All posts by butterfly

Paris: Okuda paints monumental Mona Lisa

July 4, 2017 butterfly 1 Comment

Spanish artist Okuda is brightening up a nineteen storey building in Paris by giving it a contemporary makeover. Using more than 450 spraycans, Okuda painted one of Europe’s tallest murals at 50 metres (164 feet) high by 15 meters wide during less than five days.

‘The City of Paris and Mona Lisa are intricately linked, so it was a natural choice’. The street artist wanted to pay tribute to the French culture and to the iconic portrait at the Musee du Louvre.

Internationally known Okuda is a surrealist pop artist with a psychedelic universe, his subjects are very colourful and this artwork is no exception.

With zebra hair and a rainbow cubic face, the reinterpretation of Leonardo da Vinci’s masterpiece, also known as La Gioconda, depicts a standing woman in a starry sunset, with a bird on her shoulder and carrying a handbag. The handbag is decorated with repetitive patterns, reminiscent of a famous French luxury brand, as a nod to Paris as capital of Luxe and Fashion.
The multi-cultural-skinned woman is illustrated by different types of colourful fabric from dots, stripes and stars like different parts of the world.
While we have seen many reinterpretations of this famous portrait, it is also very unusual to see the Gioconda standing, we discover here the rest of her body with curvy shapes, standing in rainbow waters.
We were lucky to join Okuda on his cherry picker during the painting process, so here are some pics or the work in progress.

This modern colourful portrait celebrates Paris with culture, luxe and fashion but also its population from a multicultural background and diversity.

The project in collaboration with By Night Gallery and Ink and Movement was inaugurated by Jerome Coumet, Major of the XXIII District in presence of many local residents.

Photos credit: Butterfly Art News
View the full set of pics here

Come back again soon for our coverage about Okuda‘s Parisian solo show ‘ The dream of Mona Lisa’ at Adda & Taxie Gallery running until the end of August at 35 rue Matignon.

Paris, Shows, Street

Paris: Ludo ‘I’ve been missing you’ Solo Show

June 30, 2017 butterfly

French artist Ludo is returning to Paris after five years with a new solo show namely titled ‘I’ve been missing you’ at Magda Danysz Gallery.

After extensive travelling, creating installations in New York, monumental walls throughout the world and institutional projects, like at the Power Station of Art Museum in Shanghai, Ludo invites us for a journey through his multi-faceted works, whether photographs, paintings, drawings or sculptures.

In this exhibition LUDO also presents an installation made up of an army of fireflies whose phosphorescent light dazzles and envelops while letting emerge a certain question about the relation of man to technology. Hybrid creatures emerge from the artist’s imagination with botanical precision using a colour palette ranging from grey to his signature green.

The images of LUDO explore the environment, the future, the space, the human. His biotechnological creations come to colonize the three levels of the gallery and plunge us into a chimerical universe where we find the passions and multiple inspirations of the artist.

In parallel to the show, wandering through the streets of Paris in the 20th and 11th district, visitors can discover some of the artist’s latest creations, from a snake to a ‘BeeLice’ and a Grim Reaper.

View full set of pics here

Ludo – I’ve been missing you
Until 29 July 2017
Magda Danysz Gallery,
Rue Amelot, Paris

Paris, Shows

Paris: Tristan Eaton ‘Uprise’ Solo Show

June 26, 2017 butterfly

US artist Tristan Eaton who is currently on the front cover of SC Exhibition Magazine is exhibiting in Paris at Galerie Itinerrance. The solo exhibition titled ‘UPRISE’ is a visual history of protest and resistance. A look back on human history reveals time and again how the powerless have risen to topple the powerful and how the little man can vanquish tyrants with peaceful protest and the power of ideas. This exhibition is a reminder of that awesome power, a reminder that protest and resistance is a human trait and a human right.

Tristan Eaton mentions:
‘UPRISE’ is a visual history of protest and resistance. As an artist, I am compelled to paint what consumes me. In the age of Donald Trump, rising racism and xenophobia, corporate greed and blatant human rights violations across the globe, I am consumed by the desire for change. I am consumed by hope for a better world and a need to throw out of power those who don’t deserve it. As we all know, history will repeat itself. A look back on human history reveals time and again how the powerless have risen to topple the powerful and how the little man can vanquish tyrants with peaceful protest and the power of ideas. This exhibition is a reminder of that awesome power, a reminder that protest and resistance is a human trait and a human right. Wether it’s Martin Luther King Jr. at Selma, an anonymous man in Tiananmen Square or a Palestinian child with a sling shot, change always comes at a price and with much endurance. In these works, I hope to honor those brave leaders of the past, while emboldening the freedom fighters of our future.

