Artwork: Christian Guemy (C215, @christianguemy)
Just a reminder this morning from one of my fave street artists, Christian Guemy (C215, @christianguemy), of what’s eternal and necessary:
“Paris, eternal city of love. Love is what we need, more than ever...”
Image: Underwater mural by Sean Yoro from his Deep Seads project, 2019
Sean Yoro’s (@the_hula) next art project goes deep underwater.
Wanting to make a difference to the degradation of coral reefs due to environmental factors, human activity in the oceans and pollution, Yoro’s Deep Seads project involves freediving to create underwater mural reefs. These artificial reefs are intended to help jump start marine growth, potentially becoming thriving reef sites for a multitude of different organisms. Importantly, all materials Yoro employs, including the pigment sticks, are eco-friendly and safe for marine ecosystems.
For more images and the video accompanying the project, check out Yoro’s website: https://www.kapucollective.com/works/deepseads
image: paste-up by @pipsqueakwashere
Just a girl and her bear and…friends!
Love the duo behind @pipsqueakwashere. If you’ve ever read Philip Pullman’s amazing His Dark Materials trilogy beginning with Northern Lights, the concept of having a deamon, an animal companion that represents your inner-self or soul, is beautiful. This girl and her bear that features throughout their work, reminds me exactly of that.
I wouldn’t mind the bear, but I bet mine would be a cat, maybe even a panther!
Artwork: mural by millo, Hongi—the breath of life, New Zealand, 2019
Having been to New Zealand a couple of times, this resonates: @_millo_ has just completed a gorgeous new mural in Whangarei, NZ, titled Hongi—the breath of life.
Millo explains:
“HONGI is the traditional Māori greeting in New Zealand. It is done by pressing one's nose and forehead (at the same time) to another person at an encounter.
During the hongi, the ‘ha’, or breath of life is exchanged and intermingled.
The breath of life is also considered the sharing of both parties' souls.
Through the exchange of this physical greeting, one is no longer considered ‘manuhiri’ visitor, but rather ‘tangata whenua’, one of the people of the land.”
Ummm, well for me they do!
And hoping I find the words today…writing…😊
Kind of love this. Yves Tumor’s track Honesty from his album Safe in the Hands of Love (2018). It hooks in and I keep wanting to listen to it—sizzling, funky and just a bit trippy. Check it out.
Artwork: mural by Seth, Cat Walk, Shanghai
Another gorgeous artwork by Seth (@seth_globepainter) titled Cat Walk, one of his paintings made in an old district of Shanghai.
It’s the black cat that I love!
Artwork: mural by Alice Pasquini, make love not war
“make love not war” mural by Alice Pasquini (@alicepasquini).
Awesome.
As part of an end of year round-up, the team at NOWNESS (https://www.nowness.com) has produced a series, 12 Days of Performance, featuring dancers, musicians, and prominent creative individuals, such as Sergei Polunin in this “capsule performance”, directed by Bunny Kinney. Simply gorgeous.
Image: @murmurestreet, L’enfance de l’art : Paris
Whatever you believe in—peace, love, creativity, freedom—here's to celebrating whatever matters most to each of us, and hopefully with the people who matter most in the coming holidays. With joy.
Image: @exogalaxies
Butterfly nebula. Just a reminder of the beauty that’s out there.
Artwork: Stellar Axis: Antarctica, Lita Albuquerque, 2006
Stellar Axis; Antarctica was created by Californian based artist Lita Albuquerque in 2006 as an incredibly ambitious ephemeral art project inspired by Albuquerque questioning the place of humans in the enormity of infinite space and time.
The installation was created in Antarctica at the Ross Ice Shelf, and later replicated in the North Pole. It was comprised of 99 blue spherical structures arranged on polar ice calculated exactly to align with 99 stars. Each sphere’s diameter correlated to the relative brightness of each star. The installation was in effect a stellar map on Antarctic ice. And as the planet rotated on its axis, the alignment of spheres and stars shifted, creating a spiral of motion at the South Pole. This motion was enacted in a performance where 51 scientists and technicians from the nearby McMurdo Station research facility walked the spiral path of the spheres, their feet visibly tracing the unseen relationship of the planet, stars, and humans.
Albuquerque speaks about these epic connections in her art practice:
Artwork: Stellar Axis: Antarctica, Lita Albuquerque, 2006
"I am interested in change of scale: how the observer affects the object of observation; space as a void; non-space existing in time. By altering the scale and context of the grid (as a scientific tool of measurement), the grid becomes an artistic tool of perception.
The fossilized brachiopod from three hundred millions years ago appears to be an ancient remnant of star, waiting to be transformed back to its stellar origin.
Some brittle stars exist in the Antarctic and Arctic, and some are found even in the deepest parts of the ocean where there is no sunlight. Others have exquisitely developed crystalline lenses, formed from the bone in their skeletons, which focus light inside their bodies and enable them to see.
But this is not blackness, it is full of something from long ago with the potential of something yet to be.'"
(quote source: domus)
Inspired by Botticelli’s painting in the Uffizi, La Primavera, artist Cia Guo-Quiang (@caistudio) created a fireworks spectacle in Florence at the Piazzale Michelangelo, City of Flowers in the Sky which also marked the opening of his exhibition at the Uffizi, Flora Commedia, from November 20, 2018 until February 17, 2019. Magic.
Loving this. The Deru remix of Robot Koch and Savannah Jo Lack’s, Instructions for Time Travel. Cosmic.
Artwork: No hesitation mural in Pistoia by millo
Gorgeous mural by millo (@_millo_) in Pistoia: No hesitation.
About the project: “The aim of the entire project is to renovate a small area close to the historical centre of the city, it has been wonderful to be there and see how much we can do for our spaces. Sometimes we should just take off our structures, let somebody turn the key and open our heart’.”
Two elements, opposing forces, where one could at an instant, smother the other. Jeppe Hein’s installation, Water Flame (2006) is an improbable balance akin to wonder. Mesmerising.
Artwork: Michelangelo Bastiani, Geyser III, 2016
Water is an element I love. Its liquid flow and flux. Its transformation through states of gas, liquid, to ice. Its fundamental necessity to life. And swimming in the ocean, immersing myself in its briny depths, I feel closest to the energy that supports all life, this very earth. We need the ocean to breathe, to support the earth’s climate, to feed the ecosystems we all depend on to survive.
Artwork: Michelangelo Bastiani, Geyser III, 2016
So I’m especially drawn to art that explores water such as Italian Michelangelo Bastiani’s work Geyser III (2016), an interactive video projection that engages with states of transformation and change between nature and technology, between reality and perception, and between the viewer and the artwork.
Bastiani states: “Water, and liquidness in general, is my preferred field of investigation. My favorite subjects are natural phenomena of different magnitude, from the most tumultuous storms to soft clouds, relaxing water lilies, cold icebergs, waterfalls, fountains, galaxies, travels to the center of the earth… For instance, an artificial lake might take shape in a room and, thanks to digital techniques, the spectator becomes an integral part of the work by simply passing in front of it, thus becoming a part of the kinetic process. Analog and digital blend in these holograms which are enclosed in transparent bottles and jars, and direct interaction from the viewer results in infinite variables. The relationship between work and observer become stronger transforming what we imagine as the traditional ‘passive’ visit into an ‘active’ experience.”
Image: @yonopo
Couldn’t resist—Yayoi Kusama’s mini-me tricked out for Halloween!
Huh! Maybe they’re already here…
(image: @nicestreetart)
Been listening to Four Tet’s set from Lost Village Festival in August this year. It’s fabulous. Check it out on SoundCloud here