Graffiti Paper | The master thesis by Dutch student Silvia Pietrosanti includes about 90 pages, but that’s not really unusual. It’s the content which makes this dissertation rare. The European Communication student wrote “A journey with the graffiti writers of European walls” and that’s quite interesting! The question of graffiti crossed my mind again last year, during a class named ‘Subcultures and Lifestyles’ when I had to pick one subculture to discuss in a final paper. I chose the graffiti subculture so that I could finally explore what was going on in the minds of the people standing behind those tags. ...

Animated Banksy | Rats, tags, a unicorn, a lot of Chinese kids, an hard-working panda and almost 3 days without an accident, that’s the summary of that great intro of the latest “The Simpsons” episode, storyboarded and directed by none other than famous street artist Banksy himself! It’s full of dark humour coupled with anti-Chinese prejudices and although I don’t really like the new Simpsons episodes that much I have to watch this one, because it’s “the first time an artist has been invited to storyboard part of the show” (Wooster) and will for that reason make history… ...

Street Art News | I heard this weekend will be sunny and warm in London, so before you will go enjoying the weather, I will pelt you with the latest street art and graffiti news and of course some urban art eye candy from around the globe! This time I collected interesting interviews with artists, some exhibition hints for Paris and Berlin and new impressions from the streets. Have fun while clicking through these link-tips. Bon appétit! ...

Exhibition | What I like about Augustine Kofie’s art is rather easy to explain - I like everything! The abstract forms, the colors, the way he creates his artworks, the astonishing details, etc. Recently his upcoming show, entitled “Retrofitted and Other Forms of Vintage Futurism”, at White Walls Gallery in San Francisco was announced. The exhibition will include a series of wood triangle collages, medium-sized assemblages on wood, acrylic paintings and an installation. ...

Exhibition Review | Yesterday, the “Blind By Stardom” exhibition by English born urban artist Word To Mother (By the way a really nice guy!) opened its doors at the Stolen Space Gallery in London. It’s the fourth exhibition by Word To Mother in these rooms and of course I visited the show, which features paintings in mixed media on wood, canvas, found objects and installation pieces and was highly impressed by his fantastic technique and the more or less hidden joke in his artworks [*]! ...

Adbusting | French street artist Ludo, who is also known as Nature’s Revenge and became famous by pasting paper artworks showing combinations of technology and organic live, recently started a new street art series called “Co-Branding” in Paris. Because of “brands use crappy ultra aesthetic images that no one understands to sell their stuff” (Ludo) he had the idea to create “Nature’s Revenge” posters for Chanel, Dior, Calvin Klein, H&M, and other brands and takeover some advertising light-boxes on the streets of the French capital. ...

Abandoned Places | This list of creepy, beautiful and spectacular modern ruins I recently found is really amazing! It includes probably the top 10 abandoned places worldwide and may I should start travelling to one of them every year… Since the world we live in has been largely mapped and plotted, we urban adventurers turn our sights toward the relics of old and the ruins of the recent past. If you find beauty in urban decay, in the crumbling and abandoned places of yesteryear, you’ll want to read on. (thecoolist.com) ...

After the successful graffiti documentary Bomb It, which through interviews and guerrilla footage of graffiti writers in action told the story of the graffiti movement the successor Bomb It 2 will coming soon and feature the street art movement around the globe. Although I’m a bit confused after watching the trailer [*], I’m looking forward to watch the entire graffiti/ street art documentary, because it promises interesting impressions of urban artists in action, statements and great artworks! I’m most excited about the reports from Singapore, Hong Kong and Bangkok, because I haven’t seen that much from there… Does anybody know when it will be published? ...

“The Humble and Sublime” is the name of a nice video, documenting the creation of a new painting for the the upcoming solo-show by famous graffiti artist El Mac in New York. Mac, who visited Berlin earlier this year for a live-painting together with Augustine Kofie, will present some astonishing acrylic paintings in his well-known rendering style. Born in Los Angeles in 1980 to an engineer and an artist, Mac has been creating and studying art independently since childhood. Raised primarily in Phoenix, he drew inspiration from the surrounding Mexican & Chicano culture of the American Southwest, religious art, pin-up art, graffiti, and a wide range of classic artists such as Caravaggio, Mucha, and Vermeer. (about El Mac) ...

Do you remember Alexandre Orions? Yes, he’s the Brazilian reverse graffiti artist who created that amazing skull mural inside a car tunnel in Sao Paulo in 2007. One of his latest urban art projects, called “Pollugraphies”, is again about pollution in the urban landscape. Orion uses a self-made construction, including paper and a metal stencil, to create stencil artworks out of car-pollution, brilliant idea! Sounds a bit freaky but is in my opinion a really nice project. ...