Vignettes/

On Advertising

People are taking the piss out of you everyday. They butt into your life, take a cheap shot at you and then disappear. They leer at you from tall buildings and make you feel small. They make flippant comments from buses that imply you’re not sexy enough and that all the fun is happening somewhere else. They are on TV making your girlfriend feel inadequate. They have access to the most sophisticated technology the world has ever seen and they bully you with it. They are “The Advertisers” and they are laughing at you.

You, however, are forbidden to touch them. Trademarks, intellectual property rights and copyright law mean advertisers can say what they like wherever they like with total impunity.

Fuck that. Any advert in a public space that gives you no choice whether you see it or not is yours. It’s yours to take, re-arrange and re-use. You can do whatever you like with it. Asking for permission is like asking to keep a rock someone just threw at your head.

You owe the companies nothing. Less than nothing, you especially don’t owe them any courtesy. They owe you. They have re-arranged the world to put themselves in front of you. They never asked for your permission, don’t even start asking for theirs.”

~ Banksy

07/25/12

Photo by Martin Reis.

07/25/12

Photo by Martin Reis.

Torontoist:

The cARTography spokesman insisted that the group wasn’t vandalizing the pillars, but was rather undoing acts of “vandalism” perpetrated by Astral. “Astral is vandalizing our city,” he said.

“We’re not really trying to do any permanent damage. They’ve done a lot of permanent damage, tearing up sidewalks, cutting down bike posts, and creating a sightline hazard for pedestrians, drivers, and cyclists…. We don’t see it as vandalism. We’re just offering an alternative.”

07/25/12

Photo by Martin Reis.

Media Pillars Reclaimed:

This weekend, cARTographyTO replaced ads in Astral Media “Info” Pillars with art-maps created by Toronto residents and local artists. This site-specific art offers new possibilities for these spaces, and information about the surrounding neighborhoods. This is a response to sidewalk billboards, and the erosion and privatization of public spaces.

07/25/12

Photo by Martin Reis.

Sean Martindale: “They’re privatizing pubic spaces with these huge walls.”

07/25/12

What is MUU?

Street Art Museum (MUU) is a project dedicated to forming a more coherent street art scene in Croatia, and raise people awareness about street art and it’s esthetic, cultural and social value.

Street Art Museum doesn’t have it’s own space, working hours or pompous exhibition openings. It’s all about urban interventions and how they reflect our reality and the impact that they have on our surroundings.

Our aim is to bring art into neglected parts of the city where there is no cultural content. Since culture bears great importance in society growth this is our priority. By changing the city we are changing people as well.

07/10/12

“Works of “removal art” are unintentionally made by city workers and property owners who have the conscious intention of erasing that which they do not sanction as art. With the addition of carefully chosen colour and occasional sculptural elements, VSVSVS consciously and deliberately “removes” the graffiti removals in such a way as to elevate the erasures”.

07/5/12

“The Subconscious Art of Graffiti Removal” (2001, director: Matt McCormick, narrator: Miranda July, based on an original idea of artist Avalon Kalin).

07/5/12

“

I wouldn’t call myself a street artist […] To me art already has its own values, and they’re pretty bougie. And then there’s the street. I feel like it’s condescending—like, “from the art world down to the street”—and I don’t really feel like it’s appropriate a lot of the time […] Graffiti, to anyone who sees it, regardless of how they feel about it, is like an unequivocal “I don’t need permission and I’m not letting anyone tell me what to do” type of statement, whether that’s aggressive-looking graffiti, or whether that’s some of the more feminine styles that pop up. It’s also accessible. I don’t know many people that feel too comfortable walking into a gallery show […] I hadn’t been to one in years, except to maybe pocket a couple beers and run away. But the street is right there. Anybody can look at it.

Weed Wolf, 2011.

06/26/12