Secret Wars at Underbelly Miami

UPDATE – LOCATION CHANGE: The Underbelly Show has moved to 78 NW 25th Street in Wynwood, Miami to accommodate the large scale of the artwork in this show. The address on this flyer is WRONG.

The Secret Wars painting battle series will be making its way to Miami for this year’s Basel insanity. Secret Wars is a team paint battle where two teams are given 90 minutes to simultaneously paint two walls live in front of a crowd of cheering and partying spectators. Secret Wars Miami is going to take place on December 1st at The Underbelly Show with Chaz (of The London Police), Wayne Horse and Mr. K on one team and Tristan Eaton, Buff Monster and Kano on the other.

Tristan Eaton and How & Nosm in Williamsburg

Whenever I visit Williamsburg, I tend to stick to the few blocks in the vicinity of the Bedford Avenue subway station. Yesterday, we ventured further south, where we discovered not only first-rate paste-ups and graffiti — but some amazing murals, as well. My favorite is the wall shared by Tristan Eaton and How & Nosm.  Here are a few images:

Tristan Eaton close-up
Tristan Eaton
How & Nosm close-up
How & Nosm

Photos by Lois Stavsky

Anonymous Gallery at Wooster Street Social Club

Ron English, for his recent show at Lazarides in London

Anonymous Gallery, the mostly New York-based pop up gallery, has put together a show that will open later this week at the Wooster Street Social Club, aka the site of the show NY Ink. Flash includes original artwork as well as designs by those same artists that people can get put on them by the tattoo artists at Wooster Street Social Club. Flash opens on September 17th, runs through October 29th,  and includes Anthony Lister, Curtis Kulig (aka Love Me), Dan Witz, Eric White, Greg Lamarche, Kenji Hirata, Kenzo Minami, James Jean, Logan Hicks, Nick Walker, Ron English, Shelter Serra and Tristan Eaton.

Photo by RJ Rushmore

Weekend link-o-rama

Beau Stanton and Darkclouds at Welling Court

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.

  • Contra Projects showed at Scope in Basel, Switzerland. They had work from TrustoCorp, How&Nosm and Tristan Eaton.
  • 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.
  • This is a few weeks out still, but Subliminal Projects has a group show of female artists including Swoon.
  • Lois has been posting 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.
  • If you haven’t in a while, go check out Xylo’s website. Lots of good stuff on there. Especially his supermarket 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.

Photo by Beau Stanton

Vandalog and M.A.N.Y. present Up Close and Personal

In two weeks, Vandalog and Murals Around New York (MANY) will be putting on a pop-up show in a New York City apartment. Up Close and Personal mostly came out of two ideas: 1. Street artists tend to work large outdoors and we wanted to challenge people to make art on a small scale and 2. We’ve all seen artwork in galleries that either would only look good in a gallery but not in a home, or is just too big to fit into a typical apartment and we wanted to see something different from that. With Up Close and Personal, the show itself is taking place in an apartment on the Upper West Side, and we have capped the size of the artwork at 30 x 30 inches, with an emphasis on going as small as possible.

I’ve worked with Keith Schweitzer and Mike Glatzer of M.A.N.Y. to curate this show, and we’re really excited with the line up that we’ve managed to put together: Aiko, Chris Stain, Clown Soldier, Don Leicht, Edible Genius, Elbowtoe, Gaia, How & Nosm, Jessica Angel, John Fekner, Know Hope, Logan Hicks, Mike Ballard, OverUnder, R. Robot, Radical, Retna, Skewville, Tristan Eaton, Troy Lovegates aka Other and White Cocoa.

Up Close and Personal opens May 12th from 7-9pm. We’ll also be open from 7-9pm on the 13th. Then noon-9pm and noon-7pm on the 14th and 15th respectively. Particularly on the 12th, it is possible that we’ll be shifting people in every half hour or so, since the space is a small apartment. The show is taking place at 217 West 106th Street, Apartment 1A, New York, NY 10025 – Between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenues.

Hope to see you in a couple weeks!

Chris Stain

Tristan Eaton’s 3D Art Book launch in NYC

Tristan Eaton‘s new book, The 3D Art Book, is being launched this week with a show at Opera Gallery‘s NYC location. Andrew Bell, Stephen Bliss, Kevin Bourgeois, Ron English, Mat Eaton, Tristan Eaton, Filth, Haze, Travis Louie, Tara McPherson, Kenzo Minami, Mint, Serf, Dr. Revolt & Tom Thewes will be in the show, and the book includes over 100 artists. I haven’t seen this book in person yet, but I’m looking forward to checking it out.

Para Mi Gente – Chicha poster style art at Primary Projects

El Celso isn’t the only artist who is experimenting with Peru’s unique Chica style of posters, a style pioneered by the Urcuhuaranga family in Lima, Peru. In Miami, Primary Projects have a group show opening this Saturday in homage to Chica posters. For Para Mi Gente, more than 50 artists have contributed designs to a Chica-style collaboration. Shepard Fairey, El Celso, Tristan Eaton, Skullphone, Posterboy, El Tono and others have sent designs to the Primary Projects crew who will combine all these designs by hand painting them throughout the gallery. The artists have little control over how their designs will look on the walls, where they will appear, or next to what. This sounds like a pretty unique and risky show. It should look cool, and it will definitely mess with the standard notions of what gallery art should be and look like.

Here’s the flyer with all the critical info you may need:

Some NY art fair suggestions

EVOL will be at the WILDE Gallery booth at Volta

With two midterms exams tomorrow, I’m rushing this post, but here’s a simple list for some of what to check out at the art fairs in New York this week.

I won’t be in NYC for the fairs myself, but I’ll hopefully have some photos to post. Otherwise, the places I will be getting my art fair news will be Hyperallergic and Arrested Motion.

Photo courtesy of Volta Art Fair

Strange tribute

Last month in Miami, Tristan Eaton installed the above painting outdoors as part of Primary Flight. Tristan sent over a funny story though. Apparently, that painting isn’t there anymore. Instead, somebody, not the artist or anyone in Primary Flight, recently took the painting off the wall and replaced it with this wheatpaste:

It’s a strange tribute, or something… Post a comment if you know what’s going on here.

Photos courtesy of Tristan Eaton

More murals in Miami

Surge. Photo by Jeremiah Garcia

Some more of my favorite new murals in Miami, again mostly with Primary Flight. For more, check out my other Miami mural posts. Most of these photos are by Jeremiah Garcia for Ice Cream Man, which is an awesome project all about free ice cream. They have lots more photos on Ice Cream Man.

Joe Iurato and Chris Stain. Photo by Becki_Fuller
Remed (in progress). Photo by Luna Park
Mr. Jago, Ron English and Tristan Eaton. Photo by Jeremiah Garcia
Eugene Good and Tina and Jim Darling

Photos by Becki_Fuller, Luna Park and Jeremiah Garcia.