Tony Quant aka TEMPT ONE at Getting Upper in Pasadena

At the Pasadena Museum of California Art a poster project and museum exhibition is up that examines how communication and typography has been infected by graffiti and street art. Twenty-six graphic designers were each asked to create a silk screened poster that reinterprets a letter of the alphabet in the spirit, but not conventional styles, of graffiti.

There is an incredible story behind the poster representing “T” by Tony Quan known by the moniker of TEMPT ONE. He designed this poster using only the movement of his eyes! Quan is now paralyzed as a complication of Lou Gerhig’s Disease. But in the early 80′s TEMPT ONE crushed the street scene in LA as wildstyle letterforms began to spread from New York City trains to the world through the photos of Martha Cooper and Henry Chalfant. He was able to create this work using a software tool called “Eyewriter” that tracks the movement of one’s eyes. His participation in the project really is incredible, and thanks to the innovation of technology Quan is still “getting up”.

There is some incredible work at the Pasadena Museum of California Art right now including Mike Giant’s representation of the letter “G”. Each poster was printed in an edition of 100 that can be purchased at the museum. You can see the whole exhibit at gettingupper.com

The Ginko Agency brings us Faith47, a painter and street artist known best for the giant murals that adorn the city of Cape Town.

“Public spaces should be used for the public to engage with each other in. If you look globally the street art scene is huge, and there is a lot of really high quality work being done. It’s really like a new art movement that a lot of people can’t get there head around, but I think in 20 to 30 years from now people will be reading about it in all the art history text books.”

The Ginko Agency team works for 21 Icons Global Project, which is an organization celebrating the people who shape the 21st century.

Renowned for their giant collaborative zen pop murals, KAMI and SASU’s works combine elegant geometry with ebullient, uplifting colors.

KAMI and SASU are collectively known as Hitotzuki which literally means “Sun and Moon”. Another great video by Melbourne based independent film maker Louis Mitchell.

KAMI and SASU have been an inspiration to a generation of Japanese underground artists. Like an eclipse, the show OMNI was a vibrant celebration of the couples idealistic spirit, held at Backwoods Gallery, Melbourne, Australia in November 2010.

HITOTZUKI KAMI & SASU ‘OMNI’ from Louis Mitchell on Vimeo.

Fuck You All, is an international traveling collection of photographs that span the prolific and influential career of artist, Glen E. Friedman.

Now in its 13th year, this exhibition makes its way to San Francisco for the first time, bringing with it the work that presented some of the world’s most significant photographic contributions to the punk and hip hop subcultures and not only documented the genesis of skate culture, but helped shape it for generations to come.

Friedman’s 941Geary exhibition of Fuck You All will feature several never before seen collaborations with Shepard Fairey, which will be displayed along with the original photographs for the first time. These works are true artistic collaborations, executed symbiotically and inspired from a history of mutual respect between Friedman and Fairey.

To see photos from opening night click here:

flickr.com/​photos/​warholian/​sets/​72157625214123783/​

- A Colin Day Feature -
From Warholian on Vimeo

Husband and wife, and French artists Supakitch and Koralie just painted at VÄRLDSKULTUR MUSEET GÖTEBORG in Sweden, and Elroy shot a really well-made video of the process.

“Compelling art to me is a name carved into a tree. Sometimes a rock soaring through a plate of glass can be the most beautiful, compelling work of art I have ever seen.” – Barry McGee

Retna crushes murals all over LA. His work is characterized by massive scale, incredibly detailed and cryptic typography, and it is almost always coupled with a figurative piece by his partner in crime MAC. If you ever drive around LA, they are impossible to miss.

Retna lets us peek his downtown LA studio (and coincidentally drives past my studio) and brings us to a recently mural he did with MAC at a church on Skid Row.

Once again JR is on a massive crusade, this time in China’s worn down industrial neighborhoods of Shanghai. JR makes the world his gallery and it’s inhabitants become both his subjects and his audience. His ability to capture the burden of a city’s most subjugated citizens through portraiture never ceases to amazes me.

This is how street art changes the world and for JR this is just the beginning.

To learn more about JR’s projects, visit his website by clicking HERE.

I know nothing with any certainty, but the site of the stars makes me dream.

A quote by a man who needs no introduction, Vincent Van Gogh.

Magnificently illustrated quote by London based type designer, illustrator, and artist by the name of Seb Lester. Check out his website at seblester.co.uk. He has created typefaces and type illustrations for some of the world’s biggest companies, publications and events, including the likes of Apple, Nike, Intel, The New York Times, The 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics and J.D. Salinger’s final reissue of The Catcher in the Rye. He is passionate about letterforms.

Telephone – The Black Angels

The Hair Song – Black Mountain