Showing posts with label Martha Cooper. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Martha Cooper. Show all posts

Tuesday 28 September 2021

Martha A Picture Story Q & A

Subway Art 25th anniversary hardback cover
Subway Art 25th anniversary hardback cover


A bit of context to begin with. All over the world there are graffiti writers who will testify that their introduction to graffiti began with one book, Subway Art written by Martha Cooper and Henry Chalfant.

In 2009 I queued with literally hundreds of other graffiti fans and graffiti writers to get the Cooper/Chalfant signatures on my new copy of this bible at a book signing held at the Black Rat Press gallery under the railway arches behind Cargo Nightclub as well as NY graffiti legend Blade whose subway graffiti features in some of the most memorable photos in the book. Graffoto recorded the details of that night HERE.

Martha Cooper is a photographer!
Martha Cooper is a photographer!


Mobbed book signing, Black Rat Press, June 2009
Mobbed book signing, Black Rat Press, June 2009


The documentary movie “Martha: A Picture Story” by Australian director Selina Miles does a brilliant job of combining some amazing archive footage with interviews and over-the-shoulder experience photography to present a much more rounded view of Martha Cooper’s life journey and achievements. The film is being streamed free of charge for two days on the House of Vans website as part of their monthly Doc Nights series. Somehow, I got to play the role of host for a 30 minute Q&A session with Martha and Selina (first name buddies now, ha ha), I was in London, Selina was in Australia and Martha was in New York so you can imagine I got the best of the deal in terms of timing!

Martha Copper, Selina Miles, DocrRoll films 'n me
Martha Copper, Selina Miles, DocrRoll films 'n me


Details on how to obtain access to the film and the Q&A can be found on the House Of Vans Doc Nights page HERE. Unfortunately it is UK audience only, sorry to those of you outside UK.

Martha Cooper - photo courtesy House Of Vans
Martha Cooper - photo courtesy House Of Vans


Martha Cooper - photo courtesy House Of Vans
Martha Cooper - photo courtesy House Of Vans


Selina Miles, Director  - photo courtesy House Of Vans
Selina Miles, Director - photo courtesy House Of Vans


For the curious, the other tags in the book are friends from Burning Candy who were exhibiting Subway Art art at the event and TRP members also present.

Photos by Dave Stuart except where stated.

Tuesday 12 November 2019

My Dog Sighs - Crylong

CRYLONG
Nelly Duff
156 Columbia Rd, London E2 7RG
8TH – 14TH Nov 2019


My Dog Sighs has a London solo show at Nelly Duff, well overdue after a long gap since his last London solo show.

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This photorealistic extraordinaire has steadily built up a broad array of impressive street art styles, most famous of which is his Free Art Friday cans drops. The cans feature a crushed and folded cylinder with cute snub hosed faces painted onto the shiny base which were left outdoors for people to discover and keep, they were hugely admired by many, found by few. The concept and discipline of painting photorealistic faces on circular can bases fed into other street art styles, notably in many enchanting paste ups created in collaboration with fellow south coast artist Midge.

My Dog Sighs & Midge
My Dog Sighs & Midge, London 2013


My Dog Sighs & Midge
My Dog Sighs & Midge, London 2014


My Dog Sighs has also a massive reputation for his incredible murals, his eyeball paste ups, his stickers, his waterdrops and his completely different uncircular non photorealistic stick character.

Upfest, 2015
Upfest mural, Bristol 2015


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Upfest mural, Bristol 2017


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Eyeball, London 2017


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Sticker, London 2015


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Stick Man, London 2017


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Water drop, over Subdude, London 2019


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Rising damp in Nelly Duff 2019


The humble tool of the graffiti writer, street artist and amateur bodywork repairer is the spraycan and My Dog Sighs art has brought the can right into the art as a canvas as well as a source of paint. This show is all about the cans.

My Dog Sighs - beige
My Dog Sighs- Beige


Crylong, the title of the show plays with the phonetics of the name of a major spraypaint supplier Krylon. Back in the early days of graffiti spray paint manufacturers were focussed on industrial applications, particularly car paint and a major source of paint for graffiti writers was the cans of paint sold in car repair shops, not all of it finding its way through the checkout before ending up in the graffiti writer’s hidden pockets. Crylong also speaks to the sad doleful appearance of My Dog Sighs’ characters.


As well as the cans, it’s all about the eyes. Watching My Dog Sighs in action on a public mural is to watch someone painstakingly paint microscopic detail in flecks of colour in the iris and in the reflection on the eyeball. In his exhibition you ascend the rickety wooden stairs of the Nelly Duff Gallery and enter into the Room of Stares.

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If you ever photograph a face close up then home in on the eyeball in the image and blow it up full screen size you will see the eyeball is a wonderful mirror. Usually the thing in the reflection is a photographer as we have yet to see a photorealist painter be brutally honest and paint a phone in the reflection. Engage in a staring match with each of the square eyeball images and in the reflections in each of the eyeballs you will spot different characters inspired by legendary photos from the 1980s era of subway graffiti. One lining up his spray cans is unmistakably Dondi photographed by Martha Cooper and published in graffiti’s Book of Genesis Subway Art. Look right into the detail of the eyeball and you can see that My Dog Sighs has even replaced the Rustoleum logo on the can Dondi holds with the characteristic triple spot of Krylon’s logo.

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Pink canvas (detail)


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Pink screenprint (detail)


Dondi by martha Cooper
Dondi by Martha Cooper, Subway Art, published by Thames and Hudson


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Red screenprint on paper (detail)


Flick through your copy of Subway art and you will find spraycans littered, almost literally, throughout Martha Cooper’s photos which embraced the broader context of graffiti culture rather than just the trains themselves. B-Boy legend Crazylegs, again from a Martha Cooper image makes an appearance.

