The London Police: Street art Icons

The London Police (TLP) is a London based duo which paint their LADS with smiley faces all over the world. They started in 1998 and TLP is essentially built on friendship. The friendship between Bob and Chas and their mission to travel the world and make boring places into more colourful, enjoying and friendly spaces. TLP make clean, graphical and bold street art. I found and photographed this piece (above) in Berlin and it's made on a big wall facing a playground for kids. Imagine the place without that mural. I think it makes a big difference.

In 2011, TLP and other artists were in Oslo to raise awareness and funds for Human Rights Watch. TLP claimed that Street Art fans are typically more in touch with the needs of communities and are fierce advocates of the rights of all people. The photos below, I took an early morning in Oslo. In general the street art culture have always been concerned with social awareness, societal values and political issues. E.g. the Occupy movement was massively supported by street artists who helped the activists to spread their message to the world. "We are the 99%". When Banksy presented a street art piece to the Occupy Movement in London it was news headlines all over the world. Shepard Fairey did the same for the movement in US (occupy wall street). The same happened when street artists began to paint on the Israeli wall on the West Bank drawing attention toward the situation for palestinians.

TLP in Oslo

TLP closeup

I don't know if street art can change the world, but street art isa very and social attention to a number of issues. Street Art have an impact becausethe work is public and for all, and that's hard to ignore. In addition to the public availability in the urban space. Today, if a new street art piece comes up in London, Berlin or Vardø, it burns through internet almost before it's finnished and is made available for people all over the world. You may not know where Vardø is, well check it out here. Well, I think that TLP makes a difference and you may visit their web site here for news. Together with this post I choose "All along the Watchtower" with Jimi Hendrix. This song by Dylan is so so cool! (Click on the link or the "play" button in the box below to listen).

Steve Powers: A love story in the streets

In 2008 Steve Powers also known as ESPO spent about six months in Ireland, in Dublin and Belfast. Steve Powers is from Philadalphia US, and have a history of being a notorious graffiti maker and a writer (one who makes tags). In 1994 he moved to New York and became infamous for painting his signature boxy letters in daylight on shuttered storefronts. His work led to his apartment being raided by the police’s vandals squad in 1999. With six felony charges in Manhattan and Brooklyn for criminal mischief, he eventually accepted a plea deal in which he did five days of community service. In an interview Steve Powers explained his decision to stop painting illegally: “I wanted to find a way to grow out of it while succeeding at being creative.”

In 2008 he was granted a fulbright. His idea was to create public artwork with the help of teenagers from troubled housing projects in Dublin and Belfast. The theme was " a love story in the streets". The fulbright primarily go to scholars and professionals who go abroad to pursue research and teach in academic and specialized fields. Thirty-seven Fulbright winners have also received Nobel Prizes.

“I was shocked,” Steve Powers said in an interview; “I didn’t think I would get it but I felt a few feet taller when I did.” Although a Fulbright scholar typically must have a doctorate, Steve Powers, an art school dropout, was granted an exception because of his achievement in the arts.

I first heard about Steve Powers when I saw the documentary film "Beautiful Loosers" and fell in love with him and his hair he he. A lovely personality and brimful of creative ideas. I took the photos in this blog in Dublin on a nice an windy nice afternoon together with my daughter (she is found of street art). 

Visit the online home of Stephen Powers and the ICY Sign mechanics here. Together with this I choose the song "Overkill" from the scottish born artist Colin Hay, known from the band "men at work". (Click on the link or the "play" button in the box below to listen).

An old mural in Glasgow

I have visited Glasgow once and I walked around from morning to late evening. My feet and legs were sore for a week afterwords. In the afternoon I walked along river Clyde up to the Scotland BBC centre. On my way I passed a derelict area and I "smelled" graffiti and street art. On brick walls of an old industrial site I saw the beauty among layers of spraypaint. Three goddesses, or three graces came through.  

