8-bit and Beyond

First we have an 8-bit art show.  If you don’t know what that means think fine art crossed with Mario, Q-bert, Zelda, etc. I’ve been reading about shows like this out on the left coast for a while and I’m glad we’ve got something to compete.  This is the kind of art that uh…speaks to me.

(Totally unrelated circuit-bent Speak and Spell video below)

The show is going to be in Old City at Brave New Worlds, one of our fine city’s finest comical book shops.
Friday, August 7th
6-10 PM
45 N. 2nd Street Philadelphia, Pa.
The Autumn Society Of Philadelphia: 8 bit and beyond.

Sneaker Pimps

Next we have the infamous Sneaker Pimps touring sneaker festival. From their site:

Sneaker Pimps is the worlds largest touring sneaker hip-hop lifestyle exhibition featuring over 1500 pairs of rare, limited edition, vintage, celebrity signed, artists collaborated sneakers and a collection of sneaker inspired artwork, fashion and photography. The tour also features live street art installations, live skateboarding demonstrations, street basketball competitions and live hip-hop and rock performances by some of the world’s foremost recording artists.

The Sneaker Pimps Tour was founded in Sydney, Australia by Peter Fahey and has traveled to more than 60 cities world-wide and put on over 200 shows since 2003.

(Totally related video from the NYC show below)

Starlight Ballroom
460 N 9th Street
Philadelphia, PA 19123
Sneaker Pimps.

Star Trek Exhibit at the Franklin

Finally there’s the Star Trek exhibit at the Franklin. Not much I can say about this other than I feel obligated to go because of my sister and Karen’s brother. But I can be a man and admit that I like TNG and the movies. I’m just mad that my sis taped over my VHS tapes of Pee-Wee’s Playhouse with TNG. Here’s another blockquote for you because I’m lazy:

STAR TREK: THE EXHIBITION features the world’s most comprehensive collection of authentic Star Trek objects and transports visitors into parallel universes of the future and past. This 12,500 foot exhibition, an amalgamation of all five television and ten film series spanning over 40 years, is the ultimate opportunity to connect with iconic Star Trek moments and characters, while celebrating the creative spirit of science fiction and science that gave rise to many of today’s modern marvels. From the Next Generation Bridge, to the Engine Room, to sitting in Kirk’s original captain’s chair, STAR TREK: THE EXHIBITION not only relives the legacy but invites you to be a part of the Enterprise!

(Somewhat related Shatner on the Mount video below)

Franklin Institute
20 Philadelphia St
Philadelphia, PA 19103
Star Trek at The Franklin Institute.

Wanamaker Organ Facade

More pics and trivia in the extended…

The Wanamaker Building currently houses an outpost of Macy’s Department Stores but it once was home of a famed group of department stores founded by John Wanamaker way back in the 1860s. It was in fact the first modern department store and many things that we take for granted now like price-tags were innovations of Wanamaker. Truth in advertising, something we would love to be able to take for granted again, was one of Wanamaker’s guiding principles.

The building famously houses the largest working pipe organ in the world. Throughout the regular year it is played twice daily Monday through Sunday; it is played more often in the holiday season.

The best time to visit is now, obviously! The multi-storied facade of the organ is the stage for the annual light show. It’s timed to match with the music and is quite a sight. It occurs every hour from 10AM-8PM and lasts about 15 minutes. This year will see the debut of a Magic Christmas Tree with LED Lights so if you’re like me and a fan of both Magic Christmas Trees AND LED lights you’re probably prety excited. Go soon because it only lasts until New Year’s Eve!

Other things that are cool about the Wanamaker Building:

The Giant Eagle Statue

The Crystal Tearoom

Wanamaker “Firsts”

Wikipedia Entry

So where are they and what are they doing?  I’ll sit here and pontificate with my Chestnut Delight (thanks to the Chestnut St. Smoke Shop WHAT!?).  Please join me and comment as I’ve only lived in this fine city for three years now.

The first thing I think of when I think of Philly is South Street.  It’s not a touristy thing; it’s me coming here with my buddies to skate and hook out of school when we were sixteen.  You can say what you want about it but driving two hours to spend the day skating at Love Park and cruising South Street was a teenager’s view of heaven in 1993.  So we were too young to be turning down fiends asking for change but it was exciting.  The spot where Johnny Rockets is now used to house an old-school Star Trek pinball machine and I played that thing for longer than I thought possible when I was sixteen and my parents thought I was spending the night at my buddy’s house a few doors down.

That was the same time The Roots were out in the street looking for their big break and it’s before Zipperhead had to move around the corner.  It’s a time when a guy in the street would say “spare some change so I can get drunk and high?” and that seemed like the funniest thing in the world.  It’s a time when I first drank Brass Monkey and The Beasties were on 24/7.

Yeah, it’s a bit silly to romanticize.  But it’s my formative years.  It’s a good bit before I started getting really into food.  It’s disconcerting to walk down those same streets and see people following in the shadows of those memories.  South Street’s been ripped up.  All of the old trees were just replanted, the old stores are gone and riding a skateboard down the street used to be like riding an asphalt wave.  But those just got ripped out too.

So where does that leave us now?  Well South Street has lost all its romanticism and we’re going to have to wait another 10 years before those trees grow back.  The 9th Street Market has a hole every other shop.  But if there’s a light at the end of the tunnel it might be T & P Fine Art Gallery.

