Australian Scott Marr creates works through pyrography which is the process of burning wood or other materials with a heated poker.
Where you see Scott Marr painting, he's applying natural pigments that he's made himself. The raw materials for these are mostly collected from the bush near Scott's home - ochres, bark, flowers, sap, berries and other natural products.
Mark your calendar, because FFDG in San Francisco will feature works from Mars-1 opening Friday, Nov 11th (6-9pm). Exact details coming soon. For now enjoy a taste of this SF based artist's incredible works.
Pedro Matos just swung through FFDG and introduced himself. About to move to London from his native Portugal, Pedro is here in San Francisco to open his solo show at White Walls (or Shooting Gallery as he's on The Shooting Gallery's calendar) entitled Ephemera featuring oil-on-canvas works this Saturday, Sept 3rd (7-11pm).
Check our interview w/ him from last year. We'd imagine the work is going to be great. I mean, check the prewview below. Crazy talented painter.
Got an email from the German anonymous artistic group Luzinterruptus whose projects involve a lot of light work in urban spaces. Their latest below Radioactive Control was created for the Dockville music festival in Hamburg. They tried to demonstrate, in a humorous tone, the paranoia that we are suffering from since the escape of radioactive material in Japan, has brought into question the safety systems at the nuclear power plants.
With our mysterious army of 100 illuminated radioactive figures, which advanced threateningly on the natural environment of the festival, we wanted to invite reflection regarding the use and abuse of nuclear energy, cheap in economic terms, but which can cause grave secondary effects for the environment and health, forever irreversible.
Want this copy for FREE? The first person to stop in FFDG tomorrow, Wednesday, and asks for the book, gets it. We're open 1-6pm, and you can view Damon Soule's current show Then What Happened.
"It’s like Holden Caulfield with his phaser set on kill. Phonies beware." –Time Magazine
"The Death Ray reads as a cautionary parable and an acidic rumination on the travails of adolescence…Clowes demonstrates what the comic book can do and literary fiction can't."–The Observer UK
Teen outcast Andy is an orphaned nobody with only one friend, the obnoxious-but -loyal Louie. They roam school halls and city streets, invisible to everyone but bullies and tormentors, until the glorious day when Andy takes his first puff on a cigarette. That night he wakes, heart pounding, soaked in sweat, and finds himself suddenly overcome with the peculiar notion that he can do anything. Indeed, he can and as he learns the extent of his new powers, he discovers a terrible and seductive gadget - a hideous compliment to his seething rage - that forever changes everything.
Greg Roman emailed over this recent video he did on Shepard Fairey... covering how skateboarding/ punk rock/ hip hop had on influencing him and his work.
Shepard talks about the influence graffiti, skateboarding and punk rock had on his life and the ways it shaped his art career. Key moments such as a school trip to NY and the melding of styles by brands such as Shut Skateboards allowed him to develop his techniques. Look out for some classic 90's skate footage as well.
A small taste of a great show featuring some of Australia's best street artists creating works from stencil to spray paint on all mediums filling 941 Geary's large walls. Should be a great show that you should get to when SF's art season gets kicked off in a couple weeks. Now go back to sitting on the beach or by the pool while your vacation lasts.
A couple weeks back we checked out the Divisadero Art Walk on cold San Francisco summer evening. Compared to the last Divis art walk we made it to, this one seemed a lot less crowded. No doubt the cold weather was the culprit.
A few weeks back we were in Sao Paulo and had the honor of getting a behind the scenes of the upcoming show "De Dentro e De Fora" at one of South America's greatest museums MASP (photos). Our friend and Sao Paulo resident Flavio Samelo reports on the show which opened last week. Besides being a fine artist himself, Flavio is also the photo editor of the great Brazilian skate magazine VISTA.
This week in São Paulo, Brazil, one of the most important Museums of South America, the MASP, opens a super nice exhibition called “De Dentro e De Fora” which means something like “Inside Out, Outside In.” The exhibition features the amazing works of artists, JR (France), Swoon (USA), Invader (France), Remed (França), Point (Czech Republic), Defi (Argentina), Chu (Argentina), Tec (Argentina), and Bijari (Brazil).
