Showing posts with label Street Art. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Street Art. Show all posts

Wednesday, October 22, 2008

ART/SCENE: OBEY = VOTE!

South Carolina native Shepard Fairey continues to "Rock The Vote" with a series of video postcards created in mid-October in his Los Angeles studio and in New York. The video postcards will begin circulating virally today (10/22) and will feature Jack Black, Joaquin Phoenix, and Saul Williams, as well as Fairey's eclectic mix of talented friends whom have their own significant community. Think: pro-skateboarders, owners of popular clothing companies, infamous street artists, snowboarders, singers of goth bands, drum n bass DJ’s, authors, famed tattoo artists, fashion models, renowned architects, web-celebs, museum quality photographers…the cultural tastemakers - be they hipsters, outsiders, misfits or squares - who are brimming with HOPEand FIRED UP to get a message across: WE NEED AMERICA TO VOTE EARLY!

Shepard Fairey is a contemporary artist, graphic designer and illustrator who emerged from the skateboarding scene and became known initially for his "André the Giant Has a Posse" sticker campaign. The Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston calls him one of today's best known and most influential street artists. He usually omits his first name. (source)

Fairey has an exhibit up until December 6 at Irvine Contemporary in Washington, DC, his second monograph, E Pluribus Venom, was recently published by Gingko Press, and the Boston Institute for Contemporary Art is planning a retrospective exhibition of Fairey's work for February, 2009.

Tuesday, September 2, 2008

ART: Banksy Paints New Orleans


One wouldn’t normally expect to find the world’s most Googled street artist lurking among the ruins of the lower ninth ward in NEW ORLEANS, but that’s just where renegade stencil artist BANKSY has been holed up for the past week, covering the desiccated city with art to commemorate the anniversary of KATRINA, the hurricane that killed 1800 people when it struck the coastal city in 2005. Said Banksy of the operation, “Three years after Katrina I wanted to make a statement about the state of the clean-up operation,” and attested that the city’s levee wall offered “the best painting surface in the state of Louisiana.” However, the Bristol Bomber seemed to feel some pangs of regret in his action when he added, “…I wanted to highlight the state of the clean-up operation. Only later did it dawn on me that if you choose to do this by drawing all over their stuff, you’re actually only slowing down that clean-up operation.” Of course, in the art world, timing is everything, and as the roving stencil demigod wraps up his project, the city braces for the onslaught of oncoming tropical storm Gustav which threatens to again devestate the slowly healing city. Hopefully, once residents realize what’s been painted on their doorstop, a quick sawsall session and a little eBay savvy will net them enough to build a mansion in the French Quarter. HAVE A LOOK (courtesty of SuperTouchArt.com)