Street Art London

Thierry Noir paints tallest mural in Britain

4 Feb ’2130 Apr ’17

Thierry Noir has recently painted what is the tallest mural in Britain on Barwick House on the South Acton Estate in London. The mural titled ‘A message to the Children of London. Brush your Teeth, at least, three times a day‘ but also dubbed ‘The Acton Giant‘ standing at 37 metres and a staggering 14 storeys tall. This is Noir’s first public artwork in London in 2017 and took a total of one week to paint. The mural was created in association with Artification as part of their public art programme to beautify the South Acton Estate. Artification are a London based arts charity who use art to catalyse change in communities. In 2014 STIK created ‘Big Mother’ alongside Artification on the neighbouring Charles Hocking House. Together Noir and STIK’s murals represent (at the time of writing) the two equal tallest murals in Britain. See below for the full photos of Thierry Noir’s new mural.

Interview: John Dolan

11 Sep ’132 Sep ’13

Photography by Rob Weir
Interview by Carina Claassens

If you’ve been to Shoreditch on a sunny day you would have noticed John Dolan and his dog, George, sitting on the High Street. George sits patiently while John draws portraits of him and the buildings opposite. In this in depth interview we find out exactly how John became the artist he is today.

Badgergate – Martin Ron paints the VU Wall

2 Sep ’1328 Aug ’13

Martin-Ron-Street-Art-London-5

Martin Ron is one of the pre-eminent street artists in Argentina. He paints hyper realistic surrealist imagery on a huge scale. Upon invitation from Street Art London he travelled to London to participate in our Village Underground Wall Project and over the course of eight days painted a breathtaking mural. Certainly a contender for one of the best ever pieces on this prestigious London wall. We also talked a little to Ron to find out about his rationale for painting the piece he did.

How did the project to paint this mural come about?

I came to London after being invited by Street Art London. It’s an important mural project that gets together a lot of international artists who come to London to paint. It’s an interesting project and it’s exciting to paint the Village Underground Wall that is one of the best and biggest in Shoreditch, a neighbourhood where a lot of top international street artists have painted. Every few months different street artists from different parts of the world come here and paint the VU Wall one after the other. I am here in London in August with my girlfriend.

Outside In: Thierry Noir, BRK, RUN, Christiaan Nagel and Zomby on the Strand at ME London

12 May ’205 Jul ’13

For one month commencing 10th July, Street Art London will take over ME London on the Strand with a five strong artist line up from the worlds of graffiti and street. Thierry Noir, BRK, RUN, Christiaan Nagel and Zomby will exhibit their works on canvas and project directly on the nine storey marble walls of ME London’s 30 metre high atrium, providing a stark contrast with the walls of the city. Speaking about the exhibition, Richard Howard-Griffin, Director of Street Art London says: ‘It’s exciting to exhibit such an eclectic group of street artists and graffiti writers in such a rare environment and take these art-forms to new places and audiences in London’

Street Art London’s Chichester Street Art Festival

3 May ’1821 Jun ’13

Street Art London staged a large scale street art festival in May. The following artists were brought together in Chichester by Street Art London: Christiaan Nagel, Cityzen Kane, Dscreet, Hitnes, Liqen, NUNCA, Phlegm, ROA, RUN, Thierry Noir and The Rolling People. This is what we got up to.

A Foot in the Door: RUN and Dscreet at Cock ‘n’ Bull Gallery, beneath Tramshed

21 Jun ’1319 Jun ’13

Street Art London are proud to present a major collaboration between world-renowned street artists RUN and Dscreet at the Cock ‘n’ Bull gallery, beneath Tramshed.

A Foot in the Door: RUN and Dscreet will juxtapose wall paintings with drawings, painting and sculpture, leading the viewer to reassess the role of environment and context in contemporary art. The exhibition runs from 28th June – 25th July and is open from 11am-6pm daily. The exhibition will include two new limited edition screen print editions from the artists that will be on sale in the gallery and through Salted Prints.

There will be an opening party on July 4th, 6.30-9.30 pm in the gallery. Come along for an opportunity to meet both artists alongside the release of limited edition exclusive signed prints. Free entrance, open to all.

Baroque The Streets: Dulwich Street Art Festival 2013

12 May ’2030 Apr ’13

Street Art London are proud to announce a very unique project entitled, “Baroque The Streets: Dulwich Street Art Festival 2013” which will be happening between the 10th and 19th of May. We have invited some of the biggest names in international street art to Dulwich in order to create an outdoor gallery of large scale public murals inspired by works held by Dulwich Picture Gallery, England’s oldest public gallery. The nine day long festival explores the position of street art, huge new global art movement that it is, in the continuum of art history and will see over 20 of the current masters of the street reinterpret and remix the works of the masters of old. The event will be accompanied by tours of the murals and debates led by academics and experts from both the worlds of street art and classical art alike. We have also taken over an entire house in Dulwich and are putting on a large scale exhibition of works for the general public. The project is a collaboration between Street Art London and Ingrid Beazley, from Dulwich Picture Gallery. Ingrid masterminded Stik’s project in Dulwich on 2012 which first introduced the concept of reinterpreting classical works from Dulwich Picture Gallery around the streets of Dulwich. Three Dulwich Picture Gallery works that will be reinterpreted are set out below with the respective artists. We will be releasing details of all associated events around the Dulwich Street Art Festival soon.