"Point Vermelho" (detalhe), 2011 Ao fundo, "Linda Marinho de Oliveira", de JR
Space Invader
Swoon
"Iemanjá" (detalhe), 2011 Ao fundo, "Del Anarquismo al Comunismo" de Chu, Defi e Tec
Hahaha. Got this great image from Portugal based Mr. Phomer earlier in the day. Which side do you stand on?
About Mr. Phomer: "Son of the 1980's, raised by wolves, ink, super heroes, polaroid pictures, video games,cartoons,the cold war,
tape mixing, sneakers, vintage references, posters, bikes, vinyl collections and street playgrounds.
He has learned through graffiti and urban culture and studied the fine arts of graphics and illustration to
enhance the ever-growing self-made knowledge."
Mr. Phomer is up for work at not quite art, or illustration, or graphics, or design, or concept, or visuals, or urban, or actions, or photo,
or audio, or video, or cooking or even friendship for some food and expensive taste items.
20 year old Hamishi from Melbourne, Australia emailed over some of his work, and we love it. Thanks for sending some our way, Hamishi. You can view much more on his Flickr page.
Nick Thompson emailed over his recent video he directed --> Super Slow-Mo Video for Colourfornia. (Babes beating each other up shot on the Phantom HD). Nice work.
We are Crajes a creative team from Barcelona (Carla Rendon (1987) and Jessica Ruiz (1988)). We are multidisciplinary artist but now we are centered in Fine arts. We are into Pop surrealism, influenced by the social problems we have nowadays, and all the pop or trash culture we absorbed during our childhood.
Right now we are represented by Mito Gallery inside Spain.
David Shillinglaw who blogs it up for Fecal Face in London from time to time was State side recently and did a little mural work while he was in Brooklyn.
Absolute vodka got all excited abot contemporary art. Some familar names in there: Sam Flores, Jeremy Fish, Dave Kinsey, Mario Wagner, Brett Amory, and others. Hope they paid well. Something tells us they probably did.
SF (Lower Haight) based artist, Mike Kershnar, is up in the mountains at skate camp and filmed a little minute and a half painting time-lapse at the dump in the woods... a little shout out to Muska who's having some legal issues.
This day may have been inevitable, but now it's finally here. In its attempt to take over the world - or at least everything that can be bought and sold in the world, Amazon is launching an art gallery.
This summer Amazon is planning to launch a Fine Art Gallery where customers will be able to purchase original artwork offered by a select group of invited galleries via Amazon.com. ~continue reading
A new HBO documentary looks at the work of street artist JR, whose giant portraits force people in troubled areas to confront the humanity that's all around them... On the day JR found out he'd won the $100,000 TED Prize, the French pasteup artist found himself in China being questioned by police for doing his thing on the streets of Shanghai. ~continue reading
Street artist JR HBO documentary premiered yesterday, May 20th
Art lovers, collectors and gallerists will gather on Thursday for Hong Kong's inaugural edition of Art Basel, sealing the city's status as an international art hub and Asia's leading art destination... Hong Kong has surged to third place in the global art auction market behind New York and London and Western galleries are falling over each other to open franchises in the former British colony. ~continue reading
Our buddy Ferris Plock opens a small show of drawings at Benny Gold on 3169 16th St this Friday, May 24th (7-10pm) featuring 31 drawings priced at 75-140 bucks.
Ferris also released the video Fingered! he produced with animator Jim Dirschberger. View it
Wowzas, there's a lot of art happenings this weekend, and while you're making the rounds, be sure to stop at SFAI's MFA show Currency opening Friday, May 17th at the beautiful old SF Mint Building (88 5th Street).
SFAI's 2013 MFA graduates—working in painting, photography, printmaking, film, sculpture, installation, digital media, performance, and across media—will present work that embraces the Institute's signature spirit of experimentation and conceptual risk-taking.
