From around the world.... San Francisco coming very soon...

>NEW< Argus (Norway)
http://www.stencilarchive.org/archives/index.php/Europe/European_Artist…

Banksy (one old one from SF)
http://www.stencilarchive.org/archives/index.php/Europe/European_Artist…

Prague
http://www.stencilarchive.org/archives/index.php/Europe/Czech_Republic

Berlin
http://www.stencilarchive.org/archives/index.php/Europe/Germany

Greece
http://www.stencilarchive.org/archives/index.php/Europe/Greece

Russia
http://www.stencilarchive.org/archives/index.php/Europe/russia

>NEW< Kenya
http://www.stencilarchive.org/archives/index.php/Africa/Kenya

>NEW< Tunisia
http://www.stencilarchive.org/archives/index.php/Africa/TN-Tunis-Beeshu…

S O O N : WALLSCAPES – Prints in Street Art
Urban art and prints
May 26 to September 2, 2012

OPENING : May 25 - 18 o.

MORE: http://www.centredelagravure.be/Page.asp?docid=28984&langue=EN

On the occasion of La Louvière métropole culturelle 2012 - La Louviere 2012, Cultural Metropolis, Urban art will be in the heart of the head exhibition in 2012.
                            
Be they provocative, playful, in the form of taglines or icons, images are printed and multiplied and they invade the Centre de la Gravure and the City of La Louvière.
Wallscapes – Prints in Street Art illustrates the amazing wealth of this bold artform, that has manifested itself during the last thirty years through many various techniques (prints, posters, stencils, stickers, installations, mosaic tiling …).

We invited artists from all over Europe and the United States : C215, Denis Meyers, Doctor H, Evol, Invader, Jef Aerosol, Ludo, Muga, Obêtre, Obey (Shepard Fairey), Sten & Lex, Swoon.
 
With the support of the Embassy of the United States of America.

http://solpurpose.com/featured-artist-xavi-panneton/

For about 5 years now, I have have been lucky to visit with artist Xavi Panneton and snap photos of his glyphic stencils (check out his archive here). Over the past few months, Xavi has been putting up a mural on Cypress St. (at 24th St.). Utilizing graffiti and stencil techniques, along with other amazing styles, Xavi's mural continues his deep search for universal meanings via color, patterns, and lines. Soulpurpose snapped some great shots of his new work and interviewed him in the process. You should click over to see all the great photos that go with the discussion.

Here's an example Q and A to tease you to click through:

Many of the stencils and glyphs that you create seem to be encoded with a form of language - holding layers of information expressed through geometries.  Do these symbols carry any preset meaning for you?  Are there any symbols that hold a particularly special resonance?

X:   The primary ‘meaning’ of the symbols for me is that they are vast sums of experience condensed into a single package that can be downloaded instantly into your mind and heart. The total contents of the package will then be instantaneously cognized at every level of your being. The symbols are literally a visual mark of the experience contained within it. For example, you get a package that contains the entire history of a particular culture. The ‘symbol’ is the -spiritual identities- of every person who lived in that culture combined, as well as all their knowledge and experiences.  All this is condensed into one shape that burns with meaning and a strange familiarity.

Sometimes I like to make a symbol that looks like a frog or whatever and say “thats the frog symbol”!  “Sun Spirit”  symbol is another one… thats just for fun…

Exhibition dates :  May 4 – July 22, 2012

Opening reception:  Friday, May 4, 6pm - 8pm

Location:
SFAC Gallery Window Installation Site
155 Grove Street
Viewable 24/7

http://www.sfartscommission.org/gallery/2012/tahiti-pehrson-sea-of-love/

Tahiti Pehrson, an artist based in Nevada City, CA with strong Bay Area roots, has been hand cutting paper for decades.
The San Francisco Arts Commission Galleries commissioned Pehrson to create a site specific window installation for our Grove Street site, and the result is Sea of Love. This installation, the largest work Pehrson has ever produced, is a myriad of spirals created from hundreds of linear feet of hand cut paper. Veering from his earlier, more figurative and narrative works, Sea of Love features repetitive geometric patterns referencing those found in astrophysics, mathematics and biology. The artist is driven by an interest in the way humans organize information and our environment; and how strong our instinct is to seek out patterns to explain everything in the universe.

How Arab revolutionary art helped break the spell of political oppression

Graffiti, murals and other dissident art have transformed public spaces and mobilised public opinion in the Middle East

    Julia Rampen and Laurie Tuffrey
    guardian.co.uk, Saturday 5 May 2012 08.00 EDT
    Article found here

In January 2011 the Tunisian dictator Ben Ali fled Tunisia. Ten months later, his giant smiling face appeared on the side of a building in the busy port city of La Goulette. At first people just gathered beneath it and stared. Then they started to get angry. Urged on by the crowd, a group of men pulled the dictator's image down. The poster crumpled – and revealed a second poster: "Beware, dictatorship can return. On Oct 23rd, VOTE."

Half-ad, half-performance, this was one of the examples of art as political statement selected by Professor Charles Tripp, a specialist in Middle Eastern politics, who spoke at the University of East London on Tuesday night. He argued that graffiti, murals, posters and other visual art forms helped to "break the spell" of dictators like Ben Ali, continuing to mobilise protesters against threats to the revolutionary ideals.

For instance in January this year, as tensions between Egypt's interim military leadership and the crowds in Tahrir Square grew, the prominent street artist Ganzeer declared: "Art is the only weapon we have left to deal with the military dictatorship". When the authorities put up barricades around Tahrir, they were soon transformed by the city's artists. The use of visual tricks further undermined the installation of the barricades - many of these paintings simply depicted the forbidden street that lay behind.

Sam Lowder Solo Show
May 12 – June 2, 2012

Opening Reception
Saturday, May 12, 2012
7-11 p.m

Shooting Gallery
839 Larkin Street
San Francisco, CA
94109

http://www.shootinggallerysf.com/

A Syrian Graffiti Artist, Defiant Until Death

Original Article appears here

They called him "the spray man" for his graffiti that appeared all over the Syrian capital of Damascus. But in truth, 23-year-old Nour Hatem Zahra was an activist like any other activist.

He started protesting in Syria last spring. Back then, the opposition thought it would only take a few months to get rid of President Bashar Assad, as it had in Tunisia and Egypt.

Then Syrian forces started killing protesters, detaining them, torturing them. And the people started fighting back.

But still, there was Nour Hatem Zahra and his friends — organizing protests, hiding activists from the dreaded security forces, ferrying medical supplies to those who were injured but terrified to go to a government hospital.

Then late last year, Zahra got caught. Under torture, one of his friends had given up his name. Zahra later forgave the friend.

He was locked up for 56 days. As soon as he got out, he was at it again. He and his friends went around spraying the suburbs of Syria's capital, Damascus, with slogans against the Syrian president: "Down with the traitor." "To the trash heap of history." Pictures of the president with the word "pig" scrawled underneath.

A few weeks ago, Zahra and his friends declared "Freedom Graffiti Week." The Facebook page calls their work a mix of civil disobedience and peaceful expression.