Ecuador's radical grammar pedants on a mission to correctly punctuate graffiti

(Eduardo Varas in Quito and Jonathan Watts, The Guardian UK)

A pair of anonymous vigilantes are cleaning up Quito’s graffiti; by adding accents, inserting commas and placing question marks on sentences scrawled across city walls

In the dead of night, two men steal through the streets of Quito armed with spray cans and a zeal for reform. They are not political activists or revolutionaries: they are radical grammar pedants on a mission to correctly punctuate Ecuador’s graffiti.

Adding accents, inserting commas and placing question marks at the beginning and end of interrogative sentences scrawled on the city’s walls, the vigilante editors have intervened repeatedly over the past three months to expose the orthographic shortcomings of would-be poets, forlorn lovers and anti-government campaigners.

Interview with IRL, anti-tech graffiti artist
22 Feb 2015  Renzo (for the Wildernist)

I’d been seeing anti-tech graffiti around my town [Chapel Hill, NC] for the better part of a decade. Over the course of months it would appear in bursts, then slowly fade as the authorities cleaned it. Some places, images, or slogans only seemed to appear once, while others were clearly contested territories where cleaning and painting happened regularly. For years I wondered who the vigilantes that made my walks and bike rides so much more exciting could be. In a funny synchronicity, I finally met “IRL” through a mutual friend the same week another friend of mine started an anti-technology journal. We wandered for an hour all over town, behind warehouses, down train tracks, and beneath bridges discussing this very particular subset of graffiti. Some edits have been made for clarity. — Renzo

Renzo: So, you're an anti-technology graffiti writer. What's that mean?

IRL: I'm a graffiti writer who believes that technological society is the greatest threat to human freedom and that's reflected in my art or vandalism or whatever you wanna call it.

Renzo: What kind of graffiti do you do?

IRL: I play with everything I can. Tagging, scrawling, stenciling, stickers, billboard defacement, wheatpaste posters. It really depends on the image or message and the surface or neighborhood.

Why Stencil Typography Is Here To Stay

(from fastcodedesign.com; photo by Louise Fili)

DESIGNERS LOUISE FILI AND STEVEN HELLER COMPILE 60 YEARS OF STENCIL TYPE FROM 8 COUNTRIES AND REVEAL WHY THE PRIMITIVE STYLE STILL REIGNS.

The stencil is one of the world’s most primitive printing techniques. It dates back to prehistory, with stencils found in caves, in the art of ancient China and Japan, and in the crafts of indigenous people worldwide. Stencil typefaces are still popular today, whether in the form of new, witty takes on the genre, like Der Weiner Stentzel’s sausage shapes for letterforms, or vintage typefaces redrawn as stencils, like Bodoni or Century.

Stencil Type, a new book by design gurus Steven Heller and Louise Fili, compiles 60 years of this universal typographic style with photos from around the world. It reveals why the stencil has been and remains such a valuable tool for designers and typographers even in the age of digital printing.

Compared to other forms of typesetting, stenciling has always been a low-cost, easy-to-use medium for bold, clearly legible mass communication. This made it ubiquitous in the military and transportation industry (think of the stenciled labels on shipping containers and burlap bags); in populist and rebellious movements (in occupied France, the stenciled letter "V" for victoire became a powerful symbol of resistance; much of the Occupy movement’s poster art is stenciled); and in magazine and poster design, especially in the Bauhaus, Futurist, Constructivist, and Art Deco movements.

"SYNERGY"

duo show : JEF AEROSOL & LEE JEFFRIES

opening / vernissage : 6 mars 2015 - 18.00 > 21.00 (entrée libre)

Galerie Mathgoth, 34 rue Hélène Brion 75013 PARIS

From March 6th to April 4th 2015, Matgoth gallery is welcoming stencil artist Jef Aérosol and photographer Lee Jeffries. The two talented artists have joined hands to produce the duo show : SYNERGY.

Since the very first time Jef Aérosol stumbled across Lee Jeffries' works, he's been fascinated by the portraits of homeless people that the British photographer magnifies and brings into the light.
Jef immediately saw that they could lend themselves to a stencil rendition and he could revisit in his own style those wearied faces, pregnant with meaning. In early 2014, he got in touch with Lee and they met up a few weeks later in London. They got on well with each other at once and decided on the spot about a duo show.

