Back in the eighties I went to countless acid house parties, Wayne Anthony’s ‘Genesis’ was one amongst many such as SIN, Hypnosis, Dungeons, Land of Oz, Biology, Trip City, Krazy Klub, Karma Sutra, Hell, Rage, the Fitness Centre, Nut House, Phantasy and others….
Now in 2010 acid house party pioneers Wayne Anthony from Genesis and Sirius23 are producing one of the best magazines on the planet and I’m honoured to be writing for it.
It’s an alternative lifestyle publication covering art, street art, graffiti, music, consciousness, protest, poetry, philosophy, festival culture and plenty other good vibes it really should not be missed……full of great inspirational stuff to read if you’re a head and full of great ideas to rip off…….. if you’re an 4RTFAG
EDIT
I removed the word 4RTF49 from this post as someone suggested the term could be perceived as anti gay!!!!
(just the opposite in fact, I’ve always stood up for the marginalised and taken issue with their oppressors and many of my girlfriends have been bi )…..so replace it with the following italic text and quotation.
…..if your desire to be perceived as innovative and underground outweighs either your powers of imagination or respect for the originality and culture of your peers and forebears .
“The seed ye sow, another reaps; The wealth ye find, another keeps; The robes ye weave, another wears; The arms ye forge, another bears.”
New issue ‘Stand and Deliver’ is out now….. there’s an article I’ve written about cosmic stuff on page 210 and Sirius interviews lil’ ol’ me on page 412. click below to read in your browser…
2010 has been a great Summer for underground painting events…..now London’s brand new ‘old’s kool’ hall of fame was given a baptism of fire this Sunday just gone in the heat of the end of London’s summer….Instigated and organised by Insane and Choci Roc, WRH/AWE/RocStars the first ever UK writer to have painted the NY Subway trains starting in 1985 alongside Kase 2 and Mare 139 from ‘Style Wars’ and many others……
Passing through or painting were…..
Prime, Doze, Robbo, Drax, Elk, Dase IL, Choci Roc, Rage, Insane,Skore, PIC ,Krash151, Shuto, Cane, Part2, Shade, Shazer, Merc, Time, Keen One, Letty Lions, Kilo, Disk, Rage, Demon, Steam156, Oker, PIC, Dev666, Krash151, Etch, Kilo, Don, Jet (WRH juniors) Jenny who took the shots and many more…….. including a film crew from an internationally acclaimed TV network who filmed the day and interviewed many of us for a major new documentary that’s in production…..
At last…. a major UK graffiti/art documentary that’s independently produced…..should be interesting!
I can’t wait to see it, they certainly seemed to have done their homework, and seemed fully aware of the history of the movement in light of current events……
An early start meant we were on the wall by around 9 and I started to get my outline up…
We couldn’t have hoped for better weather or a better spot….oh yeah and there was a few legends there too….
Rage and Skore
It’s great to see Part 2 writing again…
My piece finished
Jet WRH juniors
Prime WRH….and at last the place is returned to it’s true use…the locals certainly seemed grateful for our efforts.
News of broadcast dates will be coming when I hear them, massive thanks to all involved especially Insane and Choci Roc/ We Roc Hard Crew and Jenny for taking most of the photos.
I did all the artwork for Arcadia, one of the highlights of Glastonbury 2010, the Festival’s 40th Birthday, the hottest on record and some say the best yet…
For two weeks we relished the bliss of perfect English midsummer in the most mystical part of the country, Glastonbury, where ley lines meet and legends were born, in The Vale ofAvalon, the ancient mythic gateway to the heathen goddess; a place of pilgrimage for millennia.
I was onsite with the team of militant revolutionary dreamers and genius engineers known as Arcadia, easily the best sound system around and quite possibly the greatest show on earth.
Their meticulous attention to detail and fantastic organisation extends to the busy site canteen who kept me fed and watered with an ever-changing array of fresh veggie delights and herbal teas….
I painted anarcho punk slogans since 82 then graffiti at the birth of UK hip hop in 84, onto London’s tube system in 86 through the golden age of train graffiti moving to acid house backdrops in 89. The nineties and new millenium saw me painting at traveller squat parties and Reclaim the Streets protest raves. Throughout the quiet renaissance of classical, surreal and visionary oil painting I was at the easel and fused my skills back with graffiti in Shoreditch in 2009 then onto MuTate Britain with the Mutoid Waste Company in Ladbroke Grove under the Westway…
Now in 2010 I feel glad to have played a small part by painting for the next underground zeitgeist, one which takes influence and energy from all those phenomenon and more, but boldly maps out a new frontier that is purely its’ own…ARCADIA.
