Art Festival: Immersive Street Art & Graffiti Events

Berlin’s urban art scene is about to get a vibrant new addition! After recent setbacks, like the disappointing closure of ATM Gallery, there’s finally some uplifting news for street art enthusiasts. At the end of this month, the French art association ARTAQ will host the inaugural Urban Arts Award Festival in Berlin, celebrating groundbreaking talent from around the globe. This prestigious event recognizes 19 exceptional artists chosen from over 320 submissions worldwide, with 4 receiving Special Jury Awards. Their work will be showcased in a traveling exhibition across five major European cities—Angers, Paris, Berlin, Brussels, and Lyon. Berlin’s iconic Stattbad Wedding, a former swimming pool turned creative hub, will be the festival’s central stage. ...

It’s the month of urban art fairs and festivals. In addition to the Stroke.03 in Berlin and the Moniker in London, the urban art festival “Escape 2010” will take place in Vienna until the end of October. Enthralling national and international artists were invited to the exhibition in order to display and communicate the current positions of urban art. Above all, the intrinsic references to space and urban settings as well as comic, pop and street art are the main focus of the show. (about Escape 2010) ...

For those of you who like the commercialization of street art, the next month will be pretty interesting: In Berlin, the “Stroke.3 - Urban Art Fair” will take place between October 7th and 10th (more about that commercial street art event later!) and in London, the “Moniker - International Art Fair” will take place between October 14th and 17th. Because I’m currently in London, I’ll write about that Moniker-event first… ...

Big is better is beautiful seems to be the motto of this year’s Nuart urban art festival in Norway, which gave the city of Stavanger its new huge mural artworks - some call them artistic landmarks - by Roa, Blu & Ericailcane, Alex­an­d­ros Vas­mou­lakis, Vhils, Dot­mas­ters, Sten & Lex and other urban artists… Three days ago, the town’s people turned out in force on Sunday for the first of Nuart’s landmark street art tours (via Nuart), showing the town’s new landmarks and providing background-info about the artworks and the artist. ...

Today I received an interesting message by LukeDaDuke - The Temporary Art Centre and cultural initiative WEI organise a no budget, mixed media festival including an cardboard art exhibition… The American city Detroit is the inspiration source for the No budget festival this year. I have been asked to fill a van with art for this festival. And I want you to join me in this project by making art on cardboard and send it to me. The size of the carboard is limited to A2. ...

“Backjumps” goes into the next round - The popular street art and urban intervention exhibition project with its long history opens the doors for the “Backjumps 4.2 Junior Issue” at the end of this week and will in addition to an exhibition present workshops for kids and still-kids… As usual, the line-up includes the big names of the international urban art scene: Victor Ash (Copenhagen), Martha Cooper (New York), Dave the Chimp and Poet & Aski (Berlin), Delta and Pips Lab (Amsterdam), Jonone and Skki (Paris), Mode2 (London). ...

The world’s biggest graffiti festival, the legendary international Meeting Of Styles, took place in the Highbury Studios in north London for the last two day. In addition to London-based graffiti legends as Tizer or She1 about 50 other international well-known wall painters and graffiti artists - for example Inkfetish, 3Steps, MadC, Probs, Korps, Dran, Sowat, Bomk, Sebasura, Liliwenn (teaser-shot) - participated and created in that way a fantastic graffiti atmosphere! Since its inception in 2002, Meeting Of Styles has organised more than 70 events, reached more than 120,000 people, and spread its creativity, passion and message across 16 countries. Their mission? To add ‘colour and vitality to blank urban landscapes in a creative and relaxed atmosphere whilst leaving a legacy of art,’ and with such a broad range of graffiti styles on offer they’re certainly taking the London festival seriously. (ukstreetart.co.uk) ...

One week ago, my friend the Portuguese street art blogger Target wrote an interesting article about an at that time upcoming street art installation by the famous urban art collective Faile. One whole week, the Faile-team and their helpers worked hard on their massive, big and unique installation and what came of it is a fantastic temple in the city of Lisbon, which is part of the art festival “PortugalArte10”! Today, Target uploaded impressing shots of the creation process… ...

Last Friday, the urban art festival “Concrete Playground” started in Essen. With about 20 internationally well-known street artists, contemporary artists and urban art photographers the art show with its unique installations and paintings is the most important part of the festival, which also offers different workshops and lectures. To put the phenomenon Streetart under the microscope, a series of events called Concrete Playground is taking place in 2010’s subcultural capitals Essen, Bochum and Dortmund. In the Fördermaschinenhalle 1/2/8 of Essen’s Zeche Zollverein you can find different workshops and temporary exhibitions of modern and classical street artists. (Words from the Playgroud) ...

This Friday, May 7th, the fantastic “Concrete Playground” street art festival will start in Essen! Concrete Playground, that are different workshops, lectures and of course fabulous temporary exhibitions with a lot of the world’s greatest modern and classical street artists. Some of the participating artists, of whom you should have heard as an Urban Artcore reader, are for example BUFFdiss, Above, D*Face, Just, Martha Cooper, Base23, Niels Shoe Meulman and 44flavours. Regardless of being legal or illegal, Streetart meanwhile is part of the townscape of even smaller cities. Linked-up with other subcultures such as skateboarding, BMX and Hip Hop, Streetart has a large impact and a huge economic power that makes it ubiquitous for all kinds of media that deal with youth or culture. This means that Streetart becomes less and less ’street’, its term is reduced to absurdity because much Streetart is produced by graphic designers on a computer with an apple attached on it. (Words from the Playgroud) ...