have high expectations and the print release seemed silly, but damn was I wrong (about the show, still big on the print release). Faile get a lot of crap for their prints, but when they are on, they are really really on.
Lois has beenposting on Vandalog about Ad Hoc Art’s Welling Court mural project, and the photo at the top of this post is from that project as well. Obviously I’m a fan. So here’s even a bit more from Welling Court, over at Brooklyn Street Art.
This show over in Milan with Futura, Os Gêmeos, Delta and more looks great. Especially the Futura pieces.
Someone, possibly associated with Banksy and possibly not, tagged this Banksy piece at MOCA. There has been work put up inside MOCA by uninvited artists, both in the bathrooms and throughout the McGee/James/Powers Street installation, but Banksy has also been changing up his section, so either option is definitely possible.
Abstract Graffiti by Cedar Lewisohn. Photo by KR, Berlin, 2010.
Often I find myself asking why certain artists have not been included in a book, but when it comes to Abstract Graffiti by Cedar Lewisohn, the spotlight is not on who should have been showcased but who has been and what they offer.
This insightful, thought provoking, and perhaps most importantly, interesting book, focuses on the increasing abstract nature of both graffiti and street art. Covering topics as diverse as knit graffiti and street training, alongside more conventional sprayology and pop influenced chapters, Abstract Graffiti immerses the reader in a world of vibrant colours, political statements and folk inspired characters.
Beginning with a fantastic introduction and conversation with Patricia Ellis, the book’s main basis is a series of interviews with both established graffiti artists and new practitioners of art based avant-garde practises. Each interview covers a different topic, my personal favourites being with Barbara Kruger, Futura, and the interviews on law with the Honourable Judge Hardy, Sweet Toof and Tek33. Juxtaposed alongside some great photos, the book not only provides an extensive review of graffiti and street art, but raises questions about how you yourself view the highly controversial art forms and their impacts on public space.
Sweet Toof's studio, London, 2008. Photo by Cedar Lewisohn (page 11).
For me, the only negative is that despite Cedar stating that he does not aim to outline a new form of art, at times I feel it does portray it as exactly that. However, I do say that with reservation, it’s more of a slight downside rather than any issue or problem. And this negative is completely forgotten when you start reading the final chapter – a conversation with Les Back, a professor of sociology at Goldsmiths in London. Not defined directly as a conclusion, the conversation provides a perfect ending to the book and rightly so. Les’s clear passion for graffiti and street art comes to the fore whilst you read questions and answers on society, race, and London’s over jealous planning authorities. Often these topics are not usually raised, or in fact covered, in the usual run of the mill street art book, but this book is not run of the mill, it’s a fantastically written and completely absorbing.
In short, I think everyone interested in art should pick up a copy and get reading. It’s thoroughly enjoyable and I highly recommend it.
Escif - Insiders, Valencia 2010. Photo by Escif (page 158).
More information can be found here on the Merrell Publishers website.
Photos courtesy of Merrell Publishers. By KR, Cedar Lewisohn, and Escif.
