When you go about town in Rotterdam, enormous murals pop into sight. They make the surface of the city a lot more interesting to look at. But no matter the guerrilla outlook, most street art is somehow domesticated. Even the local Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen started featuring street art and artists: a true contradiction in terms, since it seems sheer impossible to intertwine the street and the institutions.
For two months, the YEAH BOIJ concept not only provided artist Baschz Leeft with a workshop in the entrance area of the museum, but granted many more local street artists the opportunity to expose themselves to a new public. It was a royal gesture of open-mindedness, because let’s face it: street art isn’t part of the museum curriculum yet. Street art is done outside, on the surface of buildings or as interventions in the urban environment. However, since street art is taken to a new level, both professionally and artistically, it is too omnipresent to ignore. Also, since the Dutch cultural sector is re-identifying itself and its place in society, awareness of the benefits of street art’s cool image has risen.
But not only museums, commercial hot-spots instrumentalize street art too. For example the Mini Mall located in the former Hofplein station in Rotterdam. The piece adorning the side of the building which now houses cute little shops is the result of a collaboration between Maarten Alexander and Rul3ers. Notwithstanding it is a fine piece of art, I cannot help but question the integrity of the artists. How much fun is it to make a piece on demand? It is like going back to the golden age, when Rembrandt made his paintings for the wealthy citizens of Amsterdam.
Is street art leashed?
Graffiti restoration is yet another result of the commercialization of street art. In both New York, where graffiti artists avant la lettre Michel Basquiat and Keith Haring left their traces, as well as in London, local governments declared to try and save the pieces by their famous citizens. London’s street cleaners are instructed to leave the Banksy’s at peace, whilst remove the other pieces and tags. A Banksy is supposed to uplift the neighborhood’s image and above all, it increases the housing prices.
Though street art has its roots in the classic graffiti culture, it is less anonymous and less about personal territorialism. Street artists often engage in contemporary politics and pose questions about the ownership of the urban environment. Exemplary is the work of the Icy & Sot. The two Iranian brothers started spraying their pieces on the streets and surfaces of Tabriz in 2005. Today their stencil technique has grown more intricate. Their works are build up out of multiple layers and mostly feature images of children and elderly people. By simply popping up unexpectedly in both the city and on the countryside, this imagery is supposed to raise questions and awareness about poverty and other hardships. Not only in Iran, but globally. In December a selection of works by Icy & Sot will be on display in the do-it-yourself-gallery Chiellerie in Amsterdam.
Icy & Sot’s inside-outline style fits in with pieces by other artists seen around the world, of which Banksy is most renown. Banksy however based his technique and style on Blek le Rat: the godfather of Parisian graffiti art who pioneered both stenciling and the image of the rat. And even though Banksy acknowledges this Parisian source of inspiration, the uneasiness around who owns which style and place in the street art scene shows that this phenomenon is still in its experimental phase. Also the London-based war between Banksy and King Robbo is typical of the rough edges of the outlines of street art itself. Robbo, in business from the eighties on, was not amused when Banksy painted over one of his oldest pieces. It catalyzed a chain-reaction of attacks on each other’s works by both the two artists and their teams. The whole story is brilliantly documented in Graffiti Wars.
No matter the iconic status street artists hold in our times, to remain interventionists and critical spectators of modernity they should try to remain true to themselves instead of their opportunistic admirers.
by MILOU VAN OENE
One Comment
Not only is this information incorrect also should you find a good source or ask an artist before writing down your thoughts. The piece wasn’t on demand and it was not payed!! It costed more then 1000 euro (for the artist) and we we’re able to push down the cost to fix some sponsors for paint and prints. None of this sponsors had any influence on this piece and neither did Mini Mall. They only gave us the wall.