Testing...testing...testing

A beta version of Street Art Dealer soft launched at Westbourne Studios, on the 5th March as part of the “Urban Art Showcase” organised by The Portobello Film Festival & Street Art Dealer.

“Urban Art Showcase” is a year round exhibition of the urban art available to buy straight from your mobile phone. Street Art Dealer have curated quite a stable of some of the freshest talent in the UK to start proceedings. Westbourne studios are kindly hosting these works so we can iron out system problems and usability in a more controlled environment before hitting the streets. (www.streetartdealer.com) a full street trial planned in the Bristol wide area.

Street Art Dealer launched a test environment of their system where works of art can be bought from a specific street location via a mobile phone using a QR tag. A QR Code is a matrix code (or two-dimensional bar code). Many camera phones now have these bar code readers, there are a number of third party software’s that can be installed on a large variety of makes of phone and PD-A’s using a large variety operating systems. Street Art Dealer will be a quick and seamless mobile sales tool.

Featured Artists:

DOTMASTERS
The Dotmasters are the latest incarnation of C6.org the pranksters that brought you Man in a Box, Toogle and New Media New Arse. Alive and bombing since 1997 C6 have invaded both the web and street in a onslaught of puerile proportions. The Dotmasters are C6’s stencil arm, with exhibitions that range from Banksy’s Can festival in May 08 to works at the Cabaret Voltaire and the curating of Nuart in Stavanger Norway. C6 mix technology, hand craft skills with a sheer bloody mindedness to any commercial success. For the Urban Art show they present their new works on paper ‘A Load of Rubbish; and assorted prints.

ZEUS
For the past 20 years, London artist Zeus has been drawing inspiration from urban culture to create dynamic, experimental compositions that have re-defined graffiti art. Captivated by the hip-hop scene of the 80s, he began expressing his creative talents on the street when he was just 14, using walls, trains, and open spaces as his galleries. Since then Zeus has continually pushed the boundaries of graffiti artistry, taking the form out of its traditional setting and into new, exciting and more legitimate places. His latest works represent an innovative fusion of graffiti techniques and typography, fine art and sculpture and reflect both his background on the streets and his formal training at Chelsea College of Art. www.zeus-uk.com

SOLO ONE
Solo One has been one of the most prolific graffiti writer in recent times. His work is a comic book style reflection on society today and incorporates contemporary issues on a ever changing basis. Solo One continues to make art for the street and has exibited in Azerbajan, Cape Town, New York and Tokyo. He continues to keep a low profile in the mainstream street art scene and creates collectable one off pieces from his small studio in South London. www.myspace.com/soloone_vopstars

INKIE
One of the first graffiti artists in Britain, inspired by the arrival of the film Wild Style as well as the book Subway Art. After coming 2nd in the World Street Art championships in 1989 and then being arrested along with 72 other writers as the ‘Kingpin’ in the UK’s largest ever Graffiti bust Operation Anderson he moved to London and has since worked as a leading graphic designer in the video game industry as head of design for SEGA and Xbox as well as continuing to contribute as a leading member of the European graffiti scene.

He was recently named by the Daily Mail as Banksy’s partner in crime, described by The Times as one of the world’s most in demand street artists, and featured in the Banky’s Bristol, Children of the Can & Graffiti World amongst others, Garphotism magazine, Studio Voice magazine in Japan and the LA Graffiti documentary ‘Bomb It’.

Inkie is currently working in Jade Jagger’s West London studio producing large scale paintings and designing graphics, illustration and clothing. www.inkie.co.uk

GRL
The Graffiti Research Lab is dedicated to outfitting graffiti writers, artists, pranksters and protesters with open source tools for urban communication. The goal of the G.R.L. is to technologically empower individuals to creatively alter their surroundings on the scale of advertisers and the authorities in order to reclaim public space and encourage uncurated speech. Their work has been featured in the New York Times, Wired, Time Magazine, Time Asia, Esquire, Rolling Stone, a White House press release, Boing Boing, Digg.com and on the front page of YouTube. G.R.L. Weapons of Mass Defacement (WMDs) have earned numerous grants, awards and detentions from rogue governments, art organizations and global super powers, including an Award of Distinction from Ars Electronica in 2006. Their work is in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art, and has been shown in museums, toilet stalls and the streets on five continents, including the Tate Modern and Art Basel Miami. Their first film, “GRL: The Complete First Season”, premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2008, and sold-out the MoMA. In December 2009, the G.R.L will be featured in the Pompidou in Paris, France. The GRL is a F.A.T. Lab production, headquartered in Brooklyn, NY. www.vimeo.com/951135

CHU
Some highlights of his 27 year graffiti journey-

· Sitting on a coach waiting for the sun to rise with Futura on his 40th birthday, so we could photograph our paintings at an outdoor rave, 1994.
· Launch event for the Graffiti Bastards show in Birmingham’s Custard Factory, 1996.
· Painting my first stereoscopic 3d painting at Urban Games, 1999.
· Painted inside the bomb-proof basement car park of the Swiss embassy with Banksy, 2001.
· Painting the ladies toilet at the Big Breakfast house in East London, 2001.
· Working alongside Banksy and the bourgeoning Pictures on Walls, 2002.
· Only graffiti artist to work on the walls of the Barbican in London, 2003.
· Giving my hometown a 100ft & 15ft mural declaring ‘Born in Walsall’, 2004.
· 200ft by 20ft mural inside the Selfridges store in Birmingham, 2006.
· Helping Jamie Hewlett ‘paint’ 18 whole cars of a Virgin Pendolino, 2007.
· Creating the world’s largest aerosol mural singlehandedly, 2007.
· www.schudio.co.uk