MAY DAY: Killing In The Name Of…

// May 28th, 2010 // View Comments // Eyes on the Crowd

Raging against the machine. Catalysing change. A pilot distresses as he watches his plane plummet. We’ve picked art from our crowd in this vein. The activist or revolutionary believes one person can change the world and that the world needs a changing. The outsiders and free thinkers have always refreshed man’s consciousness and artists are our cultural visionaries. b-uncut’s online artists network has started an art revolution going against the grain of the traditional art industry. Liberating and empowering artists and opening their work up to the world. From our talented collective we have selected 5 artworks that sing the sweet song of rebellion.

“The subject matter is based on the philosophy that lies behind the perception of reality and imagination and the way that those two can blend together. Following those principles I am creating visuals and stories blending traditional techniques with digital and special effects” Margarita I. Alassia

“I find my work can be in your face and that’s the effect I wish to give off as well as a message. Sometimes I can find my art to be dark and yet also give light on what is affecting the world.” Jason Ellis

“There is no winner, we are all losers – I didn’t finish this painting series yet, several other key incidences and the city ablaze including my little Spa Siam shop in one of the city centre’s largest shopping Mall – still too hot to assess the damage but I don’t think there’s much left-just mangled steel and burnt out concrete. The Red shirts have announced that they will be starting up again on 26 th June – great we clear up what’s left of our city for them to come back and destroy it again.” Arisara Caroline Faulder

Carl John Dimitri has a selection of political mixed media pieces. This style is aggravated by the subject matter which ingrains these images with frustration and presence.

“Redvolution is a small painting that was shown at a group show called “Retomando el Rojo”, which means something like “taking back the red”. Chavez´s so called revolution has taken the colour red hostage and the show addressed that. Redvolution is a perfume bottle in the spirit of Gautier that represents the fake ideal of the revolution. The cologne bottle of the Redvolution is fashioned in our real liberator’s classical attire, Simon Bolivar’s. Fundamentally it is more of a capitalist venture for a few than a populist movement but they have been sooo smart at doing it that they have fooled many for more than a decade.  Now millions of Venezuelans and Americans; people like Sean penn, Danny Glover, and even Oliver Stone!!! I lived in Cuba for over a year so I know how bad these repressive regimes are!!! Anyway Redvolution is the new fragrance By Hugo D´Boss… a.k.a Hugo Chavez….” Javaroa Jose-Vazquez

Join our artist community here. Buy artwork online here.

GRAFFITI ARTIST MERES COMES FOR NYC SUBWAY BATTLES IN LONDON

// May 27th, 2010 // View Comments // b-scene, b-street

Graffik gallery on London’s Portobello road are hosting London’s graffiti event of the year. MERES from 5 POINTZ and other NY graffiti artists are travelling over to exhibit, paint live, teach and battle against London’s finest. Graffik have walls out back, cans for sale and artists go there regularly to throw up all sorts of great work. Like all true graffiti and street art the shit don’t last long. Those walls are living eye candy. I was lucky enough to catch FALSE from the 284 Crew go start to finish. One word. crisp

Buy art online here.

From War in Afganistan to Art Exhibitions in London

// May 26th, 2010 // View Comments // b-loud

Shikyba Azizi has a tough story to tell and she creates tense, bloody work. She uses unique techniques to create these striking graphical images that speak of the conflicts she escaped. Shikyba joined our online artist network in January and we were immediately struck by the raw and radical intensity. Shikyba is exhibiting in London till the 15th June in The Spring Show at The Gallery at Willesden Green Library Centre. Read the fascinating interview below.

What was your very first artwork?
When I was young I drew flowers or butterflies for fun in a corner of my notebooks and presented my homework in creative way to my teachers. I did not train in school how to draw or paint. We had art class but they didn’t encourage the students to improve their skills. I was interested in art so I decided to do Fine Art when I finished secondary school. When I started my BA course in Fine Art in 1990 I was the youngest and least skilled student in my class. Everyone had very good skills because they had a family member to help them or they took courses before enrolling. So it was a bit hard for me to reach their level and learn the techniques, but I tried.
We had to study the human body and draw from life but we were not allowed to draw the body without clothes. I drew an ear of one of my classmates. When my tutor saw it, he said to the class very loudly “Shikyba’s gonna be a good artist soon”. (Unfortunately I have not got the drawing)

Describe the piece you love the most—why?
The piece that I love most is the forth from a series of five the drawings, ‘Prisoner inside the veil’ which is an image of a woman covered by a bloody pigeon on her head and its blood spread on her face and her neck twisted tight with lines. I love it because she is disturbed by all these thing but she is still solid and gazing at the viewers.

