October 2 – December 11, 2010
Street Text is a two-part exhibition examining Street Art and its evolution into a world-wide cultural movement.
The upstairs portion of the exhibition titled Art From the Coasts is curated by Andrew Connors, Curator of Art at The Albuquerque Museum. He compares masters of graffiti art from New York and Los Angeles, including the work of Chaz Bojorquez, Gajin Fujita, John Lorne and Lady Pink, as well as the documentary photography of Henry Chalfant. It focuses on educating audiences about this highly developed international art form in contrast to tagging and vandalism.
The downstairs portion of the exhibition titled The Populist Phenomenon is curated by Francesca Searer of 516 ARTS. It includes a mix of local, national and international artists, and examines the artists’ work as a means of expressing a message to the masses. Featured New Mexican artists include Jaque Fragua, Stevan Gutierrez, Thomas Christopher Haag, NESE and Albert Rosales; and guest artists include Shepard Fairey, Mark Jenkins, Alexandre Orion, Chris Stain, Slinkachu, SWOON and Chip Thomas.
Work will include on- and off-site installations, photographic documentation, portable representations of wheat-paste, stencil and canvas work methods and video clips and films of street artists in action.
The Street Text exhibition is the center of a city-wide series of events titled Street Arts: A Celebration of Hip Hop Culture & Free Expression during October and November, presented in partnership with the ACLU-NM and local arts organizations. The project celebrates art in the urban environment and explores issues of free expression.
http://www.516arts.org/exhibitions.html
