In what is likely the second-t0-last post of murals from Living Walls in Atlanta, here’s work by Ever, Freddy Sam, Never, Gawd, Labrona, OverUnder, LNY, Sharktoof, Feral Child, Entes and Pesimo.
Photos by Greg Mike, Feral Child and nickmickolas
Even more from Atlanta’s Living Walls… Today it’s Greg Mike, LNY and Jaz.
Photos by Greg Mike and RJ Rushmore
Here’s the mural that Ola Bad (who has no website but can be reached at olabad.art@gmail.com) and Howdy Nater collaborated on for Living Walls.
Ola Bad tells this story of how the mural came about…
This is my first wall which was done in collaboration with Howdy Nater. The wall is out in the West End of Atlanta on the border of two run down neighborhoods, Adair Park and Oakland City. It lies directly along the Northbound Marta Line which is what everyone coming into the city has to take from Hartsfield Airport. Living walls had started a few days before we started painting and we were just tripping out at how much all the out of town artists were talking about all the love they were recieving and how this felt truly like a home away from home. We had decided that because of the location we wanted to welcome every traveller into the city with the hope that they would experience the same feeling as the artists.
Howdy Nater came up with the saying Your Southern Home Away from Home. I wanted to do portraits but didnt know who. As HN was laying out some letters I walked across the street to goto the gas station to buy us some 40s of Colt 45. The gas station had two lines , mine which was barely moving and the other which was flying by. I decided to move over to the other line when I was greeted by a man named Fred. He had two gold fronts a towel over his shoulder and was completely thugged out. He congratulated me on my patience and offered to let me cut in line. We started a converstion when a homeless man i was talking to earlier came in and asked me to buy him a hotdog. Before I could even reply Fred interjected that anyone who was humble enough to ask for food deserved to eat and purchased the hotdog. Fred told me that he had lived in Oakland City his entire life. I was completely blown away by his kindness and the way he treated anyone in his neighborhood like family. I knew immediately that he was the perfect ambassador for the mural and got to work.
The second portrait is of a wonderful woman who is heavily involved in the atlanta graff/street art scene, whos name is Sharon. She and Fred both share the same love for Atlanta and its inhabitants no matter who they are or what they look like. Its rad to think that two completly different people with completely different backgrounds share the same love and the only hope I have is that there are people like this in everycity to welcome and love people.
Photos by Ola Bad
More from Living Walls Atlanta. Today, Marco Sueño. Marco is a photographer from Peru who works with stickers and wheatpastes. He did a few murals for Living Walls. Here’s how he describes this series:
Sacha Project is a muralism, photography and public space intervention that proposes, through a series of compositions that highlight the hybrid nature of icons and objects a result from the fusion between modern urban culture and the andean culture traditions a visual explorations on the peruvian identity, seen from its own transfiguration. “Sacha Project” displays how the sacred and the “Hybrid” create a jigsaw of different realities interacting through synergies and fragmentation.
Photos by Marco Sueño
Over the last week or so, there have been a lot fewer posts on Vandalog than usual. Two reasons for that: This week I’ve been spending time with my family and relaxing, but last week it was because I was in Atlanta for the second annual Living Walls Conference. It was a crazy few days, resulting in some beautiful new murals for Atlanta (like these from Gaia, Nanook and Escif). I’ll be posting more of those murals over the next few days.
For now, I’d like to focus on a massive thank you to all of the volunteers, organizers, artists, speakers and sponsors at Living Walls. In particular, all the volunteers who spent their own money on gas to practically act as personal drivers to all of us without a means of transportation. And while there’s a long list of sponsors, here’s a little shout out to those that I had the pleasure of connecting with: Sam Flax South, Eyedrum, Dodekapus, Atlanta Beltline, Streetela, The Goat Farm, MOCAGA and The Sound Table. The artists and speakers at Living Walls are some of the most talented around, but they are also some of the most fun. So thank you to everyone involved in Living Walls on any level for all the hard work. It was an honor to be invited to speak, and I hope to return again next year.
Photos by Drew Tyndell and Evereman
As Gaia mentioned, a bunch of artists were painting murals last week in Atlanta for the Atlanta leg of the Living Walls Conference. My personal favorite of the walls I’ve seen so far (I was there, but a few walls were still unfinished when I left town) is this one by Escif.
Photos by RJ Rushmore
Living Walls conference was a tremendous success bringing some of the most recognized international street artists to the beautiful city of Atlanta. Inevitably, when you put a bunch of them in one city, some unsanctioned work is bound to go up. Here is a little overview of the work Nanook and I produced for the A. And check out the full map of spots that are still running and or have been buffed here
Continue reading “New Gaia and Nanook Street Work for Living Walls, ATL”
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…
Photo by Elbowtoe
Later this month, Atlanta is going to be taken over by street artists from around the world for this year’s edition of the Living Walls conference, Living Walls: the City Speaks. From the 12th-14th of August, there will be film screenings, lectures and artists painting murals around the city. Living Walls have brought together an impressive artist roster from around the world including (but not limited to) Doodles, Swampy, Gaia, Roa, Labrona, OverUnder, Sam3, Freddy Sam, White Cocoa, Nanook, Greg Mike, Paper Twins, Clownsoldier and Gawd. And I can’t complain about the keynote speakers either: Tristan Manco, Gaia, Ricky Lee Gordon and me.
So if you’re in Atlanta, come out check out the opening party at The Sound Table on Friday the 12th, lectures at the Museum of Contemporary Art of Georgia on the 13th during the day, a party at The Goat Farm the night of the 13th and a tour of all the new murals on the 14th. I’ll post more details about exact times later. And of course, I’ll be posting plenty of photos from the conference as well.
In September, another Living Walls event will take place in Albany, NY. More on that later.
Photo by Greg Foster Photography
The Living Walls Conference took place last August in Atlanta and included some Vandalog favorites like Chris Stain, Gaia, Jordan Seiler and Swampy. In fact, Monica Campana, a recent addition to the Vandalog bloggers, organized Living Walls (and that plays into the series of coincidences of how we met, but that’s a story for another day). Christine Sylvain just posted this short video from the conference:
CONCRETE VOICES from Birds of Prey Productions on Vimeo.
I’m also pleased to say that Living Walls will be taking place again this summer, and in two locations. There will be a conference in Atalanta again in August, plus another one in Albany, NY from the 16th-18th of September. For more info or if you think you would like to help make this year’s Living Walls conferences a success, email livingwallsconference@gmail.com for Altanta or livingwallsalbany@gmail.com for Albany.