See, Los Angeles and San Francisco and New York have had wonderful modern art (pop) galleries like this for a long time. Philly has Olde City, a collaboration of the B&T crowd, bad restaurants that the Jersey crowd goes to on the weekend, and some really expensive galleries. Philly just isn’t big enough to support all of its artists in a tiny grouping of expensive blocks. Sure there are some well-to-do artists that get to show in places in Olde City but Philly, the birthing ground of Cornbread, has no place to show *street* artists. People that might not get a buy-in to expensive shows in Olde City.

So where better for the nascent underground/sticker/graffiti art scene than the remnants of an immigrant market built around the needs of locals? The Italian Market has the makings of an emergent underground art scene. It’s close to Center City, the rent is cheap and it already gets a ton of foot traffic. What’s to stop T & P from leading the charge?

When I first moved to Philly I noticed that the street art scene was mostly relegated to stickers.  I figure this may be because we have so many historic old buildings and local artists had the respect to not mess them up.  It could also be because we don’t have a very active transit system.  Either way it leads to a fun game of hide and seek.  Artists throw their work up on the back of signs, on the sides of newspaper boxes, and in the hidden spots that you only find if you’re really looking.

My two faves are El Toro and Bob Will Reign.  Great character design, always changing it up, and all over town. Frost (El Toro) – Bob Will Reign

So, obviously, I found his stuff on flickr.com one day.  Browsing through I found and decided to buy it.  We met briefly, I handed over some cash and the painting was mine!  It’s been up in my place for the last couple of years.  Time passes…

I started brewing beer and had the idea that El Toro could make me some labels for my brew, just for kicks. A painting called El Borracho seemed perfect. And so El Borracho Homebrew was born. We drank it all very quickly and called it good. Our girlfriends met and seemed to get along very well. Again we called it good.

Fast forward again and I’m up in Chinatown one day when I spot (the ducks are fake). I was driving and couldn’t stop but food and and sneakers are a holy union for me. See Exhibit A, Exhibit B, Exhibit C and oh, I guess most of this blog.

When I finally got back to the shop I was beyond impressed. Killer design and a fun setup. I introduced myself to the guys and mentioned in passing that they should have an art show with El Toro. To make a long story short I told Frost, he went over, introduced himself to , and last night the whole thing went down in great form. I had a few cases of homebrew lemongrass wheat beer with a Frost-designed label. They were “free gifts” to go along with the purchase of a can. The show was a big success and the art will be up for the next month, so get over there if you’re in the area! I’m guessing the t-shirts are all sold out (but Karen and I got ours!).

[flickr matt.ohara 72157607556729419]

(These pictures will be added to as I take more and move pics over from different flickr sets, so check either my flickr page or back here to see a lot of other philly street art!)

[flickr matt.ohara 72157602211191670]

My friend David once told me an old neighborhood joke. It goes like this:
“Don’t stop to tie your shoe in Bella Vista.”
“Why?”
“You’ll have a mirror attached to your ass when you stand back up.”

For anybody that doesn’t know, Isaiah Zagar is a mosaic artist. If you’ve been to Philly before and visited South Street/Bella Vista you may have noticed that the neighborhood is sprinkled (some might say covered) with mosaic murals created out of ceramic, mirror, bottles, bicycle wheels and more. Take the time to explore the neighborhood and you’ll see doors, walls and whole buildings covered with mosaic tiles. I’ll add a whole bunch more photography of his work to the set above in the coming weeks.

Philly is also the home of a huge mural art program. Everywhere you go in the city you’re bound to run into some murals. Here’s a nice photoset on Time’s website.
Philadelphia Murals and the Stories They Tell (Amazon)
They’re all different shapes and sizes and styles and subject and places. Many deal with famous locals. Many more are focused on positive messages for the community. They all provide a nice bit of visual stimulation when you round a new corner and find a piece that you haven’t seen before. There’s one artist I like particularly and that’s David Guinn. His 4 seasonal pieces are abstract and depict simple, colorful cityscapes in each of the four seasons. I’ve found three (all in the photo slideshow above), but I can’t find the fourth! If anybody can help me locate it please let me know in the comments. Update:Thanks Art from Foobooz for the spot, now I’ve just got to go get a pic of it!

My favorite artists in philly are a lot less well known than Zagar or Guinn. They’re El Toro and Bob Will Reign and they work with markers, stickers and paint. They work on train cars, signs, newspaper boxes, sneakers, vinyl records and well, anything you can put a mark on. They’re two of the first artists I found when I first moved to philly. They have more coverage than Zagar and Guinn put together but I’ve talked to a lot of people who have never seen any of their stuff!

El Toro on flickr

A Bob Will Reign slideshow on flickr

Toro has huge horns and giant toofs. Sometimes he’s wearing a gasmask. Bob Will Reign (AKA Bob) has a big head with eyes way out on the side and sometimes some arrows. Try walking around philly and looking for Toro and Bob pieces (they’re together a lot of the time). Soon you’ll be spotting them everywhere! Give yourself more points for non-obvious ones (like newspaper boxes and stop signs). Look in the photoset above for the painting of El Toro as Captain Ahab (it’s hanging in my house).

Philly has a ton of other street and sticker artists. It’s really fantastic that they keep their work in the city on signs and boxes and dumpsters, as opposed to marking up any of the old buildings we have around here. It’s illegal art for the most part but they have respect for the older art and architecture. And each other! Check out the box in the photoset above and notice how nobody has stickered over somebody else’s piece. If you have any other favorites that you’d like to share please let us know in the comments!