The street artist known only as Slinkachu has been abandoning little people on the streets of London since 2006. His first project, ‘Little People in the City’, saw minature men, women and children living their lives on the streets of London and was immortalised in the 2008 book entitled Little People in the City”.
Dear Son
This is Stik, paint-splattered and hard at work in the Mile End Arts Pavilion on some material for his solo show back in 2010. He’s been creating Stik in various forms for 10 years now. You’ll find his work mainly around Hackney Wick, Dalston and Shoreditch – Stik people resting, dancing, entire Stik families bringing life to neglected walls or empty billboards. Recently, Stik’s been branching out, with people in other parts of London asking him to graffiti Stik on their walls, working at Glasto and putting up a few pieces in Bristol. He even did a campaign for British Waterways.
Stik tells us how his art has seen him through his toughest times on London’s streets, about the beauty of language and movement and a little story about a woman in Mayfair.
What is the significance of Stik?
Quite often, simple images are the most noted. If I’ve got too many lines, I kind of lose track of what’s going on. I like to have very few things going on, but a lot of data compression in that. This arm’s got three bends in it (pointing to one of the figures he was painting) and I think about the way it conveys movement. Beauty is in movement. That’s what it’s about. Beauty is about the way that someone moves their body. You can tell by someone’s walk if they’re angry, whether they’re happy or if they’ve just eaten. You can tell a lot about someone just by the way they’re moving their back or their eyes. There doesn’t need to be a great deal of detail there. You can see it from across the road. You can see someone silhouetted against a white wall in the night and check whether they’re walking in an aggressive way or if they’re someone you know. That’s what I’m trying to capture in my work – that direct recognition. Before writing, before speech, it’s the language of toddlers, the language of cave people, body language. I think it came from trying to speak to people I don’t share a common spoken language with, just trying to find a way of conveying complex emotions without speech.
C215’s street art represents an exploration of animals, architecture, freedom and those forgotten about by society all in incredible detail and against a backdrop of overlooked places. C215’s real name is Christian Guémy but he goes by his artistic identity, ‘C215’. He has put work up all over the world in India, Israel, Poland, the USA, Senegal, Russia, Morocco, his home-country of France and of course, London.
C215 talks with Street Art London about the subjects and themes that have inspired him to become a full time artist. He tells us about Nina, his daughter, who is already becoming a street artist in her own right and he lets us in on a pretty crazy Friday afternoon stunt he pulled in the middle of London.
Most people’s first job involved burgers and fries. David walker’s first job was creating t-shirt designs for The Prodigy. After that, he started designing record sleeves and party art before running his own street wear label called “Subsurface” for five years. It was only three years ago that he started painting. (Pretty impressive he’s accomplished all of that considering he’s broken his hand over 10 times!)
Once a fan of only black and white (with a little bit of pink thrown in for good measure), David now paints with in explosions of colour following his discovery of a little treasure box of spraypaint tucked away in a studio. His portraits are realistically surreal – the sort of images that make you stare for ages.
Banksy is in town again. Two new pieces have gone up in London in recent days. The first piece is on Regents Canal in Camden and sees Banksy reclaiming a wall from King Robbo. The canal underpass seen below is the location where the Banksy/King Robbo fued initially flared up last year when Banksy went over an ancient Robbo piece. Banksy’s perceived dissing brought Robbo out of retirement and since then, ownership of this particular wall has gone back and forth between Banksy and King Robbo. The second new piece, entitled Sperm Alarm is near Victoria Station.
Regents Canal
Born in Rome, Alice Pasquini, a.k.a. AliCè, has recently been using London’s streets to ignite conversations about creativity. She paints with rich colours, using the walls to express her true artistic ideas that can be stiffled in a more professional environment.
AliCè gives Street Art London a bit of insight into her inspiration, talks about the value of street art in communicating new ideas, and gives us a heads up about her graphic novel to be released next month. The three pieces featured in this interview may be found in Blackhall Street, Shoreditch. Go check them out!
Your street art focuses on representations of women. What is your inspiration behind this choice of subject?
I am interested in female models different from street art cliche. I am often annoyed by female stereotypes proposed by artists where women are seen as sexual objects or cartoon heroines. I am seduced instead by real women, strong and independent women. In general, I am interested in the representation of human feelings.
Where and when did you create your first piece of street art and what was it?
In 2006, in Rome. My first piece of street art was a girl seen from up above.
Christiaan Nagel‘s mushrooms may be found dotted all around the East End, high up on the top of buildings and walls. The mushrooms themselves are made from polyurethane and come in a variety of vivid colours. How many have you seen? Check out more mushrooms after the jump…
This week we are featuring videos from street artists Eine, The Toasters, Ronzo and Cityzen Kane.
The Toasters
This is the teaser trailer for ‘Everywhere’ by The Toasters which documents the exploits of the The Toasters over the years and will of course feature a sticker or three. ‘Everywhere’ will be landing this Spring.
Stik has been creating Stik people around London for over ten years and anyone who has wandered around Shoreditch recently will have been greated by Stik’s supersize, bright street art adorning shop shutters and walls. Stik people initally began to appear in Hackney Wick and in recent years marched westward to Shoreditch and the rest of London.
Stik people, although androgenous and constructed from simple shapes, are nevertheless capable of conveying complex body language and emotion. These themes of human emotion and expression are infused in Stik’s brightly coloured street art. Stik, the street artist, himself was homeless for a period and ideas surrounding human vulnerability are also detectable in his art.
“Beauty is in movement. That’s what it’s about. Beauty is about the way that someone moves their body. You can tell by someone’s walk if they’re angry, whether they’re happy or if they’ve just eaten. You can tell a lot about someone just by the way they’re moving their back or their eyes. There doesn’t need to be a great deal of detail there. You can see it from across the road. You can see someone silhouetted against a white wall in the night and check whether they’re walking in an aggressive way or if they’re someone you know. That’s what I’m trying to capture in my work – that direct recognition” – Stik, in Little London Observationalist, 6 December 2009
Check out Street Art London’s Stik photos from all over London after the jump.
Otto Schade
Otto Schade has a solo show coming up at Lava Gallery in London which opens on the 6th of January (tonight!). We recently did an interview with Otto Schade so head over there first to check out some of Otto’s work – Osch Interview.
This week we have videos from Stik, Banksy, Roa & Eine.
This is a video of Stik putting up a piece in Phoenix Garden which is just off Shaftsbury Avenue in London’s West End:
Twisting ribbons weaving through the work of Chilean street artist Otto Schade (aka Osch) have become a trademark of his portfolio after The Kiss went up at the Truman Brewery on Brick Lane. Otto is following his artistic passion with some impressively detailed street pieces that show off drawing techniques refined over many years.
In conversation with Street Art London, Otto talks to us about the complexity of his work, the simplicity of his first attempt at street art and lets us in on his thoughts behind the tangled tongues of The Kiss.
Though you have traditionally worked on canvas and paper, we’ve seen more and more of your work on the walls of East London. Are you planning to head out to the streets more in the new year?
Sure, but I want to find some legal walls to show my 2011 stuff.
These pieces are complex, very detailed, compositions. Can you talk a bit about your technique and the thought process that occurs from initial idea to completion?
Fistly I sketch the main idea on an A3 or A4 paper. Then if I am doing a stencil of it, I scan it and over draw using computer software. Once I decide which sizes I am gonna do the graffiti, I scale the drawing and cut the stencils with laser (by pieces) due the complexity of the stencils. Once the stencils are cut, I proceed to make the graffiti. After I spray it, I retouch the graffiti with a marker because of the shadows I want to show between ribbons.
