During my 2008/9 Stencil Nation book tour, I set up an event with Matteo Grieder at his art space Zeitvertrieb in Vienna, Austria. Matteo was nervous about the turnout (a common anxiety during my European tour), but I had Pod and Austrian artist Dieter Puntigam backing me up with live VJ and DJing. A nice crowd came for my presentation, bought books, ate and drank, and made a great scene for the event. Matteo was surprised and happy with the results.
A month ago, Matteo approached me with a request for photo submissions to his fun art zine “Artyfucked”. It is mostly a sketch zine, but he also features street art from cities around the world. Issue #8 features my stencil photos (the cream of the crop) from SF. They mostly cover 2011’s greatest hits. He also put them all in an online album.
Support a great project and buy a copy of “Artyfucked” today!
For well over 10 years now, I have been documenting stencils on Bruce Tomb’s wall on Valencia Street (If you search the Archives for "DAP" they will appear). I have also put art up there and enjoyed all the other art that I do not document. Tomb may not confess to actually owning this wall, because over the years it has become a wall of Free Speech for many artists, neighbors, and organizations. Some call it the Democracy Wall, but Tomb named it the (de)Appropriation Wall, especially since he resides in a former SF Police Department building. The building had a literally tortured past (Chicanos and Latinos were treated poorly by the mostly Irish police in the last century), and a bomb was placed at its back door during the violent era of radical factions in the Bay Area. Tomb decided to use the facade of this building as a force of freedom, more specifically of speech.
Tomb had a brief tussle with the City authorities over his free access to whomever wants to get up on this wall. When the City realized that it could potentially be a Constitutional matter, they backed down. The DAP wall shows up in my book "Stencil Nation" about half a dozen times. He has written about it in the book "Mission Muralismo," where it was featured. Before the book came out, some of the contributors had a show at ATA. I showed a slide presentation of Mission District stencils. Tomb showed the following video of the photographs he has taken over the years. I believe he stands in the same exact place about once a week and snaps a photo of the wall. Being a historian and documentor, I asked him to post this video for others to enjoy and analyze. For a reference of time, notice how the tree grows in front of the wall!
The (de)Appropriation Project Archive will be participating in the Theoretical Archaeology Group Meeting held at the University of California Berkeley from May 6-8, 2011.
Resident archaeologist on the project, Phoebe France will present a paper for session 15: Graffiti and the Archaeology of the Contemporary.
This is an exciting chance to present the project in a new context, and to get feedback on the most recent iterations of the web resources and tools. Please join us! http://arf.berkeley.edu/TAG2011/
Ah… FaceBook sucks all my creative energy. Thus tolls the blog bell. Haven’t posted pics on here lately because of the ease on FB. Share TO the world rather than have them come find it. Spending more time up in Mendocino county on some land that the Noyo River runs through. Rained five inches when I was there a few weeks ago! The land is so alive; the river fast and furious. A bear visits sometimes. Salmon are said to like the Noyo. No industry along this river which cracks out of the hills and heads to the Pacific.
Here are four photos I took this past visit. Morel mushrooms! Yum. Lichen loving a rotting log. A rusting piece of farm equipment in a field in front of second growth redwoods. And the flooded banks of the Noyo.
Tiffany had a great idea: wander over to Twin Falls, SC. Thing was, she didn't really know where they were! No worries, we got directions and had a great visit at a sweet nature spot.
Stencil hunting by the Asheville train tracks means getting eaten alive by mosquitos... esp. when Kathleen and I get stuck waiting for a train to pass.
Stencil guru Jef Aerosol wandered through SF on a family holiday and stopped by to finally get a hug from your humble narrator. He also got up on CELLspace while briefly saying howdy.
While Southeast, I happened to come across a strange gathering of alien lifeforms known as Phish heads. Some SC folks got 3rd row seats the day of the show! I got stubbed down and shot pics of the boys (Mike Gordon in this'n).
Steven, Jessica, and Russell take a lunch break across from our theater (that's the LA Disney Hall behind us... the REDCAT is in the basement of that UFO).
Christine Marie poses in front of a large pair of stereoscopic glasses, which she drove by and had to check out (LA, CA)
Borrowed Rachel's amazing bike in Chicago, IL to scoot down to the site of the Haymarket Square Riot. Was stencil hunting too of course!
420 meets the Blue Ridge in this high-larious graff cartoon (Asheville, NC :: while stencil hunting)
This pic is pure Coney Island: red, white, blue, and rot. We went on a closed day, so only got a few carny teases: Brian had his palm read, we played pinball, ate hot dogs, and enjoyed the decay.
SF's Kal Spelletich had a closing-night event at an exhibit in TriBeCa while I was in NYC. Just before I went in to have a beer, the FDNY showed up! The only thing plugged in to gas was a (funky piece-of-wood) grill. This movable tree limb (turn on a timer to make it move) was the main piece. Brian actually knew most of the trees in Kal's pics!
After I couldn't figure out how to get this shot of Geo. W. on Wall St., Brian put me in the frame and actually pulled off a forced perspective gem.
Brian Livingston knows the family that owns John's Pizza (no slices) in The Village, so we went there a few times. Enjoyed the well-loved wooden booths.
High Line Park, Chelsea, NYC :: Turning an old train line into a park, what a great idea!
The REDCAT NOW Festival made the Sunday, Aug. 8 “Scene & Heard” column. Christine Marie had a great quote pulled stating “she began experimenting with the technique long before ‘Avatar.’ ‘I’m way ahead of James Cameron,’ she said with a laugh.”
