ONE FOOT IN THE GROVE ‘Christmas special’

‘One Foot in the Grove’ is back from the 4th of December.

Mutate Britain opens once again for the festive season with loads of new exhibits, new artists and a selection of favourite pieces from past shows.

See weird and wonderful sculptures from The Mutoid Waste Company. Marvel at screen-prints, stencil art, paintings street art and photographs from some of the UK’s finest accepted and unaccepted artists.

Browse the objecs d’art, bric a brac and anarchist crockery all on view and for sale.

Our festival of underground art provides a welcoming, inclusive and visually astounding experience for all ages in an atmospheric 12,000 square foot setting just off Portobello Road.

Walk amongst giant sculptures, installations and unique artwork and hang out for good times at our licensed bar with proper music and delicious grub.

The gallery room offers exclusive posters, prints, originals, sculptures, photography, clothing and object d’art that make perfect prezzies for you and your discerning friends and family. We provide that much needed alternative to the Xmas chaos of Oxford Street – so don’t miss out on the best show in town.

Full dates and opening times below. We look forwarding to seeing you in December!

Opening times:

Opens December 4th to December 20th – FRI / SAT / SUN

FRI 12-10pm / SAT 12-10pm (NO ENTRY AFTER 9PM)

SUN 12-9pm (NO ENTRY AFTER 8PM)

New Elate graffiti at Stik’s street art event in Mile End, East London that finishes This Sunday see blog post with full details here

Sorry for the lack of pictures and updates on this event, my camera broke, so many thanks to Art Of The State for stepping in with this, check his excellent website and blog for more pictures of this show plus lots of amazing underground and not-quite-so-underground art plus awesome photos of punk bands in furious action.

I have a new camera now so expect to resume normal service.

[WP-CUMULUS}

‘If This Is Peace…’ 

Oil on Canvas

Elate, Fuel

This one was done on Thursday on Sclater Street, near Brick Lane, London E1, and was the first collaboration between myself and Tizer,who did the character and background, we were both happy with the end results.

There’s also a Envy piece by Envy,Time and Fued and Wisher. A massive shout to Jim Wilson who filmed everything in HD, also to Jenny, Sarah, Fued, Time, Envy, Wish, Fuel, Hit, Trix, Inkfetish and all who passed through.

I’ve started some new canvases, based on some old ideas. Some of these are mutating and jumping off onto paper into graffiti outlines.

rant begins after the jump….

I’ve dug into some old writing of mine from way back, in which I touch on the basis of this concept, expanding on a line of enquiry put forward by, and quote from Aldous Huxley.

Nature in its savage state is bristling with…clues and cues to the eternal, even those which do not appear immediately do so when viewed either up close or from afar.

A Sung painting of faraway mountains, clouds and torrents is transporting; but so are the close ups of tropical leaves in Douanier Rousseau’s jungles, when I look at the Sung landscape I…(or one of my ‘not Is’ is reminded) of the crags, the boundless expanses of plain, the luminous skies and seas of the minds antipodes…in leaves with their architecture of veins, their stripes and mottlings permeate the depth of their interlacing greenery, and something in me is reminded of those living patterns of the Visionary world. Huxley, Aldous-Heaven and Hell  (1956)

Magnified or distant examples life forms, in fact close ups of any of natures building blocks, the systems, shapes and dimensions nature finds success in, are in fact exactly the same species of systems, shapes and dimensions that comprise the “flora and fauna” of the inner world.

For millennia these were described in many ways without the necessary technical nomenclature to denote what maybe more accurate comparisons with micro organisms, nebulae or microscopic worlds.

They used instead the only similes they knew, treasure from the deepest, darkest places under the ground the only objects whose properties mimicked transcendental perfection, those endless births and proliferations of geometric forms in their sparkle turning into ever more beautiful visions which transport the beholder beyond in an instant.

“The topaz and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx and the jasper, the sapphire, the emerald and the carbuncle and gold.” Is the Old Testament prophet Ezekiel’s description of his vision of what he calls the “Garden of Eden”.

The Vedic Otherworld was Utterakuru and is

“…watered by lakes of golden lotuses. There are rivers by thousands full of leaves…of sapphire and lapis lazuli… the lakes resplendent like the morning sun are adorned by golden beds of red lotus”.Huxley, Aldous-Heaven and Hell  (1956)

The ancient Pagan Welsh ‘paradise’ was Ynisvitrin, the Celtic ‘Isle of Glass’. The Buddhists’ paradises comprise of stones of fire. These methods of description are the best physical phenomenon that people at this point in history could reference in an attempt to describe the visual ‘symptoms’ of an unrelatable ecstatic event.

