murals

MAYA HAYUK

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(1969, Maryland, US)

With their symmetrical compositions, intricate patterns, and lush colors, Maya Hayuk’s paintings and massively scaled murals recall views of outer space, traditional Ukrainian crafts, airbrushed manicures, and mandalas. The artist weaves visual information from her immediate surroundings into her elaborate abstractions, creating an engaging mix of referents from popular culture and advanced painting practices alike while connecting to the ongoing pursuit of psychedelic experience in visual form. She has painted her iconic outdoor murals all over the world and, when not traveling, maintains an active studio in Brooklyn, sketching in paint to inform the large-scale works. Maya Hayuk sees her studio painting practice and mural making as both inversely relational and symbiotic.

Maya Hayuk earned a BFA in Interrelated Media from Massachusetts College of Art in 1991 and has studied at V.C.U. in Richmond, Ontario College of Art and Design in Toronto, the University of Odessa in Ukraine and at Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in Maine. 

Her work has been the subject of one person exhibitions and commissions at venues including The Hammer Museum, LA (2013), The Museum Of Contemporary Canadian Art, Toronto (2013), Bonnefanten Museum, Maastricht (2012) and Socrates Sculpture Park in New York (2011). Aditionally, Maya Hayuk has curated numerous exhibitions, is a member of the Barnstormers collective as well as the Cinders Art Collective and she frequently collaborated with other artists and musicians. She has created album covers, hand-made screenprints, videos, stage sets, photographs and posters for famous musicians such as Rye Rye/M.I.A and The Beastie Boys. Furthermore, she has curated “This Wall could be your Life” (2005 - 2011) on the exterior walls of the now legendary and recently demolished Monster Island/ Secret Project Robot in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

Watch this video by Hammer Museum:


KMNDZ

in ,

(Los Angeles, US)

KMNDZ, aka Johnny Rodriguez, is a Los Angeles artist who paints weatherbeaten, suffering steampunk robots and mysterious mechanical devices with street-art style and masterly technique.

A successful leader in the graphic design community, this Los Angeles based artist, has worked for some of the world’s premier design agencies and top entertainment companies. With brands like MTV Networks, Universal Pictures, Microsoft, Lexus, Disney, and Activision populating his resume, Johnny has built an impressive portfolio of both artistic and technological accomplishments in the world of graphic design and new-media. However, first and foremost, Johnny is an artist. He attributes his success in commercial design as a direct result of his passion for art. KMDNZ is about both the past and the future.

Rodriguez’s personal work is quite different from his commercial endeavors. When he sits down to paint, he puts aside the pressures of mass appeal and commercial accessibility, and instead focuses on creating art for himself. Drawing from his own life, his paintings are filled with memories of family and friends, religious undertones, and iconic elements. A recent piece features a drawing of an audio cassette embedded into a hand grenade. This represents a tough look back at the time when his father left their family to fight a war in Nicaragua, and left only an audio recording to explain his actions. 

Watch Johnny painting in his studio:

HERA

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(1981, Germany)

Since 2004 the German street art duo Hera and Akut form a fruitful partnership having worked together on various successful global art projects. Their art works can be found in big cities around the world – from Toronto to Kathmandu, from San Francisco to Melbourne. Their joint creative art process is dialogical, among themselves as well as towards the outside by embracing the public. It’s about storytelling, the creation of imaginary worlds and inspiring their figures with individual characters. Hera sets the characters’ form and proportions, whilst Akut paints the photorealistic elements. The further process is determined jointly by the two artists. 

Together they experiment with different formats, materials and methods. Their art works ‘natural home’ is the public space, where everyone can take a pause from the city buzz in front of one of their massive murals. Equally, their gallery pieces, installations and canvases are characterized by their narrative style and their ability to lead the viewer into the imagination of those two exceptional artists. There is a pictorial and textual component in their art pieces. The short quotes, passages or descriptions written next to the figures are references to the character’s life. As a central theme, their figures can be seen in the context of social fractions and collective constraints, but also embedded into fabulous quotes that tell us of love. Thus, the figures reflect the diversity of life.

Herakut’s paintings are sensuous, savage, and always remarkable for their powerful dualism. Akut’s photorealistic details play out against Hera’s expressive, more gestural, line-work in canvases that seem poised to articulate stories of triumph and hardship. Humor and text are weaved their way into the work effortlessly.

Watch this video:


EINE

in ,

(1970, London, UK)

The prolific street artist Ben Eine (Ben Flynn) is best known his series of spray-painted letter murals on storefront shutters along London’s Middlesex Street, or “Alphabet Street”, as it has become known. Eine’s trademark colorful typography adorns streets in cities all over the world, including LA, Mexico City, and Tokyo, and the artist also creates indoor installations and produces works on canvas in spray paint, acrylic, and glitter. Eine gained worldwide recognition when British Prime Minister David Cameron presented one of his works to President Obama during a state visit. He was also invited to participate in Banksy’s 2008 “Cans Festival” in London.

Watch this documentary:


DATE FARMERS

in ,

(California, US)

The Date Farmers are Armando Lerma and Carlos Ramírez. The artwork by The Date Farmers echoes Mexican-American heritage rooted in California pop culture. Their paintings, collages and three-dimensional sculptures contain elements influenced by graffiti, Mexican street murals, traditional revolutionary posters, sign painting, prison art and tattoos. Living in the peaceful seclusion of the desert, the artists often travel across the border, into Mexicali and Oaxaca to scavenge for materials. With traces of ancient indigenous art, mushrooms, and mescal, the Date Farmers combine familiar pop iconography and corporate logos with figures from comics, folklore and Catholicism. Desert creatures such as coyotes, snakes, and scorpions appear frequently in their works as well as found materials like stamps, bottle caps, hand painted or collaged lettering.

The Date Farmers have a history that is just as compelling as their artwork. Originally from Indio, California, they met at an art gallery in Coachella Valley ten years ago. Marsea Goldberg of New Image Art gave them their first show, naming them The Date Farmers because Armando’s father owned a Date Farm in Coachella where Carlos worked, picking dates. Carlos’ mother was a migrant who once worked with civil rights leader Cesar Chavez -American activist and co-founder of the United Farm Workers- during the grape boycott of the 1970s. Through their unique perspective as American-born Chicanos, The Date Farmers explore topical subjects with a profound simplicity.

Watch this video by alf alpha:


BEN TOUR

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(1977, Canada)

Ben Tour channels a dark, often haunting sense of humanism in his work. His observations deftly inform his paintings, enabling him to capture the essence of a character, then distort that view any way he desires. 

Frenetic lines, swaths of color, and intimate angles all convey a sense that Tour may not only be drawing inspiration from the lives of strangers he observes, but manifesting his own personal experiences as well. The emotional content in each portrait is palpable as this perceived notion of creation and catharsis is paired well with the immediate voyeuristic allure of his characters. 

Tour has exhibited in galleries from Los Angeles to Miami, Hamburg to New York. His work has been featured in publications including BLK/MRKT One and Two, Juxtapoz, and Playboy. He has worked with clients such as BMW, Absolut, Nike and Burton Snowboards.

Watch the Stickboy "Monster Murals" project by vancouveropera: