Mark This Town offers
people living in New York the chance to get their voices heard through
street art. The team behind the project are Minsun Mini Kim, ‘a curious
learner, educator and visual thinker,’ and Meghana Khandekar an artist
and designer both interested in human rights and doing social good.
The collaboration invites people with messages to share with the city to
fill out an online form with their ideas along with a $1 donation to
cover materials that are all sustainable. Once a week, messages are
drawn from a lottery and the selected message is stenciled in New York,
mapped and photographed. Individuals who submit the selected message
receive the original stencil used in the project, a printed picture of
the final mark and a place in the artists’ gallery. The scheme also
follows themes each month, for April it was ‘Street Harassment’ and for
May it’s ‘Neighbors’ allowing the work to be trended and for there to be
a particular focus at the final exhibition.
Liu Bolin, a Chinese artist featured in The Arteur, has come to New York to participate in the protest to save 5 Pointz but applying his unique art to that site. As reported on 12ozprophet, the artist blended and disappeared into one of Meres' wonderful murals. Jonathan was there too. See these great photos by BCooper on the project. BTW - SAVE 5POINTZ from the developers!
Just discovered this great new blog which captures all the old New York neon signs left in the city. At once modern and retro, these signs are fast disappearing. It is nice that there is a place where they can be collected, admired and remembered.
I am intrigued by the concept of Wabi-sabi (佗寂?) which Wikipedia defines as that which represents a comprehensive Japanese world view or aesthetic centered on the acceptance of transience and imperfection. The aesthetic is sometimes described as one of beauty that is "imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete". It is a concept derived from the Buddhist teaching of the three marks of existence (三法印 sanbōin?), specifically impermanence (無常 mujō?), the other two being suffering (苦 ku?) and emptiness or absence of self-nature (空 kū?).
Characteristics of the wabi-sabi aesthetic include asymmetry, asperity (roughness or irregularity), simplicity, economy, austerity, modesty, intimacy and appreciation of the ingenuous integrity of natural objects and processes.
It reminds me of what I am trying to achieve in my street art photography. I seek to capture of the impermance of street art and graffiti and how the very nature of that art, with its asymmetry and imperfections can continue to change over time.
Wabi Sabi also addresses the idea of "Ruin Porn" which photographers such as Marchand and Meffre employ to such beautiful perfection... or int he case of Wabi Sabi, imperfection.
if he would share some of his street photography techniques and he's delivered a terrific in-depth account below. James also gives private street photography workshops
that will, we promise, up your game. All the images in today's MUG are his work. The one above is called Polka Dots and Pink Shoes, 2012.
By James Maher There's a good chance that you've heard about street photography over the last few years. Maybe it's been through Joe Holmes' work shown daily on MUG, maybe you've heard about Street Shots, the new exhibit at the South Street Seaport, or maybe you've even come across some sneaky fellow trying to take your photo in public.
Well, today you're in luck, because we're going to talk about what street photography is and some tips on how to do it. And maybe you'll feel better about that sneaky fellow the next time he tries to take your photo. Or maybe not.
1. What is street photography and what is the point of it? Street photography is a clunky term that is often thought to mean the practice of photographing strangers candidly on the street. However, I prefer to think of it as a visual way of a describing what life is like in the areas that we live and in our time. For instance, the aim of street photography is not necessarily to show what New York City looks like, although that is part of it, but to portray what living in New York feels like, what its residents and visitors are like, and what its culture and atmosphere is like. It is a pictorial study of the human condition.
To get a better understanding of the long term significance of street photography, it is important to take a look at work from the past and see what it means to us today. Some of my favorite street photographers that have done a significant portion of their life's work in New York are Garry Winogrand, Bruce Davidson, Matt Weber, Lee Friedlander, and Joel Meyerowitz, among others. Take a look at the work of these photographers for inspiration and also pay attention to how their photographs have aged. It can help to think of photography as if it is a fine wine that matures as it ages and as the elements and culture in the images become dated. New Yorkers live in one of the most rapidly changing cities in the world and it is important to pay attention to that. The only constant here is that things will change, so try to figure out what those things are.