Like all underground revolutionary movements the gold rush is for the inner treasure. The ultimate reward is the accomplishment of the dream and the actualisation of the idea. At Glastonbury 2010 Arcadia surpassed all expectations and reached dizzying new heights of inspiration, engineering, teamwork, sculpture, music, lighting, pyrotechnics, performance art and energy as this film shows….
The Build
When we arrived onsite the Afterburner stage was still in its early stages, the ‘legs’ of the spider are actually scrap from customs xray machines that used to scan containers and lorries. Pure genius…
The core of the beast is expertly manoevered into place…
…and it shows its’ face.
In keeping with Arcadia’s militant branding and apocalyptic atmosphere I did the line-up board using their trademark stencil lettering, and carefully distressed the fragments of plane for that ‘hauled out of the swamp 5 years after the crash’ look….
…with lots of help from capable hands.
The entrance arch is a couple of modified plane wings, possibly from a glider, it’d been rubbed down to the bare aluminium so to keep the burnished metal intact on the ‘pipes’ I used Belton’s amazing transparent black spray paint to get the relief modelling without losing the wonderful texture which gleamed from underneath as the sun caught the metal…The design was finalised between myself and Pip Rush and based on carvings on an ancient Aztec temple….
Here’s a video of the build in progress.
The line-up boards go up….
I then cut back over the black with Belton’s burner chrome to get a contrast against the aluminium and carefully painted the pop rivets and ‘crazy paving’ seams by hand.
Pip was keen to use my ‘Circuit Splat’ style so I modified it to pure abstraction with a vivid tribal background on some pieces of aeroplane scrap to hang behind the massive ‘Arc Bar’, the sun was pounding down…
After painting ‘til twilight the lights go on on the new Afterburner for the very first time and the eerie entity blinks into life.
Next day the crew finish building ‘stage left’ so I can start the piece.
Across the field the punk tent takes shape
After being branded with the Arcadia logo by their prop maker and effects guy, Simon, he begins work on the dirty-metal-effect background for my piece….
…and I start blocking in the arrows. Some respectful inspiration drawn from amigo Keen One here, but in 3 dimensions and distressed with a strong Elate/Arcadia twist….
….and lots of rivets, seams, gleams, glints and the Arcadia logo in the centre….
….everyone seemed to really like this.
Here the graffiti began to fuse with scrap art by Simon and Sam…
Finally after sweat and dedication, blisters, sprains and minor sunstroke Arcadia opened on Thursday 24th June 2010 to the public ….
…who went nuts….while many crew take the opportunity to sleep until rested before re-emerging to enjoy the weekend.
My art at the Arcadia Arc Bar ‘scuse the poor shots
You could feel the heat on your face from the other side of the field. Experience Arcadia, they’re doing amazing things.
I’ll let the Lords of Lightning sign off this post as only they know how.
All pictures of Arcadia build by me and Jenny apart from a few select shots of Afterburner show and Glastonbury used with permission Creative Commons and taken by Luke Blackmore, lusciousblopster, mark-vauxhall, medalliamagpie, Tangentical, fussy onion, Al Green midlander123 and bfirsh; thanks to all.
Massive thanks to Pip and Bertie and all Arcadia crew.
We kick off part two of this post with the golden age train writer Cazbee 53 from DSS Crew Da Sure Shots, from Ladbroke Grove piecing the outer wall of the MuTate Britain mechanical zoo….Many of Cazbees pieces rolled past this spot on trains,or were under the Westway itself.
Now he’s back 20 years later, along with oldskool steel writers Fuel, Skore, Mear, Crok, Don myself and a few of London’s more new skool to take the vibe back to the raw, enabling a potent and complementary mix of the hardcore underground vibes and tribes….
and back inside for another shot of me and Vibes….
……and onto the wild, diverse art within, here’s Jimmy South of War Boutique
Lyle Doghead, LRRY and friend
Elate, Obey
Anarchist Crockery by Carrie Reichart
In Dog We Trust by Jolly Good, made with real dollar bills…
Vera Bong
Dotmaster
The toilets…
New Arrivals…
What I have posted is a fraction of what is there, you really have to get down to this 12,000 foot space and experience the most revolutionary art happening London, probably even the world has ever seen.
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.
I’ve been posting a lot of graffiti based stuff lately, but I never forget my love for good old oil on canvas, so here’s a little something I knocked up way back in the late 90’s called ‘Living Under The Lines’.
I realise it’s already on my main site but thought it deserved a post on the blog as the definitions of what categorisation it may fall into seem have been redefined
I suppose now they call it Lowbrow/ Pop Surrealism. I like to think of it maybe as Urban Visionary but hell what’s in a name, label, tag, school or ism?
It is what it is.
To me at the time it was just a feeling I wanted to get onto canvas. I think I hit the mark.