What are your methods? Your inspirations?
I get my ideas from my personal experiences in past and present. To expand them I also read history books and poems which wrote about the tyranny of war.
I mostly use monochromatic materials for my work both in my sculptures and drawings. My sculpture works are constructed using black fabric and wire. I cut a piece of fabric and pull it around the wire to give it a shape. In my drawings I use ink and spread it on white fabric with a string which is interwoven with metal.

What did it take to make it to where you are now?
Passionate in art and access to art materials. When I started my course, I was interested in art but not passionate about it. I wanted to complete my course and become teacher in my homeland. Unfortunately I did not and we had to stay at home and do nothing because of the war. Day after day the situation was getting worse and worse and we were surrounded by the conflict. In that time I wanted to draw, not a flower or a butterfly, but dead bodies, boundaries, distorted and bloodied faces. Living in the four walls completely changed me. I became pessimistic. I started to draw and express myself inside my brain because there was no paper to draw on. That’s until we had to leave my homeland and live in London in 2000. I started my studies again, graduated and now have a small studio space and I work very hard to buy materials and create artwork.

Do you make a living from your artwork?
Not at all.

Who has helped you along the way?
Financially my brother and emotionally my sister, but in the art world no one.

What 5 artists (dead or alive) would you invite for the ultimate dinner party?
Pablo Picasso, Willem de Kooning, Mona Hatoum, Doris Salcedo and Jackson Pollock

Your favourite curse?
I curse the evil of the world which destroys our freedom.

Your biggest (albeit endearing) flaw?
Spoken communication

Qualities a man needs to seduce you and the flaws that will repel you?
Understanding and respect / Neglect

Your parents advice you should have followed, but didn’t?
Sadly My father past away when I was two years old and my mother got married and left me when I was five or six so I do not remember if they told me what to do. My brother brought me up and I respect him as my father. He always says that I should not make art, but I do.

Your idea of the perfect weekend?
Sleeping until 10am, taking bath and having a good food and visiting friends and galleries.

Who would you chose to rule the world?
Superman or if I had a super-natural power to make the world free by cleaning up the lines on the map.

Favourite ice-cream?
All types.

Where do you see yourself in…..
One month?
In willesden Gallery in London and then at Kabul university in Afghanistan.
One Year?
In my studio in London and galleries
One Decade?
In world wide places, in my studio and galleries………………….

Join our crowd of artists here

Online Artist Network Migration: b-uncut offers a new home

// May 25th, 2010 // View Comments // b-Crowd

Recent changes at Ning mean all their free online social networks are closing as they move to a premium only service. Here at b-uncut we want to welcome any artists/networks with open binary arms that are closing due to this move. We are here to stay and offer a secure, dynamic and ETERNALLY FREE virtual home for all artists.

As you’re aware you can create groups on a ning social network. SO what we say is “join b-uncut with your collective and set up your own group within our network…continue as normal and keep expressing your art.”

Calligraffiti: Fusion of Old and New

// May 25th, 2010 // View Comments // b-inspired

Want to see king calligrapher Niels “Shoe” Meulman write with a broom! Watch the video. NOW, WOW

“Shoe revolutionized the art of writing with Calligraffiti, an art form that fuses calligraphy and graffiti. He launched this movement in 2007 with a successful solo exhibition in Amsterdam. Since then, his Calligraffiti pieces (signed NSM) can be seen in various international exhibitions.”

Buy Shoe’s awesome book and read full story here.
Buy art online here.

Love Words, Love Wood, Love This

// May 24th, 2010 // View Comments // b-inspired

Some typographic tree columns celebrating the art of words and letter forms. Created by Why Not Associates in collaboration with Gordon Young at Crawley Library.

Souvenirs for Sale

// May 21st, 2010 // View Comments // b-scene

The Tate Modern’s 10 year anniversary was an opulent festival of international independents hosted like a worldwide flea market in the Turbine Hall. There were all sorts of wild and engaging artworks, installations and performances operating closely together like a mutated art organism. ‘No Soul For Sale’ ended up a-too-good-to-be-true title as many of the artists we talked with had to finance the whole trip themselves. This debt slavery cemented their vocation to focus efforts, resources and exhibiting space to selling. Artists aren’t the best money hustlers and there was a whole host of plausible and implausible bric a brac! Watch the video to get some more flavour.

