STREET DIALOGUES #5 - artworks

/ ARTWORKS

SETH
Escape (in memory of the Bataclan attack),
Paris, November 2015
spray paint and acrylics on zinc slab recovered from Paris rooftops, steel bars and fabric
184 x 124 cm

SETH

(Paris 1972)

A writer since the mid-1990s, Julien Malland began painting murals in Paris’s 20th arrondissement under the name SETH. Graduated from the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs (ENSAD) in Paris, before dedicating himself to painting, he worked in advertising.
Since 2003, he has developed a distinctive, iconic painting style associated with the imagery of childhood. His children represent the generation of the future—observers, witnesses, and messengers of sociological, political, and ethnic inquiries. Seth depicts them by hiding their faces in a swirl of colors, leaving us to imagine their expressions beyond the rainbow; the message simultaneously plays on the contrast between innocence and discomfort, juxtaposing adolescent purity with the difficulties of adult life. In his work, the children’s candor is lost in the disillusionment of our time.
The originality of his work — evident in pieces created in the East and Latin America — also stems from his ability to incorporate symbols, culture, and subjects from the place where the work is painted.
Seth published Kapital, One Year of Graffiti in Paris in collaboration with Gauthier Bischoff in 2000, the best-selling book on French graffiti, and has produced numerous documentaries.

seth_globepainter

C215
Staring
Paris, 2013
Spray paint, stencil on found wood door
166, 5 x 72,5 cm

C215

(Paris 1973)

Christian Guémy, aka C215, has been active on the walls of Paris since 2005.
He is the most popular stencil specialist and also the most recognizable thanks to his unmistakable multilayer cuts: vivid, intense, bright, and deep.
He mainly portrays metropolitan humanity: beggars, immigrants, homeless people, street children, anonymous lovers, the elderly, workers, and cats; he favors common subjects, unknown faces, and authentic expressions. He lingers on expressions, profiles, and gazes, which he renders attractively with great technical skill — the stencil layers — and expressiveness. His daughter Nina is often the subject of his works.
He has been producing street art for about 20 years, carrying his message to many cities worldwide, completing numerous commissioned projects, as well as many works on found materials; his moniker derives from the number of the cell where he was once imprisoned.

christianguemy

JEF AÉROSOL
Self Portrait
Paris, 1992
Spray paint, stencil on canvass
4 elementi, 70 x 50 cm

JEF AÉROSOL

(Nantes 1957)

A pioneer of urban art, born during the rock era, a teenager in the beat era, and an adult during punk. In the late 1970s, he was quite active with copy art, an artistic form developed around the emerging photocopy technology. Then, along with Blek le Rat and Miss Tic, Jean-François Perroy, aka JEF AÉROSOL, became one of the most famous exponents of the first generation of stencil artists, those who in the early 1980s began painting portraits and serial images on European city walls using spray cans and cardboard masks.
His stencil is a self-portrait derived from a passport photo, executed on a large scale in Tours in 1982, a subject recurring in his early studio work. Since then, Jef Aérosol has mainly painted portraits of famous personalities and anonymous people; his style is minimal, dominated by white, black, and shades of gray, and his tag — the mark that characterizes and distinguishes all his works — is a visible red arrow.
He has executed thousands of portraits on streets worldwide.
He lives in Lille.

jefaerosol

JBROCK
L’evoluzione
Rome, 2012
Spray paint, stencil on canvass
149,5 x 99 cm

JB ROCK

(Roma 1979)

One of the leading urban artists on the Roman scene. A writer since age 12 and member of the TTS crew, JB ROCK graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome. Together with Diamond, at the turn of the millennium, he was a pioneer in Italy of poster art, sticker art, and stencil.
He is famous for the quality of his multilayer stencils and favors iconic, rebellious, and transgressive characters; among the subjects he has dedicated a series to is the hand, a symbol of vitality, self-confidence, and reaction.
His aesthetic is intense, energetic, distinctive, and instinctive. His research is inspired by humanity, social themes, politics, pop, and post-pop.

jaybeerock

STREET DIALOGUES
#5