Art Books: Explore the World of Graffiti & Street Art

Scott Burnham, a creative director, writer and consultant who is specialized in design, urbanism and open source methodologies, has recently created his “Urban Guide for Alternate Use” for the upcoming, brand-new and Europe-wide “Exchange Radical Moments” live art festival. It’s an open source city-specific field guide for alternate uses for existing urban infrastructure. As Burnham wrote on his website, he “wanted to create a platform for exchange of ideas for alternate urban solutions based on existing structures and systems.” ...

At the beginning of the year, I wrote an article about the creative celebration of Mini’s 50th birthday. The car-manufacturer invited ten well-known artists, including urban artists like Seak One, Tika and Smash137 to repaint some of their cars. Some days ago, I received a package from BMW Switzerland (the owner of Mini) with some of the corresponding “Wash Me” books in it! For that reason, I will give away three of these books to you today! All you have to do is to twitter a link to this article up to and including January 22nd, 8pm. Please, don’t forget to mention me (@berlinpiraten), otherwise I’m not able to find out who participates and who not… Tomorrow evening I will randomly decide three of you who will get the books for free. ...

Urban interventions are - in addition to graffiti and classical street art - my main topic and I think the majority of you has also a partiality for it. For that reason, I will present you a new book, called “Urban Interventions - Personal Projects in Public Places”… “Evolving from graffiti and street art, urban interventions are the next generation of artwork to hit public space. Using any and all of the components that make up urban and rural landscapes, these mostly spatial interventions bring art to the masses. ...

Until Yesterday, I didn’t know that there’s an very interesting street art book about one of my favorite urban artists Swoon on the market. Swoon is known by most people through her wheat-pasted cut-outs, which have appeared throughout New York for the better part of the last decade. Her unique style and her claim to document urban life and culture in an artistic way, made her artworks popular around the world. ...

I have really a lot of street art book here at home. I have artists collection books, like the “The Art of Rebellion” books by C100, some books about single artists, but the mass are street art books about specific cities. There are “Street Art in Berlin”, “Paris Street Art”, “City Language Berlin” and others. In this series another book recently joined. It’s entitled “Textura - Valencia Street Art”. Written by Luz A. Martín, the book describes the street art and graffiti culture of Spain’s 3rd largest city. On about 140 pages Martín placed beautiful photographs, documenting texts and seven interviews with well known street artists of Valencia. ...

British street artist and designer Dave The Chimp recently started a new sales game to make some fans of his artworks happy and to get some money for the cold month. Currently, I read about that “Lucky Dip” lottery and thought, that this playful way of art disposal has to be supported. It’s very interesting, because it’s a combination of lottery and sale… “If you’d like to get your hands on an original “Human Bein” painting, plus a signed copy of his book “Part of Rebellion 2: Dave the Chimp”, and some zines, all for just 35 euros (40 euros outside of Europe) then drop him an email and he’ll send you the instructions of how to play the Lucky Dip.” (hooked) ...

This evening, artworks from some of the best and most popular street artists in the world will come together in London for the street art group exhibition, called “The Thousands”. In addition to works by Jose Parla, WK Interact, Swoon, Faile, Os Gemeos and Banksy, there will be some by Know Hope, Adam Neate, Herakut, Armsrock, Barry McGee, Elbow-Toe and others! So you can say that “The Thousands” is a meeting of the worldwide street art scene’s “Who’s Who”. ...

Some weeks ago, I wrote about the upcoming Smash 137 graffiti exhibition. Yesterday it was time - Exactly 7pm, the Common Ground Gallery opened its doors. “Contemporary European artist Smash 137 has a worldwide reputation as being an innovator. His impact on the international writer’s scene is significant and widespread. He is what you might call a writer’s writer, with an advanced conceptual take on letter styles and modes of application. Equally at home in the street and in the gallery his work takes the art of writing to the next level.” (press release) ...

When industrial design meets typography - Dutch artist Pieter de Leeuw, who just graduated in Industrial Design, designed a very interesting bookshelf as his thesis! It contains out of several separate letters and tries to give the consumers maximum freedom of using it. The wooden letters in various colors can be arranged to the user’s liking and could also be used as seating. I like those crazy interior designs! On the one hand it’s really simple, but on the other hand there’s a great concept! However, I need such a letters bookshelf for my next apartment… ...

Stickers, they are creative, often independent and one of the fastest ways to be present on the streets. Stickers are “an integral part of [nowadays] contemporary street art and visual culture” (hooked), even if they are steady used for advertising campaigns. Used by street artists, typographers, graffiti artists or graphic designer, the small sticky notes, signs, logos and messages have become popular in cities all over the world in the last years. ...