I don't know the artist behind this, but the number three is a frequent aesthetic and spiritual structure present in mythology, religions and art: the Virgin, Mother and Crone; Sexuality, Fertility and Wisdom; Holy, Divine and Sacred. In hinduism there is the Tridevi: Saraswati (the goddess of learning, arts and cultural fulfillment), Lakshmi (the goddess of wealth, fertility and material fulfillment), and Parvati (the goddess of power, love and spiritual fulfillment). In Greek and Roman mythology the Three sister goddesses, known as Aglaia, Euphrosyne, and Thalia, who dispense charm, beauty and grace. Carl Gustav Jung described the triple goddess as an archetype. Jung considered the general arrangement of deities in triads as a pattern which arises at the most primitive level of human mental development and culture. 

I felt spritual and graced with a beautiful evening in Glasgow.

"Where the streets have no name" by U2 is a special song and I connect the song with travelling (Click on the link or the "play" button in the box below). 

 

Dolk: Girl with Megaphone

Dolk Stencil in Stavanger

Street art is a genre were the work outside on the wall is done in seconds, often at night time when darkness and shadows hides the identity of the maker. When the city wakes up, and people buzz around to work, to school, to the bus etc. their environment is changed, a wall have been decorated with something for them to see. It's not a commercial,  a poster or an info board, but street art signed by a pseudonym.

Before this happens, the street art maker have planned this process carefully. The creative process, the idea work and equipment is important. Dependent on style/technics, the street artist make sketches, drawings, prints, cut out stencils, mix wheat paste and choose the right spray paints and colours at home (street artists usually can't afford studios). The placement is important. Its important to be seen (a busy place) and is important to find a place where the work will stay for a while (not painted over or removed at once by angry owners or officials). The street artist also have to take into account CCTV cameras and quick escape routes if detected by security, police or property owners.

The difference between street art and more traditional gallery art is that street art often gives an immediate impression or message to the bypassers which is both recognizable and "food for thought" at the same time. Street art is often simple in style, use iconic images or symbols. Sometimes critical, subversive and satirical. The works challenge our minds, values and ideas. Street art is "anti-commercial", often using similar visual effects and strategies in the public space as the commercial industry.

I think this Paste-up by ICON I found in London is a good example of a classical street art work

However, much has changed the last decade, and the difference between street art, modern art, conceptual art, public art and commercialism is more blury. Today street art as a culture have elements that is both legal and illegal, political and non-political, figural and abstract, small and big, urban and rural, wanted and unwanted, commercial and non commercial, some works is made in seconds and some takes days etc. Many street artists do work both outside and inside (in galleries and in public buildings). What's the difference between street art and vandalism? It's not an easy question to answer because it depends on the eye of the beholder. Today, Dolks street art is highly regarded in Bergen (and internationally) and the works that are left in the streets are preserved, even if this was made illegaly in the first place and previously was regarded as vandalism.

The photo above, showing a girl with a megaphone, I took in Stavanger 2011. This girl have something important to say. To whom? Dolks works often challenge our minds, both on a personal and societal level. See also a previous post about Dolk. Together with this comes "Message in a bottle" with The Police (Click on the link or the "play" button in the box below)

Blu: Big Murals

Blu makes impressive street art all over the world. Blu started out as an graffiti maker in Italy and is now what can be called a global street artist who has worked and lived all over the world and his hallmark is huge murals, strong political statements and powerful imagery. Blu's murals are never detached from the places where they were conceived because Blu is a painter in the urban or industrial landscape. He always tries to communicate with the society which inhabits those spaces, searching for the uniqueness of each place. Millions have seen his animated street art streams on Youtube. Everything Blu does is ambitious, and he's talented enough to pull it off. He also stands admirably outside of the commercial art machine.

I took the photo above in central Berlin (Kreuzberg) and in front of the mural it was an open space where people lived in tents as quite neighbours to the busy an noisy city life. A very cheap way to stay and very central :-). This was my first meeting with a work done by Blu. The picture can't really reflect how it was to stand there and look at this wall and how huge it really is. And maybe you have to be a street art nerd like me to feel the overwhelming pleasure of this work. I travelled far to see this and other works by Blu in Berlin. Maybe the video below illustrates more the scale and how much paint it took make this:

Considering the size of his work, Blu have an impressive portifolio and you can see more of his work here. His animated street art movie Muto (Silent) have won several prizes and illustrates his tecniques and use of the urban environment in his creations:

Together with Blu, I choose Boys Don't Cry with The Cure (Click on the link or on the "play" button in the box below to play the song)

Aram: Colouring the world

I think this is one of the finest pieces of street art in Bergen. Its been there for a long time, at least 5 or 6 years back. In an interview Aram tells that he started with street art in 2008, but I believe this piece have been even longer on that wall. I knew about the work, but hadn't seen it my self. One day, on the bus to town, I spotted it and jumped off on the next stop to take a closer look.