Big
murals are proliferating at the moment but it is still the domain of
the individual street artist to smack up smaller works, stickers,
stencils, wheatpastes and the like. We’re featuring quite a few of these
smaller personal pieces this week in the mix of some larger ones.
Here’s our weekly interview of the street, this ...
Vladivostok-based
Street Artists Feliks Mashkov and Vadim Gerasimenko have created a lot
of graffiti and Street Art murals on city walls in the last few years,
usually with aerosol. Just last year we got to watch them paint a wall
right here in Brooklyn.
Like many young techno-savvy young ...
Our weekly focus on the moving image and art in the streets. And other oddities.
Now screening: Petro Wodkins Taking a P**s in Belgium, Jorge
Rodriguez-Gerada in Belgium, UnO in Italy, PROZAK in Poland, and Mr.
Rogers Singing in Your Hood.
BSA Special Feature:
Art Culture Jamming with Petro Wodkins Taking a P**s in Belgium
Street
Artist QRST is back on Brooklyn streets with more modernly magnetic and
captivatingly surreal work than before, and just as mired in the muck
of human dynamics as ever.
Emblematic of the new street art storytelling practice we have been
highlighting for a few years now, these uniquely old-fangled pieces are
one-off bits of mastery ...
hygienic
dress league (HDL) recently gold-plated an entire boarded up and
neglected building in the Collinwood section of Cleveland as part of
their ongoing conceptual branding art project. In the process, the
destitute structure transformed into a solid block of bling.
Part Street Art, part culture jammer that brings to mind the Billboard Liberation Front, HDL ...
Street Artist JMR has travelled far east from Brooklyn, where we
first started seeing his work on the street in the 2000s. Coinciding
with Art Basel Hong Kong, the geometry loving abstractionist had a solo
show called “Escape” with Joyce Gallery that drew a lot of new fans to
his line based work. The really ...
Stoop
sales, hula hoops, fire hydrants, ladders and paint. Get me one of
those ices from that guy with the cart on the corner, will ya?
Here’s our weekly interview of the street, this week featuring
A1one, Chris Stain, Creepy, Elbow Toe, Essen, Foxx Face, Icy & Sot,
LMNOP, Maya Hayuk, Mr. Toll, Rubin, Sexer, Werds, ...
Last
Friday Lima had their 5th Annual “Night of the Museums,” where the city
welcomes throngs of people to walk through and see art in this
metropolis that boasts an appreciable number of museums including Museo
Nacional de Arqueología, Antropología e Historia del Perú, Museum of Art
of Lima, the Museum of Natural History, the Museum ...
We
received a roaring response from BSA readers about yesterday’s post on
Bushwick and the changing nature of the scene on the street and its
relation to this artists neighborhood that feels like it is on the cusp
of full-throttle gentrification. With all the factors implied for a
maturing giant cultural moment years in the ...
Bushwick Open Studios is Paved With Street Art
Brooklyn’s already percolating artists neighborhood called Bushwick
continues to thrive despite the circling of real estate agents,
lifestyle brands and celebrity chefs. Born in the mid-late 2000s as it’s
older sister Williamsburg to the West began to professionalize, this
noisily industrial and dirty artists haven got a reprieve ...
Street Artists Among those Painting Pianos for “Sing for Hope” this Year
Out in New York streets and parks and public places will be 88
pianos for you to play starting on Saturday, so it is time for you to
practice your stunning rendition of “Chopsticks”, that Stevie Wonder jam
in your head, or that sweeping ...
Solo in Lima and with Carlos Dias in São Paulo
Today we have photos from two new projects by Berlin based Street
Artist and fine artist and Renaissance man Jim Avignon that he just
completed in the southern hemisphere.
São Paulo, Brazil
As part of a cultural exchange project for the Goethe Institute, Avignon and Brazilian graffiti/fine artist ...
By James Maher