Weekend link-o-rama

A lot of events have been happening this week, most likely so that everyone can make a last minute push in shows and such before the holidays. Then we have nothing to write about. Gotta love when a whole industry shuts down for a month or so.

Blu (photo vua Nuart)

Anyways, so here is what has been going on:

  • Tonight is the opening of the London Miles Gallery “The Idol Hours”. The show is a group show that gives artists like Luke Chueh, Travis Lampe and Scott Young the opportunity to portray artworks from the art canon in a modern sense
  • Factory Fresh will be hosting a Block Part in Brooklyn Nov. 20th with a live mural painting from Gai, Imminent Disaster, Chris Stain and Skewville. The Burning Candy Crew will also be showing new portions of their ongoing documentary Dots
  • New Blu piece in France popped up recently. Such detail as usual
  • Remi/Rough has been busy in England lately. He has a new print released, designed the decor of the new Wahaca Soho eatery, and put up a nice piece in Birmingham with time lapse video
  • Finally, A Barry McGee retrospective will take place in 2012 in Berkeley, California in conjunction with the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive. The two organizations were awarded a $100,000 grant by the Andy Warhol Foundation to put on the show
  • Unusual Image has some great photos of the Best Ever show that took place at Blackall Studios last night
  • Stolenspace will play host to the second solo show by Ronzo entitled “Crackney’s Finest.” The show will open Nov. 19th

The Underbelly Project: Art underground and what I saw

This summer, I sat in a massive pitch-black room and muttered “Holy shit. Holy shit. Holy shit. Holy shit…” over and over again. I couldn’t stop repeating “Holy shit” for maybe for five minutes. I’d been anticipating this moment for nearly a year. I was somewhere underneath New York City. I was waiting to be shown The Underbelly Project. Technically, I was there to take photos, but really I didn’t care at all if images came out or not. Really, I just wanted to see firsthand what was going on 4-stories below the streets of New York City.

Revok and Ceaze. That light comes from the lights that were set up temporarily for an artist who was painting that night.

Imagine Cans Festival, FAME Festival or Primary Flight: Some of street art and graffiti’s best artists all painting one spot. That’s kind of like The Underbelly Project. Except that The Underbelly Project took place in complete secrecy, in a mysterious location and without any authorization. Over the past year, The Underbelly Project has brought more than 100 artists to an abandoned and half-finished New York City subway station. Each artist was given one night to paint something.

Know Hope had this entire room to himself. What was this room meant to be? An elevator shaft? An office? I have no idea.

Workhorse and PAC, the project’s organizers, have put countless hours into their ghost subway station, and now they’re finally ready to unveil it to the world, sort of (more on that later). So I guess that’s why I was in that dark room, sitting in silence, waiting for them to give me a flashlight. I’m still not sure why I’d been extended the invitation to see the station firsthand, but I couldn’t be more grateful for the opportunity. The Underbelly Project is going to be part of street art history.

Surge, Stormie Mills, Remi/Rough and Gaia

Eventually, Workhorse and PAC came over to where I was sitting and lent me a flashlight. I stood up, already coated in dust and probably dirtier than I’ve ever been, and got a full tour of the station. I’m not somebody who is good at estimating the size of a space, but The Underbelly Project took place in a space that was meant to be a subway station, so I guess it was the size of a subway station with a few tracks. The station is like a concrete cavern: random holes who-knows how deep into the ground, dust thick like a layer of dirt, leaky ceilings and hidden rooms. Except the whole station is covered in art. Think of FAME Festival’s abandoned monastery transplanted to beneath New York City. I’m not an urban explorer, so I had no idea that there are abandoned subway stations throughout New York, but The Underbelly Project seems like just about the best possible use of one.

Of course, having been down there myself, I’m going to be prone to hyperbole. Even at it’s simplest, even if The Underbelly Project is “just another mural project,” it’s a story that the artists can tell for years, and it may even be evidence that street art isn’t so far gone and corporate as some people have suggested.

Swoon and Imminent Disaster. Disaster's piece is stunning beyond belief and fits the space so perfectly.

The list of artists who painted for The Underbelly Project goes on and on, but here are just a few:

Swoon

Gaia

Know Hope

Revok

Roa

Dan Witz

Jeff Soto

Faile

Mark Jenkins

Elbow-toe

TrustoCorp

Mark Jenkins and Con. This is at the end of a long and dark tunnel that, at the time, was not otherwise painted.

On my visit, The Underbelly Project wasn’t finished. In fact, somebody was painting there that night. Nonetheless, the space was already substantially painted and postered. I spent that night wandering around the tunnels, taking photos and getting lost (and also scared – Damn you Mark Jenkins! You can’t put a sculpture like that at the end of a darkened hall. I thought it was a person!).