The stencil is quite simple, showing a girl with a paint brush in her hands and a bucket of red paint beside her (hidden a bit behind the green bush). She has already painted one flower and there is another flower in black and white. And if you look closely, you can see a mickey mouse print on her shirt.  By time, the work is worn out and slowly broken down by humidity, waste residues from cars and asphalt dust. Street art is vulnerable and temporary, and I think this work have grown more beautiful and important by time.

I assoiciate children and colours with hope, creativity and beauty. Children and colours, in all their vulnerability, makes this world a better place. This is a common theme in the street art culture; It counterbalance the heavy, boring, functional and grey concrete environment in the city (which represent the aesthetics of the adult). For some street artists, creating this counterbalance, is their main motive for doing art outside in the city environment. 

Together with this work I choose: Pink Floyd - Wish You Were Here (Click on the link or the "play" button in the box below)

Enigmatic Escif

Escif have a special place in my heart and his street art makes you think. His murals are often simple and figural. It's a message in his paitings. A philosophical comment to a actual issue or a contemporay problem or dilemma in our society.

Escif lives and works in Valencia, Spain. He makes wall paintings and murals all over the world. In an interview Escif said: "I understand the painting as an exercise of reflection that can be shared with people. I´m not looking for decorative paintings, I try to wake up viewers' minds."

In 2011 Escif visited Bergen and did several paintings. The mural above is made on "Kvarteret", the student's house in Bergen. Escifs paintings in Bergen focused on the theme "greed" and he connected this theme to our natural resources; Water, Oil and Wealth. I took the photo on a nice evening in town. The obvious thought when I saw this picture is: It rains a lot in Bergen! Thats true, but the more deeper reflection seems, for me, to be about "we have much more than we need" and the problem with that can be: "too much will ruin or ultimately kill us". So, too much fortune can be unfortunate for our spirit, humanity and happiness. It may restrict us as humans rather than enrich us. Thats something to think about!

You might see some more works by Escif here and together with Escif I choose a song from Tracy Chapman: Crossroads. (You can listen by clicking on the link or better, click on the play button in the box below).

C215: City Portraits!

I took this photo this summer (2012) in Paris. I was sitting on the tube on my way to a public park, Bois De Vincennes, right outside the centre of Paris. The train had just crossed the river Seine when I spotted this piece of street art. I forgot about the park for a while and jumped off at the next station and walked back to the river and took a closer look. The signature, C215, was familiar to me. I had seen works of this artist in Bergen, Oslo and London before. 

C215 is a nickname where C stands for Christian which is his real name and 215 is the number of the room where he decided to be an artist, full time. His full name is Christian Guemy and have not been as secretive about his real identity as Banksy. C215 started with stencil art in 2006 and uses a self developed and advanced stencil technique in making his street art. He is known for making illegal works in broad day light and work on several pieces simultaneously in the same area. This video gives and impression of how C215 works. His motives are various, but mostly portraits of humans (e.g. beggars, street kids, homeless people), his daughter and cats. Motives that fit quite well in their urban environment and he seems to avoid prosecution or other forms of sanctions for his work.

It was a lovely day in Paris and my walk in Bois De Vincennes was beautiful. My interest for street art have trained my eye to see and find art in the urban environment. I pick Downtown Train by Tom Waits to accompany this post (click on the link or "play" button below to listen).

Phlegm: Archaic fantasy!

  

The strange figures and fantasy murals of the artist Phlegm are unique in the street art world. His murals looks like huge black and white pencil drawings. And yes, many of his spray painted murals orginates from his illustrations and comics.

