BÄST, NEW YORK ORIGINAL, IN MEMORIAM

May 6, 2021
Jaime Rojo, Brooklyn Street Art (Original Link)
(Photo: Stencil Archive caught this BÄST tag stencil in Brooklyn, Fall of 2003)

His wit is what we’ll miss the most! BÄST (Stencil Archive LINK) took no statement so seriously that he couldn’t satirize it – including ones that came from your mouth. A sweet-faced wiseguy with sartorial style, his illustrations on the street at once celebrated and skewered popular culture, codes of behavior, and our presumed heroics; His experimental reworkings of images and texts were a charged play on our assumptions and insinuations, an intrinsic, peculiarly bright purveyor of visual communication.

Thoroughly schooled in New York street parlance, BÄST nonetheless toyed with graff culture and its preoccupations. Some OGs of graffiti may have expected a polished vocabulary – a certain Wild Style finesse and layered smooth hand, perhaps. Neu D.I.Y kids were rocking long-handled rollers and beginning to fiddle with uncontrollable extinguishers. BÄST claimed his fame with a full-body gestural fury and indifference – a single color nihilistic splatter tag that nonetheless delivered style and raw energy, well framed by a freight elevator or a doorway.

When BÄST played in concert with duo Faile his compositions set new standards in image-making and manipulation, arguably defining a critical and intelligent street art culture that shook specific New York neighborhoods in the late 90s and early 2000s. Together they mastered new screen-print and stencil techniques on the street in real-time, poking fun at pop and advertising conventions at a scale not seen previously. Here were familiar, sometimes mysterious faces recombined, with messages chopped and collaged and stuttered and glittered, warped and bloated, sprayed and wheat-pasted.

Brooklyn Street Art (BSA) WRITER’S BENCH : “STREET ART AND GRAFFITI: THE ROLE OF COPYRIGHT” BY ENRICO BONADIO
May 4, 2021
DIRECT LINK

PHOTO: Banksy's works are frequently taken off walls, resold, etc. - all with questionable provenance. This original in San Francisco was taken off a wall and its "ownership" is still not clear beyond the fact that the artist will not authenticate the provenance.

Like graffiti writers sharing black books and styles, BSA Writer’s Bench presents today’s greatest thinkers in an OpEd column. Scholars, historians, academics, authors, artists, and cultural workers command this bench. With their opinions and ideas, we expand our collective knowledge and broaden our appreciation of this culture ever-evolving.

by Enrico Bonadio
Stencil Archive disclaimer: This post is for informational purposes only. Though Bonadio is an attorney based in London, please seek out a local IP attorney if you need actual legal advice. It is all about the client-attorney relationship, so this re-post is a great start. It is not legal advice.

Street Art and Graffiti: The Role of Copyright

Artists are getting robbed. It is time to give them the legal tools they need. With this spirit, a few years ago, I started researching copyright aspects of street art and graffiti.

These artistic movements have been intriguing me for a while. Living for several years in the East London area of Shoreditch, where creativity has exploded and developed after the new millennium’s arrival, has certainly nurtured my curiosity towards these forms of art.

Walking through Brick Lane, Red Church Street, Hackney Wick, and other London neighborhoods full of free-hand graffiti pieces, stenciled images, myriads of stickers and paste-ups, street poetry and sculptures, abandoned miniatures, and many other artworks – opened my eyes and broadened my knowledge of these artistic movements. Visiting, discovering, and experiencing graffiti-friendly areas around the world – including Stokes Croft in Bristol, Kreuzberg in Berlin, Williamsburg and Bushwick in Brooklyn, Hosier Lane and Fitzroy in Melbourne, Florentin and Nachalat Binyamin in Tel Aviv, La Candelaria and Puente Aranda in Bogota’ – filled me with even more curiosity and willingness to study further and understand these creative subcultures.

While studying and admiring the beautiful art that cityscapes can offer us for free, I could not help thinking about whether and to what extent the branch of law I’ve been researching (and practicing) for many years – i.e., copyright law – may regulate such forms of creativity. So I started wondering about whether the artworks I was admiring could and should be protected by copyright in the very same way works of fine art are, even where the pieces are created illegally, namely, without the consent of the owner of the tangible support upon which the piece is placed, for instance, a wall.

Thanks to: Lynn Ray, Novy, Brooklyn StreetArt, r/stencils, r/streetart
Spinning: Workingman’s Dead, Farewell to Kings
Photo: Artist: @bobrossofhiphop (meme is all Bernie)

>NEW< Roger Peet

>NEW< Bob Ross of Hip Hop (SF)

>NEW< Miss Fu*k (FR)

Shepard Fairey in Dubai

Xsacto en micro

New Orleans

NYC

Western Addition (SF)

Here and There (SF)

Haight-Ashbury (SF)

Financial District and South of Market (SF)

SF Protest Sign (just one)

Thanks to: Novy, Josiah
Spinning: Workingmans Dead
Photo: Art: Tony

Western Addition, SF

Mission District, SF

Other places around San Francisco

SoMa, SF

Tenderloin, Mid-Market, SF

Just one on Geary St., SF

Just one in Upper Haight, SF

Eclair in the Fisherman’s Wharf, SF

fnnch

Luinova

Yon

Thanks to: Novy, Stephen, Josiah, Russell B, Brooklyn Street Art, r/stencils, r/streetart, u/iptrucs, u/Superiluso, u/Everything4Everyone, u/MaraCorvus,
Spinning: KGLW
Photo: Positive! photo: Russell B.

Banksy (just one)

C215

>NEW< Endless (UK)

Guate Mao (just one)

Lapiz (just one)

Pobel (just one)

France (just one)

Amsterdam, NL (just one)

Spain (just one)

UK (just one)

:::::: IN THE USA ::::::

East St. Louis (just one)

NYC (just one)

South Carolina (just one)

BONUS: Stinkfish

Thanks to: Podinski, Jaime Rojo for Brooklyn Street Art, r/stencils, r/streetart, u/MrMcDrew, u/nahmate45, u/Everything4Everyone, u/stopme45, u/44Caliber-LoveLetter, u/Avoqadus
Spinning while we work: Monk, the Superb Owl LV, JGB, Ghost Funk Orchestra
Photo: Protesting against military dictatorship in Mayanmar

:::: FROM AROUND THE WORLD ::::

>NEW< Mayanmar

>NEW< Philippines (PH)

Sydney (just one)

Berlin

Copenhagen (just one)

Paris (just one)

Athens, Greece

Oaxaca, MX

Chile (just one)

UK

:::: MEANWHILE, IN THE USA :::::

>NEW< MOR (NYC)

John Fekner (just one)

Praxis (just one)

wrdsmth (just one)

A fat stack from Xsacto

Los Angeles, CA

Massachusetts

NYC

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