Many international artists attended the opening like Iranian female artist Golnaz Behrouznia, Ben Eine (UK) and C215 (FR) to name a few.

In parallel visitors can wander in the streets of the 13th District enjoy a series of murals painted by Tristan Eaton like a water tower next to the nearby hospital.

UPRISE by Tristan Eaton
Until 8 July 2017,
Galerie Itinerrance
4 Boulevard du Général d’Armée Jean Simon
75013 Paris

Paris, Shows

Paris: Belin ‘Post Neo Cubism’ Solo Show

June 19, 2017 butterfly

Having exhibited in Europe, US, Canada and Mexico, Spanish artist Miguel Ángel Belinchón aka Belin is currently showing his first Parisian Solo Show called ‘Post Neo Cubism’, curated by Nicolas Couturieux.

Self-taught artist Belin has grown internationally as one of the leading hyper-realistic graffiti artists. For over the past 15 years, Belin’s mastering technique of the spraypaint has been his signature style, free hand flowing directly from the realism of his imagination without the use of preparatory stencils, with the precision of lines and proportions so crucial in hyperrealism.

A visit to Málaga in 2016, home town of Spanish master, Pablo Picasso, has been decisive in his career and triggered a new artistic style for the artist: Post – Neo Cubism, a balance between cubism and realism.
Belin started to deconstruct his hyperrealist style and break the mould of reality, free from forms and rules, with the representation of multiplied view angles, mixing geometrical elements, patterns and textures, along with vibrant colours to create dynamic portraits, fusing hyperrealism with abstraction. People’s faces and bodies, disassembled and then reassembled, multiply their human nature to illustrate all the nuances and differences of expressions and feelings.

Using spray cans, oil painting and pencil, these dynamic portraits have such accurate expressive details of the faces, the wrinkles, the eyes, ears, noses, and mouths, that they seem incredibly ‘alive’.

Through twenty canvasses and ten pencil drawings, the current exhibition features icons and persons who captured Belin’s life as well as symbols from France to Andalucia. Family members and friends are illustrated as well as a deconstructed self portrait. Belins pays also homage to the great masters with portraits of Pablo Picasso, Dali, Keith Haring to Frida Kahlo and female icons like Mona Lisa.

Many artists turned up to celebrate the opening with Belin such as Ogre, Thomas Canto and Miss Van to name a few.

In parallel to the exhibition, Belin is also releasing a puzzle version of his ‘Marion’ painting and a show poster.

View the full set of pics here

Belin – Post Neo Cubism
Until 25 June
24 Rue Beaubourg
Paris

Videos

Video: “Disaster Collection” by Majida Khattari

June 15, 2017 butterfly

After the success of her art performances “Luxury, Oil & Arrogance” And “Merchant Migrant” at the FIAC Art Fair and Art Basel, for which she already created the “Killy” Bags , in tribute to the”Kelly bag’ from Hermes, Majida Khattari is the link between this luxury accessory and political commitment.

The video-performance “Disaster Collection” is a response to the video by Louis Vuitton and Jeff Koons announcing the release of the “Masters Collection” .

Contemporary art is now becoming a factor of influence on the way of life of our Western societies in the same way as fashion and more particularly, the universe of luxury. Artists such as Jeff Koons know how to use the language of Marketing and Advertising to be successful. This is how art can be heard, spread to a wider audience and help disseminate its ideas.

Majida Khattari has been working on the links between fashion and society, luxury and art for more than twenty years. Inspired by the ‘Masters Collection’ by Jeff Koons for Louis Vuitton, the artist created a video- who wishes to question us about the influence of the universe of fashion and luxury on our perception of the world.

Because the backdrop of its bags are images of conflicts to attract our attention to victims: the war in Syria, the destruction of the cultural heritage, terrorist attacks in Istanbul, Paris, Manchester, the European calvary …
Using the same codes as fashion and luxury, Majida Khattari succeeded in raising awareness, and make us reflect on the current conflicts and their victims.

For more info: mkdisastercollection@gmail.com