The city of Stavanger in Norway is getting ready for the world leading street art festival, NuArt. For its 17th edition, the festival will take place from the 31 st of August until the 3rd of September, with their indoor exhibition at Tou Scene staying on view through the 15th of October.

This year’s theme is POWER and through their work, the artists will discuss who has it, who doesn’t and how street art can challenge established power structures. “Nuart’s programs are designed specifically to explore and silently challenge the mechanisms of power and politics in public space” says Nuart Festival Founder and Director, Martyn Reed, and adds “This year’s Nuart Festival will bring together a diverse combination of  artists, activists and academics to reflect upon the fluidity of this transgressive new movement.”

12 artists from 10 countries spanning 4 continents will descend upon Stavanger:  Ampparito (ES),  Bahia Shehab (EG),  Carrie Reichardt (UK),  flyingleaps presents Derek Mawudoku (UK),  Ian Strange (AU),  John Fekner (US),  Know Hope (IL),  ±maismenos± (PT),  Igor Ponosov (RU),  Ricky Lee Gordon (ZA), Slava Ptrk (RU) , Vermibus (DE).

American artist John Fekner created a series of environmentally conceptual works consisting of words, symbols, and dates spray painted throughout the five boroughs of New York in the 1970s. He continued these text based interventions over the next few decades and earned a place in numerous museum collections across the US and Europe.

British ‘craftivist’ Carrie Reichardt blurs the boundaries between craft and activism, using the techniques of muralism, mosaics and screen-printing to create intricate, highly-politicised works of art. Active in community and public art projects for over 15 years, she has been designing and consulting on large-scale mosaic murals in various local communities.

Israli artist Addam Yekutieli aka Know Hope is best known for his emotive work that mixes written word and illustrative elements or photographs and even sculptures. Through his distinctive work, he often makes connections between difficult social-political situations and emotional conditions

±MaisMenos± is the working title of an interventional art project by Portuguese visual artist and graphic designer Miguel Januário that started back in 2005 and became an entity of its own. As a part of this project, Januário has been producing thought-provoking, cutting-edge work both indoors and outdoors in a variety of media – from video to sculptural installations to painting and performance.

Aside from creating and showing new works by the participating artists, the festival will include its well known satellite program Nuart Plus consisting of academic and industry debates, artist presentations, film screenings, workshops and guided tours.

NuArt Festival
Until 15 October
Tou Scene
Kvitsøygata 25
4014 Stavanger, Norway