Street & Urban Art « Arrested Motion

Category Archives: Street & Urban Art

Streets: Shepard Fairey (Detroit)

Posted by sleepboy, May 27, 2015

As we reported last week, Shepard Fairey (featured) was well on his way to completing his tallest mural to date standing at 180′ x 60′. Featuring a simple but iconic image and pattern, the massive piece will be Shep’s gift to Detroit along with some smaller murals in the Belt series of permanent pieces for the Library Street Collective, where he has solo currently showing (more on this later). Photo credit: Jon Furlong. Discuss Shepard Fairey here.

Streets: Seth Globepainter (China)

Posted by SAL, May 26, 2015

Shortly after the opening of his sold out solo show in Paris (covered), Seth Globepainter took off on another trip to the Far East. Similar to his last trip to China in December 2014 (covered), the French artist painted a series of works featuring his signature children characters in different settings and environments, often collaborating with local artists. The first part of the trip included a mural project for the Beijing Opera. This was painted at the Power Station of Art, the biggest contemporary art institution […]

Streets: Aryz (Detroit)

Posted by SAL, May 25, 2015

Shortly after opening his successful solo show in LA (covered), Aryz visited Detroit where he painted a new mural. Invited over by the Library Street Collective, the recently finished wall from the Spanish artist was for their Public Matter series. For this piece, Aryz picked his figurative, portraiture style of works and painted this unique sequenced piece. In a similar aesthetic as some of the paintings from his gallery show, this mural is his way of applying painterly skills on a massive scale, which he executed quite nicely. By […]

Openings: Herakut + aptART – “Displaced Thoughts” @ Urban Nation HQ

Posted by SAL, May 24, 2015

On Saturday, May 16th, Herakut and aptART opened an exclusive show at the studio and work space of Urban Nation in Berlin, presenting a collection of paintings, photographs and installations created both by German art duo and individuals & organizations across the Middle East, Europe and Africa. Displaced Thoughts is a show that was hugely influenced by Herakut’s visit to a Syrian refugee camp in Jordan in March last year. The fact that an estimated 51.2 million people were forcibly displaced due to persecution, conflict, […]

Overtime: May 18 – May 24

Posted by Khoi, May 24, 2015

More stories from the week that ended May 24 (click on bolded words for more information): The Space looks at Simon Denny’s work. RIP: Amy L. Brandt, who died at the age of 37 after a health-related struggle. RIP: Ekkehard Drefke, who died at the age of 75 after falling into the water in Venice and drowning. RIP: Rosemarie Castoro, who died at the age of 76 due to unknown causes. American Contemporary gallery closes its doors. Christoph Büchel’s Venice Biennale mosque is closed to the public […]

Previews: BLO – ‘Dreams have no title’ @ Swinton & Grant

Posted by butterfly, May 23, 2015

After recently showing at the 5th Year Anniversary of Graffuturism (covered here), the French-born and Berlin-based artist BLO from Da Mental Vaporz crew is having a solo exhibition at Swinton & Grant Gallery in Madrid opening this weekend. The show entitled ‘Dreams have no title‘ features a series of canvases and ink drawings on paper. Using spraypaint and acrylic, BLO splices Man Ray’s nudes and epic Renaissance Statues, creating graceful and sacred figures enveloped in bursts of cosmic abstraction, pinned in time like tropical butterflies to […]

Streets: El Mac – “Ars et Scientia” (Boston)

Posted by sleepboy, May 22, 2015

After recovering from a period of illness, the talented El Mac is taking advantage of his improved health to do what he loves best – spread his imagery via public art. His latest effort entitled Ars et Scientia was recently painted in Boston at Northeastern University on the facade of Meserve Hall, which was built in 1893. By coincidence, the Los Angeles-based artist’s father went to the university and studied Engineering where he met his mother who was going to MassArt. So the mural, which uses El Mac’s wife Kim as […]

Upcoming: Barry McGee & Todd James “FUD” @ V1 Gallery

Posted by SAL, May 21, 2015

On Friday, May 29th, V1 gallery in Copenhagen will open FUD, a joint exhibition by Barry McGee & Todd James. This will be the second time that the legendary American artists will be creating a two man show at the gallery. According to the info we’ve received from the gallery, the show will consists of new works in a variety of mediums, as is expected from these two prolific artists. From paintings on canvas and wood, sculpture, drawing and an array of various elements, the whole exhibition will be organized (or […]

Showing: “Main Street” @ Musée Mohammed VI d’Art Moderne et Contemporain – Morocco

Posted by SAL, May 21, 2015

From May 15th to December 31st, 2015, the biggest contemporary art museum in Africa, Mohammed VI Museum (MMVI) of modern and contemporary art in Rabat, will be hosting an exhibition entitled Main Street focused on street and urban art. The show aims to allow visitors to discover artists from different continents, all linked by a common passion – their efforts to change the environment, fight corporations and advertising companies, and to leave their mark in the world. The show that was curated by Nicolas Couturieux for PrintThemAll includes […]

Streets: World Roundup (May 1 – May 20)

Posted by SAL, May 21, 2015

It’s been few months without our Streets World Roundup feature, but it seems like the season for street art festival has arrived, so the only way to cover some of it is to do a group report on some of the most important murals worldwide. Tahiti once again hosted the ONO’U festival and this year’s lineup included such names as DALeast, Faith47, Seth Globepainter (who teamed up with local artist HTJ), ROA, Dabs Myla, and Pose. The south hemisphere street art scene was active once again in Dunedin […]