MAD C
Will be reinterpreting “Still Life with Flowers” by Van Huysum in a Stone Vase c.1720

Van Huysum - Still Life with Flowers in a Stone Vase - MadC Dulwich-Street-Art-Festival-Christiaan NagelMadC

Interview: Dan Witz

30 Apr ’1325 Mar ’13

Images from Dan Witz.

How did you get started in the street art scene?

I got started doing street art in the late 1970’s as an art student in downtown New York City. Back then, the idea was that if the world was a fucked up place that desperately needed changing, and contemporary art (and art schooling) had miserably failed us in this respect, then it became our job as artists to not only challenge the system but also change it. Much as I enjoyed museums and galleries, they were part of the problem: clearly exhibiting paintings on some white wall somewhere wasn’t going to change many minds. So, in search of more immediate impact, most of my friends started bands, and I did that for a while too, but I was a painter at heart. Inspired by the awesomely graffiti subway trains, I started going out tagging (or my version of it).

Christiaan Nagel

6 Jul ’2028 Feb ’13

Christiaan Nagel is a South African artist, been based in London since 2007. We, at Street Art London, last featured Nagel’s public artworks in this post here a couple of years after they began to appear in London. Now we take a slightly deeper dive into the artistic universe of this mysterious artist. At first glance, the sculptural works of Nagel contrast with the wider milieu of street and public art to be found in Shoreditch presented two dimensionally on walls and subsequently the artist’s influences subsequently appear to be more diverse and distinct from his artistic peers in Shoreditch.

Interview: Thierry Noir

3 May ’1828 Feb ’13

Thierry Noir painting The Village Underground Wall (Feb 2013)

Thierry Noir was born in 1958 in Lyon, France, and came to Berlin in January 1982. He found a place to live close to the Berlin Wall. In April 1984, Noir began to paint the Berlin Wall in order to perform one real revolutionary act: to paint the Berlin wall, to transform it, to make it ridiculous, and to help destroy it. When the Wall fell in 1989 his paintings became a symbol of new-found freedom across Germany. Noir spent a week in London painting his iconic imagery around the streets of Shoreditch.

Why did you move to Berlin in 1982?

I moved to Berlin for one simple reason – because I couldn’t find my way in France. I was fired from every job I started. After a while I said to myself, I have to change something in my life, because if I continue like this I’m going directly into a dead end. I didn’t want to be unemployed. So I thought to myself, I have to change something radically in my life. At that time I had heard a lot about West Berlin, about the music. There were a lot of new wave groups. A lot of people had to live in squats because there were no flats. The new mayor of West Berlin said, “If I am elected, I promise I will clean all the squats from Berlin”. So he got elected in June ’81, and from that point on there was a big battle in West Berlin about housing, with a lot of police and violence. It was in the news everyday in France, so I said to myself let’s go there, let’s see what’s happened. So I started from nothing, with only two small suitcases. I came with an address, but after a few days some guys said to me you have to find something else. I was really on the street, with only my two suitcases, and I started from zero to live in Berlin.

Thierry Noir visits London

3 May ’1814 Feb ’13

Street Art London is hosting the iconic Berlin street artist Thierry Noir as he makes his London debut. Noir is a forerunner of the modern street art movement, famous for being the first artist to continuously decorate the Berlin Wall illegally from 1984 to pre-empt its ultimate fall in 1989. Street Art London is joining forces with prominent London street artist Stik to welcome Noir and introduce his art to the walls of Shoreditch and Dalston. The culmination of Street Art London’s programme of events will see Thierry Noir combine forces with Stik in painting a collaborative mural on the prestigious Village Underground Wall. On the 21st of February Noir and Stik will be exploring the continuum of street art history, the old school and the new school, within the broader context of art history at a talk in association with Street Art London and The Courtauld Institute of Art at Somerset House.

Interview: Kid Acne

14 Feb ’1311 Feb ’13

Kid Acne Slogan Street Art

Sheffield 2009

Kid Acne’s art can be seen on walls all over the globe. The Sheffield-based artist is best known for his comic-like illustrations and larger-than-life slogans. He recently completed his biggest London mural and Street Art London had the chance to sit down with this one-man-army to pick his brains.

(All images save London 2013 are Kid Acne’s)

Why did you choose the phrase “OH MY DAYS” for the Village Underground mural?

I’ve been painting phrases for a while now. I probably did the first one around 2007 / 2008. I made hip-hop music for a number of years and when I was in a phase of making a lot of music I wasn’t really painting that much. I would write lyrics and ideas for songs in the back of my sketchbook and after a while I noticed I was writing more words in my book than I was drawing pictures in it. I thought I should really use them for something, so I started painting these slogans.

They’re just every day phrases that people say. I think it is nice to paint things that people can relate to, plus it has a lot of impact. Initially, it was almost as though the buildings were having a conversation. I painted one on my old art college before it got knocked down that said “You’ll Miss Me When I’m Gone”. I’ve always had it in my head that if I did a slogan in London it would say “Oh My Days”. People don’t really say that up north, so for me it’s a typical London phrase. I like painting big, bold stuff. It’s a good excuse to paint letters without having to write my own name over and over again.