The Hubble Telescope, fractal geometry and electron microscopes, are now showing for the first time physical manifestations of this universal energy which has been experienced internally and told of in legends since the dawn of man.

It seems astonishing, at first, that so little in the way of definite conclusion or correlation has been acknowledged, but with further thought the two worlds, those of subjective enlightenment, and that of objective technological observation are and will always be intrinsically divided, we can however glimpse a thread that leads toward a higher order.

Anyone who finds this interesting should read Huxley’s book which is the best I’ve read on the transcendental aesthetics which unconsciously influence our every waking moment and manifest throughout history in the art, myth and folklore of humankind.

My piece for Meeting of Styles 2009 corner of Brick Lane & Bacon Street

photo© NoLionsInEngland 2009

                Meeting of Styles London graffiti festival 2009 was held at the heart of the UK’s graff- land where Brick Lane meets Bethnal Green Road around the backstreets in Bacon Street, Sclater Street and along the Bethnal Green Road hoardings, the site of the RichMix wall.

A few of us had already been on a bit of a mission to bring proper graff back into this area, but this event certainly finished the job! I haven’t seen much of the new so-called ‘street art’ go up in the area since this lot’s been there.

Meeting of Styles is a world famous event whose aim is to bring together the best international graffiti artists with the best of the local talent.

It was a superb event showcasing a world of talent and styles with a great mix of stunning aerosol talent, much of it edging toward graphic design, comic art, visionary art and sc-fi which was enhanced by the top notch traditional graff and contemporary style writing.

It was very refreshing that it landed in the heart of a neighbourhood which was previously obliterated with some of the most barrel scraping and bandwagon jumping street art, stencils and paste-ups,

Big shout to all the London crew there Zomby, Wish, Fuel, Prime, Urge, Diet, Probs, PIC, Skire, Rigs, 10 Foot, Scip, 2 Kold, Band, Drax, Snug, Spoe, Tizer, Spat, Serva, Cade, Elk, Sieze, Das One, Beejay, Don One, Kist, Jive, Merock, Milo, Reeps One the incredible human beatbox, Jenny who took most of the pictures while I was painting and everyone who passed through and shared beer and happy times whose names have escaped me for the moment .

It was a great pleasure to paint lalongside so many great graffiti writers, aerosol artists, bombers, taggers and every mutation in-between in the heart of East London, one of my stomping grounds when I first started writing Elate back in those mad days of 1986.

How things have changed.

Meeting of Styles Graffiti Jam- Shoreditch 2009- Album 1- The Day Before

[View with PicLens]

1234...141516►

Meeting of Styles Graffiti Jam- Shoreditch 2009- Album 2- The Event

[View with PicLens]

1234...141516►

[Gallery not found]

Meeting of Styles Graffiti Jam- Shoreditch 2009- Album 2- The Monday After

[View with PicLens]

1234...141516►

I will be painting at the daytime event on the streets…

The International Meeting Of Styles will now be showcased at a one day aerosol and music festival in London on the 6th June 2009…

Evening event cancelled- daytime event still on.

The International Meeting Of Styles event will take place in a massive warehouse space in the heart of Shoreditch and will see over 50 of the finest free hand aerosol artists from across the globe to collaborate with the Best of British in a live painting exhibition under one enormous roof. The event is brought to you by EndoftheLine in partnership with Nizim and festival favourites Chai Wallahs will be providing refreshments.

From 10am to 5pm artists will be painting on hoarding and walls on Bacon & Sclater Street, at the beigel end of Brick Lane. The venue for the festival-style afterparty with live painting, music, food and drink will be a vast warehouse in the heart of Shoreditch, freshly painted for the event and a short walk from Brick Lane. Music policy on the night is a mixture of Ska, Hip Hop, DubStep, Roots, Beats and Pieces provided by: Pama International, No.1 Station, Lazy Habits, Phuturesonic, Rodney P & Skitz, Goldielocks, DJ JFB (DMC 2007), Danny Breaks, Reeps1, John Hendicott, Disraeli, Captain Crunch and MC CHU-I.