Phlegm is born in North Wales and is now based in Sheffield UK. In the greek language Phlegm means "inflammation, humour caused by heat" and refers to the thick and sticky mucus secreted by the respiratory tract. In other words, snot. In ancient and medieval physiology, phlegm was reagarded as one of the four humours of the body (together with blood, black bile and yellow bile), thought to cause sluggishness and apathy. See more Phlegm art work here.

I took this picture in Stavanger, Norway. Phlegms surreal murals makes me think about life in a different, weird and slow civilization of ideas and dreams. A gentle world. His figures often looks like they concentrate on something important, something basic and "larger than life" at the same time. 

Together with Phlegm comes "Breathe me" with Sia (play the song by clicking on the link or "play" button in the box below).

Roa: London Calling

I love Shoreditch, the main place for Street Art and Graffiti in east London. Street Artist from all over the world have left their works for us to see in the streets like a big open air gallery. The big bird on the picture is made by Roa. Roa makes big, mostly black and white, art works of birds and fury animals on derelict buildings. Alive, dead or sleeping animals, sometimes slaughtered or "x-rayed". Raw, provocative and weird murals placed very visibly in the city environment. Roa comes is from Belgium and became known in the UK when when the local council wanted his painted Rabbit removed from a wall in the Hackney area in 2010. A campaign by local residents forced the council to change their mind. Read more in The Guardian article here.

I took this picture in London february 2012 and was astonished by this and other art works in the area. Roa has a very distinct and different style in the street art world and reaches a broad audience. Even if his weird and naturalistic figures seems misplaced and sometimes brutally displayed, they are beautiful, graceful and spectacular. They strum archetypical strings burried deep in our minds. See some more of his art work here!

Along with Roa comes "London Calling" with The Clash!  (Click on the link or the "play" button on the box below to play the song).

Eine: Letters into words that make you think!

Im a big fan of Eine. Ben Eine have done graffiti and streetart for about 20 years and have been arrested a numerous times for his graffiti works around London. His interest in typography tranformed him into a street artist who work with big letters, typography and usually forming words or small sentences. Ben Eine is the "street artist who made it to the white house". When David Cameron visited Barack Obama in July 2010, he gave Obama a screen print made by Eine which read "TWENTY FIRST CENTURY CITY". A brilliant peace of work and Ben Eine later, in an interview, said:

"It's quite mad, really," says Eine whose early creative life as a particularly productive graffiti artist earned him 15 or 20 arrests, five convictions for criminal damage and, on the final occasion, a narrow escape from jail. "But it's OK. It's not the kind of recognition I seek or get every day, but Cameron seems quite a positive kind of guy and Obama's a dude. I would probably have had issues if it had been for Bush."

I first saw Eines work here in Bergen on the wall of the Norwegian School of Economics (NHH), which read: "CONTROVERSIAL CALCULATE CASH”. Big colourful letters. First, I thought is was some kind of commercial. But the text did not make immediate sense and did not refer to any known brand or product. I became curious and photographed the wall (See the work here). I did some research and discovered Ben Eine.

On a trip to London in february 2012, I spotted the work pictured above right ouside the tube station on Old Street. I just love it! See more of Eines work at Eine Diary. Together with Eines work I have chosen "Like a Rolling Stone" by Bob Dylan (click the link or the "play" button below!)

Vhils: Scratching the surface

The portuguese street artist Alexandre Farto, commonly known as Vhils, have an unique take on street art.  He converts the wall to a scratchboard, chipping away the plaster and remove the negative space with a weathered touch. The wall becomes the subject itself and his portraits grows out of the wall. I first saw Vhils work in the streets London and was amazed by his technique and style. Since then, I've seen his works in the streets of Paris, Berlin and Stavanger.

With Vhils wall portraits, I get the feeling that "the wall" is trying to tell me something. Maybe make me aware of the sacrifices that some humans do for the sake of humanity and against oppression and that others pains and struggles have secured my own freedom and welfare.

The summer of 2012, I was lucky to see a solo exhibition of Vhils in Paris. I often find that artist that do work in the streets doesn’t work very well inside, as art in a gallery. Vhils works did well in the gallery. Using his unique scratching and chipping technique on doors, iron plates and styrofoam making smaller scale portraits.