Opening: Saturday, March 7 / 8-11 PM

Exhibition Dates: March 7 – April 11

SUBLIMINAL PROJECTS is pleased to present Paper Cut, a group exhibition featuring artwork by six artists who cut into, tear into, and deconstruct the humble, traditional medium of paper to explore the terrain of their subject matter.

The exhibiting artists are: Adam Feibelman (San Francisco, Calif.), Aurel Rubbish (Paris, France), Bovey Lee (Pittsburgh, Pa.), Gregory Euclide (Minnesota River Valley, Minn.), Nicola Lopez (New York, N.Y.), and Swoon (Brooklyn, N.Y.). Each hails from a different city, drawing inspiration from distinctly different places and translating their ethos in dramatically unique and signature ways.

PERSONS OF INTEREST Opens Project M/7 for Urban Nation (UN) in Berlin with 12 Brooklyn Artists on March 14, 2015, curated by Steven P. Harrington and Jaime Rojo.

Bülowstrasse 7/ 97, 10783 Berlin, Germany

March 14 – June 15, 2015

Featuring new custom artworks by:

CAKE : CHRIS STAIN : DAIN : DON RIMX : EL SOL 25 : ESTEBAN DEL VALLE : GAIA : ICY & SOT : NOHJCOLEY : SPECTER : SWOON

Urban Nation (UN) and Brooklyn Street Art (BSA) bring Brooklyn to Berlin with PERSONS OF INTEREST, a stunning portraiture show for Project M/7. New original artworks by a diverse collection of 12 important Brooklyn Street Artists will appear on the façade and in the windows of the future Urban Nation ‘Haus’. BSA and UN invite guests to a reception and a show with new works directly on the walls at the UN Pop Up Space.

The show will open at 7-22 pm (in Bülowstrasse 97) with a reception where guests will have the opportunity to meet the curators and artists in person.

Cut It Out

Exhibition period: January 31st until February 27th, 2015.

URBAN NATION
Production Office
Bülowstraße 97
10738 Berlin-Schöneberg, Germany

Opening Hours
Monday-Friday 10.00 -18.00

An international group show dedicated to the art of the stencil.
Curated by Olly Walker and Henrik Haven.

With this exhibition we are not only showcasing the work of some of the best artists and exciting new emerging artists that choose to work with this technique, but also the tools of the trade, a bit of history, live action on walls, streets and cars to offer a glimpse insight the world of stencil art.

For Online sales and artist information please visit: www.cut-it-out-stencil.eu

For further Information please contact
Olly Walker at e-mail: olly@ollystudio.co.uk
and Henrik Haven at e-mail: henrik.haven@outlook.com

Shadows will not stop spring from coming! For now, have a few photos of stencil art with the changing climate.

Thanks to all the folks who continue to support and submit to the Stencil Archive!

<< Cow stencil/photo: Jimi Nepper (PA)

>NEW< Jimi Nepper (PA)

>NEW< Dede (IL)

>NEW< i <3 street art (Vancouver)

John Koleszar (AZ)

Eclair (SF, CA)

Scott Williams (SF, CA)

Jeremy Novy (sometimes SF, CA)

Jef Aerosol (FR)

NYC (just one)

The Mission District

Valencia Street (just one)

Lyft drops some ads

Stop Littering!

Haight St. (just one)

Democracia Real Ya!
Thu 5 February - Sat 28 February
FREE / Mezzanine Gallery 

35 - 47 Bethnal Green Road, London, E1 6LA

Richmix

Democracia real ya!’, meaning ‘real democracy now!’, is an exciting exhibition of street art by Rosario Martínez Llaguno and Roberto Vega Jiménez, members of the Mexican art collective Lapiztola Stencil, based in Oaxaca. This collective was formed following teachers’ strikes in Oaxaca in 2006 which were violently suppressed by the state. Street art became a form of political protest, highlighting the range of issues which Mexicans face, and providing hope and inspiration. The exhibition will celebrate the fight for social justice that the artists are involved with in Oaxaca and Mexico as a whole.