TrustoCorp

And what now? The walls have all been painted and the artists have moved on to new projects. When the last artist finished painting the last wall, Workhorse and PAC made access to The Underbelly Project nearly impossible by removing the entrance. Even if any of us wanted to go back (and I do), even if we could remember how to get there (and I don’t), we can’t. Nobody can. For now, The Underbelly Project has become a time capsule of street art, somewhere in the depths of New York City.

Meggs

Brad Downey once explained to me why he thought Damien Hirst’s diamond skull is interesting. It had something to do with what people would think of the skull in 1000 years, when its original meaning has been lost to time. That’s when the skull is going to become a true icon and object with immense power. In some ways, The Underbelly Project is like Hirst’s skull, without the price tag. One day, decades from now hopefully, somebody may rediscover that old subway station and have no idea what they’re looking at. Hopefully, they’ll just feel that it’s something incredibly special.

Dan Witz. This was the first time I'd seen his street art in person. It's the perfect setting for Dan's Dark Doings series.

Here are some more images from The Underbelly Project, and expect more over the coming days on Vandalog and around the blogosphere… Or you can pay £1 to read an in-depth article about it in today’s Sunday Times.

Stash (well, part of his piece). This is another room like Know Hope's area.
Swoon and Lister
L'Atlas, Mr Di Maggio, 1010, Paper Twins, Bigfoot, Control/Jice. Photo by Workhorse
Faile. Photo by PAC
Skewville, PAC, SheOne, Revok/Ceaze. Photo by PAC

Photos by RJ Rushmore, Workhorse and PAC

While I was cut off from the world…

BETTEN in NYC. Photo by a friend of the artist.

Since the end of May until a few days ago, I’d been more or less cut off from the street art world. I was driving around Europe with my friends. That’s not particularly important, though I would like to thank Logan Hicks, Ripo, Paulo, C215, Nunca and (especially) Angelo for spending time with us.

Here’s some of the things that I missed while I was away…

  • Penny’s latest piece kicks ass
  • Os Gêmeos have been crazy busy, so here’s one of the things they did: A few paintings at FAME Festival.
  • And Blu has been to FAME recently too.
  • I’m loving a lot of the pieces Skewville’s show Shift Work Disorder at Factory Fresh.
  • Some local residents completely misinterpreted the meaning behind some Shepard Fairey murals and painted them over. Actually a really interesting story. I suppose that when it is a reality of everyday life, people don’t like to be reminded that the police will “kick your ass and get away with it.”
  • Lazarides’ latest show in LA is Eurotrash with Vhils, Micallef and JR. Hi-Fructose has pictures.
  • Alison Young’s book Street Studio had a launch party in Melbourne.
  • High Roller Society has a massive group print show on right now. I stopped by on Saturday. If you like affordable prints and drawings, check this one out.
  • Daily Mail reports that Banksy has painted some pub in Primrose Hill. Reality: It’s a PR stunt by the pub’s owner, but at least now they have some artwork on their walls.
  • The New Grand Tour, a group show including Jose Parla, Rey Parla and Rostarr, is open now at Bryce Wolkowitz in New York City.
  • Kathy Grayson and Meghan Coleman, former gallery directors at Deitch Projects, have started up their own gallery in NYC called Hole. I’m not exactly sure how much street art or graffiti you’ll be able to find at the Hole when it opens later this month, but they sent me a press release, so presumably they haven’t ditched street art entirely. The Wall Street Journal has more.
  • Hrag Vartanian has started an interesting discussion on Hyperallergic about a new piece by Mark Jenkins which could easily be mistaken for trash. And by the way, if you don’t already read Hyperallergic, you should start. It’s perhaps my favorite art blog at the moment.
  • Armsrock has a solo show on right now at Signal Gallery. I’m going to check it out tomorrow, but based on the photos on Arrested Motion, I couldn’t be more excited. Armsrock is massively talented and just keeps getting better.

Willoughby Windows v2.0

Skewville

Daryll Peirce sent me these photos from Willoughby Windows v2.0, the latest version of Ad Hoc Art’s Willoughby Windows project (the first event took place last June). Willoughby Windows v2.0 brought together 15 artists to fill 13 vacant storefronts in Brooklyn with artwork. C.Damage, Chris Mendoza & Pablo Power, Daryll Peirce, Faust, Hellbent, Jef Aerosol, Joe Iurato, Laura Lee, LogikOne, Ron English, Skewville and Thundercut participated in the project this time around. Here are some of the installations they created:

Ron English
Daryll Peirce (finished piece in his studio, later installed in a storefront)
C. Damage
Thundercut
Hellbent

Photos by Daryll Peirce

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

First fan review of Banksy film

First of all, I came across this quote today from Skewville from a few years ago about the potential implosion of the street art world: “I think once there’s a big corny movie that comes out like street art 3d or whatever, then it’s gonna… that’s when it’s over.” I just thought that was funny.