Opening reception: Friday, May 17, 7–9 pm & running through Sunday 11-6pm daily. -- complete details
London based Pedro Matos opens the solo show Building Castles Made of Sand this Friday in Los Angeles at the Martha Otero Gallery featuring a new series of oil paintings on canvas and azulejo panels - a traditional Portuguese medium of hand-painted, tin-glazed, ceramic tile work.
San Francisco -- CCA opens their 2013 MFA Thesis Exhibition this Thursday, May 16th at their SF campus. Every year another graduating class produces steller work. One of the best SF art events worth getting to, but be sure to get there early as there's always a long line. ~details
The Book and Job Gallery (San Francisco) really stepped it up with the opening of Daniel Chen's loveBlast on May 4th. Complete with a doorman, piano player, old fashioneds, and some really nice paintings, I could hardly believe I was at the Book and Job. The paintings varied in size, and the show was balanced nicely between them, the spray-can work on the walls, and the smaller drawings displayed throughout. The kind notes Chen wrote on the walls are certain to brighten your day, and the rest of the work is definitely worth a look. It was a very classy evening and I hope they continue to intersperse shows like these into their schedule in the future
FFDG opened up the group show featuring original works by the artists of the world famous Skull & Sword tattoo last Friday here in San Francisco. Thanks to the huge crowd who turned out to support these four incredibly talented artists. Here is a taste of the show, and be sure to swing in to view in person. The show runs through June 8th.
Gary Baseman's retrospective "The Door is Always Open" at the Skirball in LA opened recently to massive crowds in a huge celebratory opening party. The exhibition is so complex and personal, delving into Baseman's background, family history, and all the layers of prolific work that he has done over the years. After the opening festivities winded down, I caught up with Baseman for an interview. We discussed the underlying meaning to some of the components of the show and how it felt for him, coming from such an honest personal perspective in putting this massive show together.
Fertile Menace, a new show of Mark Mulroney's (NY) work opened at Ever Gold on May 4th and it's not one to be missed. It is intelligently hilarious, with jokes riffing off sex, Foucault, and the body, and while it makes you laugh it's also going to make you think.
Our buddies Jay Howell, Andreas Trolf, and Jim Dirschberger are hyped as their show, which they've been working on for like 2 years, premieres on Nickelodeon Saturday. From the trailers we've seen so far and from what Jay has told us about, the show is going to be pretty epic. Congrats to those radical fellas.
Here's a little taste of work by the artists of the world famous The Skull and Sword tattoo shop who open their show at San Francisco's FFDG on Friday, May 17th (7-10pm).
Following his solo exhibition "The Collected" at Gallery Wendi Norris, painter Amir H. Fallah is in the throes of developing more new works for upcoming international exhibits. We spent some time in his studio in Highland Park, Los Angeles recently, discussing his process and inspiration.
We were first introduced to the photography of Spanish born NYC based Bubi Canal when he emailed us his great video Trust in Me a couple years ago. His solo show Special Moment recently ran at NYC's Munch Gallery in February, and he recently released his newest video Chrystelle below.
Although I missed the opening of Northern-California photographer Michael Garlington's newest show, Constructed Realities, I was fortunate enough to see the work still up during the Metaphysical fundraiser a couple weeks back at 111 Minna. Metaphysical fundraiser, an auction to benefit Wayne Ernzer. --- The ghoulish photographs in their heavy, hand-made frames are reminiscent of photos from the old west, and the glass crucifixes, complete with fetuses and guns, emphasize the accumulated time within the works themselves. Whether you're looking at the frames, the photos, or both, this show deserves a visit, and a walk through the golden archway Garlington constructed around the front door.
Fecal Face contributor Rachel Ralph (rachel(at)fecalface.com) has been profiling this Oakland based painter as he travels about Japan. In this segment, we feature some photos as he prepared for this show and residency at Spes-LaB in Tokyo which opened last weekend. Arnold will be featured in SFMoMA's Minna Street windows on June 8th.
