Rendez-vous Lavapies
Fortunately it’s increasingly more and more common to find new shows and exhibit from street-artists in different galleries and art spaces in Madrid. In this ocassion it’s the Cruce space in Doctor Fourquet Street (near Museo Reina Sofia) that’s recently opened a new show with 5 artists of this scene: 3 locals : Nuria, Nano4814 and Eltono and 2 french visitors: Olivier Kosta-Théfaine (aka Stak) and Samuel François (aka Sam, from Inkostruction collective). Each of these artists have defined its own space inside the gallery showing some previously ellaborated elements but mostly creating ad-hoc installations for this place.
One of the first pieces we find as we enter is a scale model of a city, omnipresent theme in the show, ellaborated by Samuel François. In this model we can find a single family small house, with light inside (therefore showing is inhabited9 surrounded everywhere by tall apartment buildings. It’s seems like a simple but effective metaphor for the conflict between indiviudual expression and freedom and alienation in the big city (well, I guess that’s what it means). Next to the model, and surrounded by small color dots all over that wall, we can find some small drawings and mixed technique on paper pieces by this same artist that have been framed but which glasses have been broken. Also my guess that showing a contrast between those nice colorful drawings and the vandalic side of art on the streets.
Samuel François
Precisely vandalism seems to be the prefered subject for the other french artist, Olivier Kosta-Théfaine. His peculiar vision of the visual aspect of the most basic kinds of vandalism is portrayed through the “drawing” of a one of those classic rose-flower shaped molding in the ceilings of all apartments and houses. The drawing has been made using a lighter and slightly burning and thus, darkening, the surface, as seen in public restrooms everywhere. This contrast between the high class motif and the purely vandalic and low class technique is similar but opposite to the installation consisting of a collection of really beautifully colored molotov coctel bottles. His ironic vision of the most hooliganesque side of contemporary urban culture is completed by the installation of a typical football scarf of a non-existent team with the name of a suburbial residential city outside of Paris.
Olivier Kosta-Théfanie
Olivier Kosta-Théfanie
In this ocassion Tono and Nuria have opted for the more visual and decided not to include direct references to their street work, that is besides the fact that they have chosen not the gallery walls to paint on but precisely elements taken from the streets. The importance they give to the places the carefuly look for and choose to paint on the streets and how in these spots textures are very important gives us the key to the material used here. They have built a structure made of recycled fruit wood boxes. Usually decorated with colorful drawings these boxes prove to be an adequate substitute for the wooden doors or panels they often look for.
Eltono y Nuria
Nano4814 is the artist that has delimited and defined more clearly his space fencing the area with wood boards directly taken from his visual universe, whose characters occupy the space through the use of different techniques. The iconography is familiar to those who know his work: bearded men, cut fingers, tied-up extremities, faces with ski masks… Specially original is the pixel-like composition made with spraycans. It seems as if Nano’s world is overpopulated with a myriad of characters needing to scape into our world.
Nano4814
Nano4814
Nano4814
Open until 15 of july at Cruce (Doctor Fourquet 5, Madrid. Subway station: Atocha)
Add comment June 20th, 2006 10:36am Administrador
