SHINE Mural Festival 2016- St. Pete- Alex Pardee

 Artists, Florida Street Art, Painting / Painters, St. Petersburg Street Art, Street Art
Nov 222022
 

Brightmares was created by Alex Pardee (@alexpardee) for the 2016 SHINE Mural Festival in St. Pete, Florida.

From the St. Pete Arts Alliance website about the work-

The mural is called Brightmare, 46 feet wide and 19 feet tall. An emaciated, purple, naked figure is bowed down under a huge, sagging rainbow-colored ball where her head should be. She’s bony and hunched over, with purple skin and long grey skeletal hands, pendulous breasts and a swollen belly. The figure is on tiptoe, knees bent, one hand on the muddy floor for balance.

The sagging striped ball covers her head and neck and droops toward her belly – a red dot like a bullseye in the center of the ball, is ringed with pink, blue, green, yellow and orange. It’s like a rainbow balloon that’s leaking air, and jammed onto the figure’s head. Colors drip from the ball, and purple splashes from her body, as if the entire mural is melting in the heat.

The figure is stooped in front of a gaping black hole painted on the wall, like the opening of a cave. At her feet, bulbous blobs of white, tan and brown are spurting mud and water into the air.

On the lower left corner, the muddy blobs touch a green metal door in the side of the building. The outline of the cave crosses vertical pipes and electrical connections bolted to the wall. Two dark metal exhaust ducts frame the figure’s heavy rainbow head.

The background of the mural is the same stark industrial tan of the rest of the building, a massive structure that takes up almost an entire block.

Alex Pardee is a multi-media designer and illustrator who’s brought his unique aesthetic to music, film, animation, clothing and comics. When he painted this for the 2016 SHINE Festival, it was the largest mural he’d ever attempted. Ricky Watts, another artist on our tour, flew in from San Francisco to help with the mural’s completion. The mural is painted in aerosol, but the gaping black hole is brush painted.

To your right, in the alley facing this mural, a small window with heavy metal bars reflects the mural’s rainbow colors.

 

NYC Street Art- Erin Ko

 Artists, Conceptual Art, Digital Art, New York Street Art, Painting / Painters, Public Art, Street Art
Nov 182022
 

Mundo Loco by Erin Ko spotted in NYC in 2020. For more of her work also check out her Instagram.

The mural has recently been chosen by MakersPlace to be part of Equal Bytes, a new artist accelerator program that aims to “recruit and onboard additional women creators to the NFT space and support the minting and sale of their first NFT”.

Until 11/20/22 you can vote for your favorite artwork on their site and be automatically entered to win one of six NFTs selected by MakersPlace from the exhibition. All of the pieces included are by first-time women NFT creators.  The ten artists who receive the most votes will be invited to participate in their Featured Creators Program.

 

NYC Street Art- Dorothy Day

 History, New York Street Art, Politics, Quotes, Street Art
Nov 082022
 

Dorothy Day, born today, November 8th, was an American journalist and social activist who co-founded the Catholic Worker Movement in the early 1930s. This portrait is located in the First Street Community Garden.

On November 4th, 2022, the newest vessel in the Staten Island Ferry fleet was named for her, and will enter service in the coming weeks. Day lived on Staten Island for several decades.

Interestingly the quote in the portrait above that reads “All of our problems stem from our acceptance of this filthy, rotten system”, although probably her most famous, may never have been said by her. For more on that debate, this article is pretty informative.

 

 

SHINE Mural Festival 2016- St. Pete- Michael Reeder

 Artists, Florida Street Art, Painting / Painters, Public Art, St. Petersburg Street Art, Street Art
Oct 262022
 

Beneath the Shell by Michael Reeder (@reederone) was created for the 2016 iteration of SHINE Mural Festival in St. Pete, Florida.

The St. Pete Arts Alliance website has more information on the artist and this work.

SHINE Mural Festival 2018- St. Pete- Cecilia Lueza

 Artists, Florida Street Art, Painting / Painters, Public Art, St. Petersburg Street Art, Street Art
Oct 192022
 

The Blue Hour by Cecilia Lueza was created for the 2018 iteration of SHINE Mural Festival in St. Pete, Florida.

From the St. Pete Arts Alliance website about the work-

A rich, dusky blue with vivid rainbow swirls and the blue-tinted profile of a woman lit by moonlight is the focal point of 100 1st Avenue North. The mural is on the northwest corner of Central Avenue and 1st Street North, across the street from The James Museum.

Cecilia Lueza calls this piece, The Blue Hour. She explains, “It’s inspired by that magical time between daylight and darkness. It explores the visual effects of color, and movement, while evoking wonder and contemplation.”

The mural feels intimate, two sides of a corner angled inward. The left-hand side, facing east, is 17 feet high, 18 feet long. The right-hand side, facing south, is 17 feet high and 22 feet long.

The background is a rich, deep blue, the color of the sky moments after the sun sets. On the right half, facing Central Avenue, a calm and lovely woman’s face looks toward the right. Her face is in profile, from the neck up, so large that the top of her head is cut off by the mural’s edge. She’s painted a range of dark and lighter blues – and very realistic – like an idealized black and white photograph that’s been tinted blue.

Her expression is thoughtful, as if she’s been watching the sun set and is looking at the quickly fading colors as the stars and Moon begin to glow around her.

Her profile shows a graceful neck, high cheekbones and a smooth forehead, one dark eyebrow in a curve, and long dark lashes. The right edge of her face is outlined in light, as if she’s facing a full Moon. Her eye, her cheek, the edge of her nose, her lips, her neck and throat, are highlighted by moonlight. The rest of her face, and her neck, are dark indigo.

Instead of the long dark hair we expect, thick swirls of blue and green – and swirls of red, pink, orange and gold – flow behind her head and across the left half of the mural, the half that’s facing 1st Street.

A swirl of blue, in stripes from dark to light, touches the back of her head, falling in an undulating band from the top of the mural to the ground, as if this ribbon of color continues past the edges of the mural. Another end of this long band curves down and sprawls across the left half before arcing up and away.

A band of color striped from yellow and green to blue, twines across the left half of the mural before it swoops around the other blue band like a crochet stitch.

Behind the swirling blues and greens is a wave striped in pink, red, rose, watermelon and peach. It twists behind the blues and ducks under another wave, with stripes that run from red to gold. The blue-green swirls and the red-pink-gold swirls dive and tangle, full of motion.

The mural is a lovely combination of the calm and thoughtful blue-toned woman gazing out as light falls on her face – caught in thick waves of color.

Cecilia Lueza was born in Argentina and is now based in St. Pete. She’s known for vibrant public art pieces in a range of media. She explains that this mural has a sense of identity, and an element of discovery.

Her goal with this corner space “was to create an uplifting, evocative, and colorful focal piece that could be viewed and enjoyed from every angle.”

Lueza’s website is linked above, but more of her work can also be found on her Instagram.

NYC Street Art- KINMX

 New York Street Art, Street Art
Oct 062022
 

For more work by KINMX (Kathrina Rupit), check out her website and Instagram.

This work is part of Street Art Mankind’s mural project. The non-profit organization collaborates with artists around the world to raise awareness on social justice and environmental issues.

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