I took the picture above in Stavanger, Norway, april 2012. "The fisherman" was made for the nuart festival in Stavanger 2010 and the huge portrait still looks strikingly fresh!

Together with this image I choose "Fisherman's Blues" by the Waterboys (click the link or the "play" button below!).

Dolk: The pay phone!

This is one of the most well preserved stencil in the streets of Bergen made by Dolk. I took the picture on an october night in 2011 on my way home from town. It's located, pretty hidden, in a backyard near the legendary pub Garage. I'm not sure when this was made, but its a long time since Dolk did work in the streets of Bergen (Norway). I read somewhere that he did his last works here around 2006. Not because he stopped doing street art, quite contrary. In 2006 he was invited by Banksy to London to join the "Santa's Ghetto" festival. Since then, Dolk have worked all over the world at street art festivals and exhibitions. Today he is among the world's most recognised street artists. Since 2008, he has also taken street art out of it's urban environment and given lots of recognition for his works on deserted wooden houses at the rural coast of Lofoten (Norway).

Dolk Lundgren was born in Bergen 1979 and little is known publicly about his background. Dolk Lundgren is a pseudonym, his signature, from the days he did illegal works in the streets of Bergen. Despite his fame as an artist, he has kept his real identity hidden from the general public.

Dolk's images are highly thought through and gives an imediate reaction or perception that stays with you long after you've walked past. Their sometimes funny and contradictory in style; Combining iconic figures, persons or symbols with a touch of sarcasm as a comment on actual issues or more enduring issues in society. E.g. when he pictured Prince Charles with a Burger King hat. Another line of his images often have an emotional undertone that supports the lonely, the different and the neglected soul (often a child). I think the image above is along that line.

Dolk Lundgren lives in Melbourne where he study art and travel the world doing art on the streets! Along with this image I choose Decoder Ring feat. Lenka (from the movie Somersault): Somersault (Score) (Click on the link or the "play" button in the box below to listen).

To June

June is the beginning of summer here north. The light time of the year with long evenings, festivals and midsummer night. You asked me to take a song or a poem with me from the highlands of Scotland back home. I am fascinated by the poetic Gaelic language. The old irish language which later came to Scotland and used during the middle age and still represents a big part of the cultural heritage in Ireland and Scotland. The Scottish Gaelic is influenced by Norse and is perfect for light northern summer evenings.

Street singer outside The Victoria Market in Inverness

In a record shop at the Victoria Market in Inverness, I found music from Julie Fowlis and immediately fell for her clear and tender voice and music. On her debut album «Mar a Tha Mo Chridhe», which is translated into «As my heart is» I found the most beautiful songs and Fowlis's music is romantic and steeped in the tradition of her Western Isles home (North Uist). The song I chose is «Tha Mo Ghaol Air Àird A' Chain» (my love is on the high seas). Hope you enjoy this voice and music and since Gaelic is unknown to us, I bring a translation of the words below.



Tha Mo Ghaol Air Àird A' Chuain
(my love is on the high seas)

On a quiet evening at the beginning of May
When the bat was in the skies
I heard a tearful young maiden 
Singing beneath the shadow of the green branches
The sun was setting in the sea
And no stars yet graced the sky
When the young girl sang sorrowfully
"My love is on the high seas"  

The night's dew began to fall
Each bloom yielding softly to the droplets
The wind blew in a fragrant breeze
Bringing life and renewal to each field
The girl tunefully sang her song
Quiet and peaceful like the June dew '
And this chorus constantly repeated
"My love is on the high seas"    

Day darkened and the stars shone
Setting their course amongst the clouds
the maiden sat, burdened by her sadness
Her singing could not have been more soothing
I moved closer to the young woman
Singing of her love sailing on the sea
Oh sweet was her sad lament
"My love is on the high seas"  

The music enticed me
Nearer to the brown-haired maiden of the warm eyes
And she prayed to the King of Heaven
"Protect my love on the high seas"
Her heart was breaking with love
When I took her by the hand
"Wipe your eyes, your love is safe
I have returned to you from the high seas"