More importantly, urbanartcore.eu has just posted a review of Exit Through The Gift Shop. From what I’ve seen, it’s the first review by a fellow street art fanatic and not a typical film reviewer. It’s great to hear that everybody from film critics to hard-core Banksy fans are loving the film.

Check out this month’s Vogue Italia

Don’t ask me how it happened, I’m still not entirely sure, but if you happen to pick up a copy of Vogue Italia this month, you’ll find an article about me and street art on page 96. I don’t speak Italian, but based on Google’s very rough translation, the article seems to be about The Thousands and me proselytizing street art as “museum quality.” So that’s pretty cool. And, because a. I’m no fashion icon, and b. it was an article about the virtues of street art, instead of photos of me taken by a famous photographer, the article features some pictures from The Thousands book of work by Burning Candy, Skewville, Elbow-toe and Chris Stain, so be on the look out for next year’s line of Skewville inspired tshirts at H&M.

Three events in Miami that you don’t know about

There is so much going on next week in Miami, that some events are bound to be lost in the sea of parties and paintings. I’ve recently come across a few events lesser-known that have gotten me pretty interested.

1. ART BURN: The Most Combustible Art Show in the World

ART BURN, the most combustible art show in the world, will combine an international selection of original art with fire. Original works on canvas, wood and paper by a selection of more than three dozen international artists will be displayed and then flambeed in Miami on the evening of Thursday, December 3, 2009 at sunset. The exhibition/grilling, curated by NYC artist El Celso, will take place in the Wynwood Arts District, within walking distance of Miami’s lesser contemporary art fairs.

An exclusive selection of more than three dozen exceptional pieces by the hottest renowned artists and sizzling, cutting-edge newcomers will be displayed from 1pm until sundown. After the brief exhibition, all of these original works will be burned for the public’s viewing pleasure. Nothing is for sale.

Venue
TBA
Duration and opening hours
Thursday, December 3, 2009
One day only from 1pm to sunset.

SPONSORS

c-monster.net
HYPERALLERGIC
BROOKLYN STREET ART
KINGSFORD® Charcoal

For the latest updates on ART BURN Miami, visit http://elcelso.com/

Artists include:

El Celso, Skewville, Darkcloud, Elbow-Toe, Royce Bannon, Gore-B, Matt Siren, Robots Will Kill, Michael DeFeo and many more…

2. Chimera at Scope

This line up looks great. I’m especially looking forward to seeing Stephan Doitschinoff aka Calma’s piece.

calma
Calma

Here’s the full line up:

Pedro Barbeito, Melissa Brown, Stephan Doitschinoff (aka CALMA), Doze Green, Luis Macias, Christof Mascher, Fernando Mastrangelo, Dave McDermott, Ted O’Sullivan, Jeff Soto, Christoph Steinmeyer, Ouattara Watts, Andrzej Zielinski and Kevin Zucker.

And of course, it’s at SCOPE, so it shouldn’t be too hard to find.

3. Graffiti Gone Global

global

Juxtapoz has the info on this show:

Curated by James and Karla Murray, authors of best-selling titles Store Front-The Disappearing Face of New York, Miami Graffiti, Broken Windows and Burning New York, the exhibition will feature a selection of work from today’s top street artists. This groundbreaking exhibition, set to take place in a 4,000 square foot venue in the Midtown Arts District, will be the largest of its kind in Miami.

Exhibiting artists include: 131 Projects (Argentina), Aiko Nakagawa (Japan), Armogedon 2057 (Armenia), Billi Kid (Colombia), Crome (Miami), Cycle (NYC), David Cooper (NYC), Doze Green (NYC), Ewok One 5MH (NYC), Flip (Brazil), Ghost aka Cousin Frank (NYC), Jana Joana (Brazil), Lady Pink (Ecuador), Nina (Brazil), Shiro (Japan), Smael (Brazil), Sofia Maldonado (Puerto Rico), Suiko (Japan) and Vitché (Brazil).

Graffiti Gone Global Show Info:
Location
3252 NE 1st Avenue
Suite 101
Miami, FL 33127

General Hours
Friday, December 4: 12 – 8pm
Saturday, December 5: 12 – 9pm
Sunday, December 6: 12 — 3pm