Independent arts organisations taking part in No Soul For Sale include: Alternative Space LOOP (Seoul), Arrow Factory (Beijing), Arthub Asia (Shanghai/Bangkok/Beijing), Artis – Contemporary Israeli Art Fund (New York / Tel Aviv), Artspeak (Vancouver), Artists Space (New York), Auto Italia (London), Ballroom (Marfa), Black Dogs (Leeds), Barbur (Jerusalem), Capacete Entertainment (Rio de Janeiro), Casas Tres Patios (Medellín), Centre Cinématèque de Tanger (Tangier), Cinema Project (Portland), cneai= (Paris-Chatou), Collective Parasol (Kyoto), Dispatch (New York), e-flux (Berlin), Elodie Royer and Yoann Gourmel – 220 jours (Paris), Embassy (Edinburgh), Exyzt & Coloco (Paris), Filipa Oliveira + Miguel Amado (Lisbon), FLUXspace (Philadelphia), FormContent (London), Galerie im Regierungsviertel/Forgotten Bar Project (Berlin), Green Papaya Art Projects (Manila), Hell Gallery (Melbourne), Hermes und der Pfau (Stuttgart), i-cabin (London), Intoart (London), K48 Kontinuum (New York), Kling & Bang (Reykjavík), L’appartement 22 (Rabat), Latitudes (Barcelona), Le Commissariat (Paris), Le Dictateur (Milan), Light Industry (New York), Lucie Fontaine (Milan), lugar a dudas (Cali), Machine Project (Los Angeles), Mousse (Milan), Museum of Everything (London), Next Visit (Berlin), New Jerseyy (Basel), Not An Alternative (New York), no.w.here (London), Oregon Painting Society (Portland), Or Gallery (Vancouver), P-10/Post Museum (Singapore), Para/Site Art Space (Hong Kong), Peep-Hole (Milan), PiST (Istanbul), PSL [Project Space Leeds] (Leeds), Rhizome (New York), Salamanca (Jerusalem), San Art (Ho Chi Minh City), Studio 1.1 (Liverpool), Suburban (Chicago), Swiss Institute (New York), The Mountain School of Arts (Los Angeles), The Royal Standard (Liverpool), Thisisnotashop (Dublin), Torpedo – supported by the Office for Contemporary Art Norway (Oslo), Tranzit (Prague), Viafarini DOCVA (Milan), Vox Populi (Philadelphia), Western Bridge (Seattle), Western Front Society (Vancouver), White Columns (New York), Y3K (Melbourne), 2nd Cannons Publications (Los Angeles), and 98 Weeks (Beirut).

4 minute chill-out

// May 20th, 2010 // View Comments // b-inspired

Acension by Chris Lavelle is a stunning video unfolding the cycle of life. This is so beautiful! enjoy the art…

Mark Robinson: Getting to the Roots

// May 19th, 2010 // View Comments // b-loud

Mark Robinson is a young fine artist studying at Manchester Metropolitan University. With influences spanning millennia his work exists as contemporary and ancient. Mark’s raw talent is clear and he is one to follow. His motto is ‘art for all’; not wanting to put up restrictions on art and hoping that there’s something in his paintings and drawings that appeals to everyone. He has been a welcome addition to our online artist network since April 2010. We’re very excited to see what he does next!

What was your very first artwork?

I used to always do little doodles on post-it notes; my girlfriend found them and said I should create these drawings on a larger scale. This was how I became interested in art and was the starting point for the style of work I’ve developed.

Describe the piece you love the most—why?

My favourite piece is titled Father. This is the most painful but rewarding piece I have created so far because it is about my father having cancer; he lost his battle last year. I found it strange that something can live inside a person slowly taking their life yet under a microscope it can look so beautiful.

What are your methods? Your inspirations?

I’m inspired by primitive, African art and 1980s graffiti. This influences the style of my painting but I also work quite spontaneously. I sometimes describe the way I paint as “pouring my imagination onto canvas”. Sometimes my artwork is very personal like the work about my father’s battle with cancer. Making art helped me to deal with it. His passing has made me more determined to do well at University and become a successful practicing artist.
In the future I hope my work will appeal to everyone and they can get some kind of enjoyment from it. I don’t want to alienate anybody from my art. I say “art for all!”

What did it take to make it to where you are now?

Passion for art, hard work and an open mind. Enjoying my work, having fun making it.

Do you make a living from your artwork?

No not yet, I’m still an art student.

Who has helped you along the way?

My family and my girlfriend always push me to work hard and to be the best that I can be.

What 5 artists (dead or alive) would you invite for the ultimate dinner party?

Donald Baechler, Jean Dubuffet, Keith Haring, Jean Michel Basquiat, Pablo Picasso

Your favourite curse?
ARSE

Your biggest (albeit endearing) flaw?
Having a big ego

Qualities a woman needs to seduce you and the flaws that will repel you?
Making me laugh/Not making me laugh

Your parents advice you should have followed, but didn’t?
Get a real job (joke)

Your idea of the perfect weekend?
New York New York

Who would you chose to rule the world?
Karl Pilkington

Favourite ice-cream?
Cookies and cream

Where do you see yourself in…..One month?
In New York

One Year?
Finishing my degree

One Decade?
An established artist

And the Guerillas say "Let there be Light!"

// May 18th, 2010 // View Comments // b-street

BillBORED is a viral art initiative to empower people. It goes to show what artists can use to exhibit these days. Now go, project your own art gallery and drive it where you please……

Join our artist network here. Buy art online here.