"We are free artists outside" is about the only English sentence you can find that describes the Malmö Streets Project, but it's all you'll need. The images speak for themselves.
Malmö, Sweden is home to a guerrilla beautification project that works with a ubiquitous element of urban life: The sidewalk. A group of artists have taken to pulling up the tiles that compose the city's walkways, and has replaced them with various vibrant works of art that range from decorative to compositions with a message.
Some have text blurbs--like the aforementioned "We are free artists outside"--while others add color, icons or pictures to the concrete sea of gray and red squares. It goes to show that street art doesn't always have to be big and bold.
Paris-based photographer and street artist JR thinks bigger than most of his peers. His black-and-white wheat-pasted images are gargantuan in scale, taking over entire faces of buildings and extending to the rooftops.
His work is often subtly socially conscious. JR takes evocative photographs of marginalized people from around the world and blows them up to massive proportions. Towering over you, it's difficult to escape thinking about who these people are, and what their stories are.
One of his latest projects is located in Soho in London. It depicts residents from the favelas of Rio de Janeiro, and was installed to coincide with his solo show at the Lazarides Gallery
Nowadays, the words "street art" usually conjure up images of quirky Banksy murals or upscale galleries hosting graffiti battles.
But the new exhibit Street Art, Street Life focuses on images of a very different kind--photography that documents New York's fast-paced and posture-heavy sidewalk culture, from the 1950s through today.
The show offers a simple focus on people in the city and how they've inspired artists throughout the years--the kind of straightforward concept that's hard to find in the compartmentalized downtown art world. Not surprisingly, it's far from downtown at the Bronx Museum of the Arts. The show, which opened this weekend, runs through January 15.
Next time you're in Reno, Nevada, take a little gambling break and keep your eyes peeled for the subversive street art of the Glenn Group.
The group recently won an award at the 2008 Society for Environmental Graphic Design Awards for guerrilla street signs illegally installed around the city to commemorate Valentine's Day and Christmas. The signs, which featured feel good sayings like "Love your enemies" and "Reindeer parking only" were designed to look official, down to the reflective metallic letters and everything.
Reno isn't known for it's street art, and the Glenn Group was hoping to add some subtle excitement and playfulness through symbols of daily life. Probably a good idea. Better to start small, than say, bombing the side of a building with a huge graffiti mural.
Whether we know who he is or not, Banksy is still out there making guerilla street art. And his latest paintings have shown up in New Orleans, on the eve the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina's landfall--and as Tropical Storm Gustav is taking aim at the gulf shore.
Jaunted's Amanda Kendle just got back from Melbourne. This week: Read all about it.
You don't have to spend all your time eating cakes or drinking vodka to enjoy Melbourne. Just wandering the central streets of downtown Melbourne is probably going to get your camera clicking.
Melbourne has a well-deserved reputation as Australia's cultural capital and it does a much better job of supporting art, music and theater than other cities. Street art is alive and blooming in Melbourne and you can find it along heaps of alleyways running off the main streets. Just follow your nose and turn right or left--the grid layout of Melbourne makes it impossible to get lost.
For example, stumble into Heffernan Lane between Bourke and Lonsdale Streets, and you'll see the results of a "camouflaged street art" project where street signs are actually full of wise sayings. Others have spectacular graffiti and then there are lanes with cool names: There's even ACDC Lane, named after the great Aussie band. Only in Melbourne!
Reporters at the UK newspaper Mail On Sunday announced this past weekend that they've found the true identity of the world's most prolific and no-doubt-wealthy guerrilla street artist, Banksy. Well known for celebrity fans like the newly twinned Brangelina, as well as inspiring political street art, Banksy's secret identity has been the cornerstone of his work worldwide, allowing him to create in public spaces without legal repercussions.
MOS identifies Banksy to be one Robin Gunningham, from Bristol, England. His family was one of modest means, but he attended the buttoned-up, $20,000 a year Bristol Cathedral School in his formative years.
What is certain is that Banksy's individual style is still one of the most widely recognized in the world. He has imposters by the dozens, but no one captures the political acuity that Banksy does. We hope whether or not this story is confirmed as true, it opens doors for street art to become more widely accepted by the authorities. And who knows, maybe it means more Banksy for the rest of us.
Cyrus Yazdani is a 24-year-old convention planner in Las Vegas. But the police say he's also a prolific Los Angeles graffiti artist who goes by the street name "Buket."
Yazdani caught the attention from the 5-0 after appearing on YouTube pulling off daring graffiti stunts like tagging a bridge while hanging precariously over the Hollywood freeway. After watching the clips, a city investigator became weirdly obsessed with bringing Buket down.
0 Comments - Add Yours
by Dan Gould