Crazylegs by Martha Cooper, from Hip Hop Files, published From Here To Fame Publishing, 2004
Blue screeprint(detail)


inspired ny Crazylegs by Martha Cooper
Blue canvas (detail)


crazylegs Martha Cooper
Crazylegs by Martha Cooper, from Hip Hop Files, published From Here To Fame Publishing, 2004


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Yellow canvas detail


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Green canvas detail


The wall of stares houses a mix of eyes on canvas, eyes screen printed on paper and in one case screen printed onto metal, each in 5 colourways, though not all on display. This allows us a very unusual opportunity to compare a screen print with the original, and only a publishing house with the quality of Nelly Duff’s in house printer would have the confidence to pull this off. Under close up scrutiny the effect of the varnish layer on the aluminium print is bewitching although really only apparent when viewed in real life, photos don’t do it justice.

Blue Crazylegs Canvas
Blue - Canvas original painting


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Blue - archival flatbed print with silkscreen varnishes on brushed aluminium


Blue - archival flatbed print with silkscreen varnishes on paper
Blue - archival flatbed print with silkscreen varnishes on paper


Any variation in colour in the three photos is actually more due to the different lighting and mixture of daylight and spotlight falling on each one rather than a real difference.


The other half of Crylong is a collection of framed faces on cans, the cans are Krylon and in each one the painted character reflects the colour of that paint can and indeed something of the emotion suggested in the faintly surreal names the colours are given by the manufacturer.

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Owl is obviously a quite extraordinary name to give a paint colour so just as well Owl has an extraordinary face.

Owl (detail)
Owl (detail)


Owl
Owl


Nice to see vintage cans of Rustoleum making an appearance.

Gold detail
Gold (detail)


Seems that aluminium is a colour now, interpreted by My Dog Sighs as a Silver lady up to some devilment at a masque ball.

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Silver


The rim of the base has been sanded back to bright metal to make it silver rather than the rust finish seen in all the other vintage cans.

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Silver detail


The frame fillet, that colour strip inside the frame that gives depth to the frame is also matched to the colour of the can and at the bottom of each frame is a used spraycan cap, also colour matched natch.

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Bright


My Dog Sighs has, in the blink of an eye, doffed his cap to the origins of street art in his homage to the classic Martha Cooper photos and the old school industrial painting spraycans are a nod to the significance of the can as a canvas for his art. He also demonstrates that photorealism can be beautiful art as opposed to the exercise in tedious virtuosity it can appear at times in the hands of others.  The show is up for a week, coming down on Thursday so blink and you'll miss it but hopefully these hindsights will have given some insights.

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Fire


Bright (detail)
Bright (detail)


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Regal


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Pink canvas


LINKS:

My Dog Sighs website
Martha Cooper instagram

All photos: Dave Stuart except Martha Cooper where noted

Sunday 5 January 2014

HISTORY! - Martha Cooper and Henry Chalfant Subway Art Interviews Back In The Day!



I don't know how I have missed this, I have not seen it before but this contemporary short film is absolutely fascinating. A sprightly Martha Cooper jumps on top of car roofs to get those outdoor whole train panorama shots while Henry Chalfant does one of the best impressions of Keith Haring ever (ok...maybe I exaggerate).




Merci Beaucoup to French graff blog AllCityBlog for bringing this to my attention.

I met Martha Cooper and Henry Chalfant  in 2009 at Black Rat when they came to London to release the 25th Anniversary edition of Subway Art.  That was an incredibly exciting experience for me.   None of us will ever replicate their achievement of truely discovering a new artform that had not been documented before quite like the way they did it.

To see what I wrote at that time about that anniversary edition of Subway Art and the experience of meeting Martha, Henry and NY legend Blade who was over with them, click HERE


Sunday 28 June 2009

Subway Art 25th Anniversary Edition

I thought that as a reference book and an X-ray shot into a counter culture that generally is inclined to shun publicity, Subway Art could not be bettered. Sitting with the 30cm x 43cm 25th anniversary addition on my knees (the book – not me) I conclude that as a photograph album this new edition just blows your socks off.







When I looked at the picture above I wondered if it was just the irregular lighting in my irregular kitchen that made the colour of the old book photos look a bit richer but a close comparison reveals the truth. At the larger scale the over-saturation of some of the colours is reduced and you can see more of the detail of the graff archaeology seeping through from the pieces underneath that have been gone over. Obviously, you can only really prove that with the Mk I eyeball, the pics you look at here have been distorted by being captured on the camera, buggered about with the flickr resolution compromises and then knackered by displaying on whatever device you use to read this. This picture is a detail of the L in a BLADE piece, old edition above, anniversary edition below.




The launch and signing graced by the presence of Martha Cooper, Henry Chalfant and Blade drew a legendary attendance of current graffiti writers and London Ol Skool (HAN – “Court and Social” page on this blog?).


Blade, Chalfant, Cooper. Sweet Toof canvas behind.


Interestingly, along with pages from the book being displayed on the wall, some huge canvasses painted by members of the Burning Candy crew provided their own stylistic and lyrical interpretation of a few of the historic and renowned images from Subway Art. Gorgeous stuff. And the Burning Candy guys had to queue like the rest to get their new books signed.


TEK 33 - Subway Fiction



Rowdy - "Train-surfing Mouse"



TEK 33 - Night Of The Denoms