Soundsystems, product and more provided by Carhartt, Red Bull and Casio G-Shock

Nearest tubes: Old Street / Liverpool Street station

Date: Saturday 6th June 2009 from 5pm to 4am

Tickets: £10 on the door / £8 in advance from GIGANTIC

 Transit

87-107 Clifton Street

Shoreditch

East London

EC2A 4LG

Further information:

http://endofthelinepresentsmeetingofstyles.blogspot.com

http://www.gigantic.com

I was invited in to paint a small piece of this monster wall by Aks, graffiti artist and the events

co-ordinator. Situated between Shoreditch high street and Brick Lane and opposite the new Chrome and Black shop with the Rarekind Gallery downstairs, this is London’s graffiti central. In the next street is Sclater Street Hall of Fame.

This is now East London’s most visible and longest graffiti wall and is at the heart of the most graffitied area in the country. The wall is a youth project organised by Richmix for young people to learn graffiti with experts and professionals such as the legendary Prime, a face I Iast saw at the Covent Garden ‘writers bench’ in around ‘89.

To read rest of this post click Read More link below

‘Covent’ or ‘The Bench’ was the Saturday spot where graffiti writers and b-boys from all over came to hang out, plan missions, sign each others black books and show outlines and photos. I never painted with him before but from seeing his work I always regarded him very highly among the kings of piecing from the eighties and early nineties along with Fuel, Scam, Foam, Cazbee and Kast. To watch Prime paint today it confirms my suspicions, he’s sure as hell still got the magic, as you will see.

Prime and Aks both did huge walls along with Gee-U, Kade and Pie doing pieces and characters with help and input from the young people and other local writers. I did a small piece with a background and character around a character by Mark, one of the young people from the project.

First sunny graff of the year… ELATE!!!

This is the space I was given to work with.

Gee-U working up his outline in the green and my silhouette against pink is taking shape..

Andrew from Spain has another similar piece just off the Osborne Street end of Brick Lane, go and hunt…

“Imajin if Drawing Was Life” it says…

You have to have been into graffiti for a long time to appreciate who this guy is… PRIME from the Golden Age of UK Graffiti.

The master from the eighties shows the new school a future, when the fizz goes from the froth of the ‘urban/ street art’ scene there will still be our movement, always mutating and pushing the limits.

(Big hint- It’s all in the clouds)

ARKADE’s magical colour palate…

demonstrates a cut and fade contrast masterclass heralded by a tuff character by Zomby.

.

Aks pulling it all together with an outline…

Mark, a young person participating from the Richmix project outlines his character.

It just goes to show…

…the sky really is the limit.

Prime outline © PRIME 2009

No Adobe Illustrator or stencils here-  take note!!! Strictly blood, sweat and tears for years and years.

Space with Slash character by Vapor.

Richmix Unity.

My effort (as yet unfinished) from the bus stop opposite…

The Saturday was drizzling and a bit grey but it kept fairly dry enough so we could paint, Me Aks, Prime and his protege had just got started around noon when a small protest march against Police violence passed us. They were in particular calling for a full and independent enquiry into the death of Ian Tomlinson at the G20 and against the use of indiscriminate violence against civilians at peaceful protests.

The small band made their way past silently and peacefully (this is nearly all of them) the mood was very sombre, like a funeral with lots of people in black.

…consisting largely of students, families, the elderly…

What's all this then?

…as the cavalry and packed battle wagons bring up the rear an officer stops to check out what Prime is up to …

….and the packed wagons roll by and keep coming, and coming and coming, very intimidating given the circumstances, and I wasn’t even marching.

The march passed and we all carried on painting with the memory of Ian Tomlinson and other innocent victims of state violence in mind. Rest In Peace.

I started to add my ELATE above Mark’s character.

Prime started on the orange 3Ds and the purple-red outline.

Considering it was made up on the spot at short notice, with a hasty outline, made to squeeze between two characters, use up the leftover colours and fit in with the ‘inclusive’ theme of the project, I’m happy with it

Mark with his finished character.

Meanwhile the finishing touches start to go onto the main masterpiece …

Das owner of Shoreditch’s new Rarekind Gallery is using Belton’s amazing new Transparent Black to do the 3D modelling on some of Prime’s floating spraycans, it’s available at their shop opposite this wall as is pretty much anything else a graffiti writer might need.

Lastly Prime defines the peaks of a metropolis that emerge from the water, next to a character by Tizer.

Prime ‘09

Get down and see this while it lasts….

Yes these guys are actually varnishing Prime’s piece not buffing it!!!