Last Saturday, here in SF's Mission district, Guerrero Gallery opened two new shows with Philly based Alex Lukas and SF based Richard Colman respectively. Colman's work occupied the project space while Lukas' work and foliage was presented in the main space. Worth getting to if you haven't already.
Just got back to SF after a little trip south to Sayulita, Mexico. After 10 years without a vacation, me and the Mrs. headed south for some mental time off sitting in the sun, swimming and enjoying the watery Mexican beer. Here are some photos as we get back into the swing of things again.
Athens, Greece based designer, architect and artist Dimitris Polychroniadis emailed over more of his work which consists of mixed media, pop-humorous diorama sculptures that make a comment on the harsh realities my country and much of the world is facing at the moment.
FFDG will open a group show with the artists from the famed Skull & Sword Tattoo on Friday, May 17th (6-9pm). Artists: Grime, Henry Lewis, Yutaro, and Lango. Below are a series of videos on Grime for Vice's Tattoo Age produced in 2011. Fascinating look at one of the greatest tattoo artists alive today.
ARYZ (Spain) opened his newest gallery show at Fifty24SF last Friday and, if you live in the Bay Area, you need to go. This dude can obviously paint, and he doesn't need an entire building to show his impecable skill. The show has lots of small works on paper which contrast his highly-defined line work to his hard-edged painted objects. The contrast between the hard and soft was the most striking thing to me about his work, since I had never seen it in person before, and the washes blend with the thick paint seamlessly. The show also contains a larger work on canvas, a huge head suspended in the back of the room, and a big wood sculpture of a wolf figure. This diversity in such a small space was impressive, and those of us that went to the opening even got to meet the man in person. If you didn't make it out this weekend, check it out before May 31st when it closes and these works will be off to some very happy new homes.
Water McBeer is please to announce its latest exhibition "Precious" a solo exhibition by David Bayus (April 6 - May 4, 2013) -- David Bayus born 1982 holds his BFA from the Savannah College of Art and his MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute. David lives and works in San Francisco and is a founding member of the basement collective. This will be his first exhibition with the world renown Water McBeer Gallery highlighting his most recent achievements with paint and digital media. David Bayus will be exhibiting 5 relatively large-scale mixed media works along with a collaborative object featuring Hungarian sculptor H.R KOONS.
The Shooting Gallery handed over the reins to the Red Truck Gallery (a New Orleans based gallery) which curated their new show, Hard Time Mini Mall and opened the it on Saturday night. This is my favorite show (so far) in the Shooting Gallery's new space and was packed full of art, a mini bar, and cowhide rugs. The Red Truck Gallery chose works with clear craftsmanship and it was easy to see in Ian Berry's denim assemblages and Chris Roberts-Antieau's awesome quilts. The space was completely packed, making it hard to see each piece individually, but this show deserves a second trip anyway. I look forward to spending more time with the chandeliers, automatons, and paintings before the show comes down on May 4th.
Toronto based photographer Nathan Cyprys emailed to let us know about his newest series "Neighbour State", and we were about to post it when we spotted this series on his site entitled "Ayre (of Distances)" and had to post this one instead. After you view this one, view "Neighbour State" on his site. Both are visually enjoyable.
Working from found photographs, Lyle's paintings are created through a reductive painting process where each piece is rendered using only black paint and turpentine. Lyle begins this process by priming a panel with white gesso. He then paints a thin, rich, oily black veneer over the primed panel, slowly and systematically developing his images by removing some of the black paint with a cloth. In doing so, Lyle renders layer upon layer of various values of black paint resulting in his signature-style of luminescent works.
London based David Shillinglaw who's blogged it up for Fecal Face in the past recently completed this mural in London as he prepares for his solo show at Stolen Space opening on April 26th.
Our buddy Henrik Haven, who brings us some goodies from his native Copenhagen, has been shooting some of his city's graffiti and street art. Last week we brought you part one of his camera's explorations.
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This day may have been inevitable, but now it's finally here. In its attempt to take over the world - or at least everything that can be bought and sold in the world, Amazon is launching an art gallery.
