There’s a raw idiosyncratic beauty to the street art that surfaces on the streets of Tel Aviv that continues to mesmerize me. Here’s a small sampling of what I saw on my recent trip:
Photos by Lois Stavsky
One of the most active artists to grace the walls of Tel Aviv, Dede Confidential’s work is increasingly moving indoors — as well — to a variety of alternative spaces and galleries. Here’s a recent sampling of work in both settings that Dede shared with me:
Outside:
Inside:
Photos by Dede Confidential
As Lois mentioned last month, a number of Israeli street artists are currently together in a show, Inside Job, at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art. Know’s Hope‘s main contribution is an installation called A Stumbled Forest (Stockpiled Like Littered Flags). Know Hope sent over a bunch of images if A Stumbled Forest, as well as an explanation of the piece.
An accompanying text by Know Hope:
With the abundance of humbled limbs and littered flags
(How we got here, and where we are now)Sincerely swindled, the troubles piled like broken accents
(Like stock, or others’ truths)Burdens like trials like trying/broke-down trains
(Tugging along these two-timing traintracks, persuaded to sing/mumble this damned anthem)We’re all too homesick and so housebroken
(Anxious like stubborn stock markets)But in the distance
(And through these empty spaces and their signaled echoes),A setting sun, like an allowing toll-booth, reassures us
that sand becomes mountains become monuments become sand
(Nothing can ever stay precious on a sinking ship)and that barricades are only as decisive as we make them
(So we sway back and forth/forth and back with the motions, hoping to reach anywhere or elsewhere)‘No homeland ever’, the tides hint; ‘No homeland ever’.
Check after the jump for more images and Know Hope’s explanation of the installation… Continue reading “A Know Hope installation”
Herakut’s been getting around. This past week they were among a group of a dozen artists — largely local — participating in the CASTRO Street Project at Tel Aviv’s Jaffa Port. Leora Cheshin — a Jerusalem-based photographer — shared these two photos with me:
Photos by Leora Cheshin
I met Dede Confidential this past fall in Tel Aviv. His whimsical stencils, drawings and stickers could be found throughout Tel Aviv’s edgier neighborhoods. He since tells me that the municipality has been buffing the walls in an all-out war against street artists. This has not stopped Dede from using his city’s walls as his principal canvas. He says he’s only more determined to engage the public. Luckily, he’s been documenting his pieces before they disappear.
Photos: Dede Confidential
Found this wall yesterday across from The Art Lounge. It features work from Mike Marcus, Klone, Foma, and Zero Cents. Mike Marcus lives in London now, but he started out working in Tel Aviv. And Klone, Foma and Zero Cents and some of Tel Aviv’s best known street artists. The only one who seems to be missing here is Know Hope (who, coincidentally, pointed out that Zero Cents and Foma have work in this photo).
Klone is one of Tel Aviv’s most prolific street artists, and lately he’s been making waves on the internet was well. Klone’s recent work has involved a series of “predator” characters that he’s painted and wheatpasted throughout Tel Aviv.
I’ve mentioned Klone before, but I didn’t really know anything about him besides what I found on his flickr. Luckily, I was about to get in touch with him to do a little Q&A session that I’m very excited to share with you.
RJ: When did you start doing work on the street, and do you have an art background?
Klone: My story with the street started in 1999 when I somehow stumbled upon graffiti, I went on trying this thing and got really into since the first time out, back then doing graffiti in Israel meant pioneering it, learning it all by yourself from internet and books since there was practically nothing out there, both writing and street art scenes started to develop only in last few years and still in their beginnings.
I don’t have any art education background but as a kid I was always drawing, building and inventing worlds for myself and the friends I used to play with.
RJ: Where did you get the name Klone?
Klone: 5 years ago I was still into writing my name which was MAKE back then, and through sketching I came upon my first characters, that looked almost the same, really simple ones, same but different, I called them klones – same clones but different, thus the ‘K’, and since then it became my name. I rarely do letter pieces nowadays, concentrating more on image work.
RJ: In addition to your work in the street, you’ve done work for galleries/charity events. What’s different about working on the street versus working in a “gallery friendly” medium like canvas?
Klone: Hmm, I still think that the only friendly thing about canvas is the fact that I can roll it up when I finish painting it so I don’t have to see it or stumble into. But seriously now I see gallery as just another place to express myself with its own terms, It wasn’t an easy thing for me to put my work on white walls, took me awhile to get used to it and be able to really handle it. I still see the street as the ultimate gallery, with the best critics, and the galleries serve as a platform to show the stuff I’m fuckin’ around with in my studio.
Read the rest and see more photos after the jump… Continue reading “Q’s For Klone. Q’s For Klone. Q’s For Klone.”
