Last Saturday night was the opening of “Close Encounters”, a show featuring works by the legendary graffiti artist Saber from Los Angeles. Some of us from the agency, as well as hundreds of others from around the Bay Area descended on White Walls Gallery in the Tenderloin neighborhood of San Francisco to check out this highly anticipated show. The event was sponsored by Sparks, and that syrupy energybeer of doom flowed freely all night long.
The bulk of the work consisted of oil paintings of the Los Angeles cityscape at dusk and night time. This show cemented Saber as a highly skilled oil painter, illustrating his success in mastering traditional graffiti and fine art, a difficult and commendable feat.
His fine art is- like his graffiti has been for some time- undeniable. He took a straightforward approach to composition and brought the pieces to life through rendering psychedelic wisps and streaks of light emanating from city lamps, and at times blasting out of the sky, their sources unknown. Overall, his treatment of light was powerful. It alluded to a deep relationship and understanding of the city, one that has no doubt been informed by countless nights spent lurking through the maze of freeway and concrete structures that compose Los Angeles’ unique urban layout. The show also featured a scale model of his now infamous graffiti piece adorning the wall of the Los Angeles riverbed, complete with a neighboring Amtrak train. The actual piece is regarded as the largest piece of graffiti ever created, and 2007 marks the ten-year anniversary of its completion.
Earlier today, a colleague sent me a press release for the latest episodes of BOOSTED FILMS, a periodic podcast series from the fine folks at Boost Mobile. While EMERGE has nothing bad to say about either of the featured artists (Revok and Saber), we do feel like the urban marketing/graffiti thing has ceased to be particularly exciting or even interesting. It just feels like cliche. Perhaps it's not meaningful as marketing at all, but remains culturally significant? One could certainly argue that point, but we think that these sorts of tie-ins aren't even culturally relevant. Sure they offer exposure and a paycheck to the artists involved, but what does it do to add to the culture of street art, fine art, or even full-on illegal graffiti? What legitimacy that world has obtained in recent years seems to have come much more from the realm of fine art (think Beautiful Losers, Aaron Rose, etc) than the simple burner paid for by brand...
What is more interesting- in our opinion at least-from both a cultural and marketing standpoint is this article critiquing the art and commerce of vanguard graffiti kid made good Shepard Fairey. His iconic work is world renowned and his clothing brand Obey does big big business, but it seems that much of his work may in fact be plagiarized. Read and judge for yourself...
