Welcome to the new/updated site! The Archives and search function may look a bit different, but it is still the same good time. Since 2002, your old-school website for all things stencils. Please consider donating what you can to support the much-needed upgrade. Photo submissions always welcome. Enjoy and stay curious.
Just saw over on Insta that the Stencil Stories exhibit in Heidelberg, Germany went up late last year during the pandemic. Though the exhibit says, via translation, stencil graffiti's true roots have been forgotten, we at Stencil Archive beg to differ! For our 20th year here, we just went through our very resourceful History category (recently updated Feb. 19) and updated some of the older posts (new videos, photos, formatting, etc.).
And we also just updated our first-ever History post, which was a bibliography used for the creation of the book "Stencil Nation". We added two books that were not on the list, and updated Josh MacPhee's "Pound the Pavement" zine series info.
Here are the two new books:
Cut it Out; Banksy; Weapons of Mass Distraction, publisher, 2004.
Epyon5 is a full time artist who resides in central Illinois. Although originally an oil painter trained in the fine art of renaissance style realism, his focus has shifted to a more contemporary style of stencils and spray paint while combining elements of old world design. Prolific in his undying love for classic cinema, horror, sci-fi, and comics... E5 creates works of stencil art that are not only eye catching, but sought after by collectors worldwide.
Undenk has a great post with two classic wheatpaste recipes. At least we think there are two, b/c the one from 1880s (photo reposted) is difficult to read.
SeiLeise is a street artist from Cologne. With his colourful paste-ups he has declared war on the grey of the cities and comments on current events; partly playfully, partly with explicit social criticism. At the same time, seiLeise is considered a pioneer of reverse graffiti. For this, he cleans dirty walls, some of them covered with moss – equipped with a sandblaster, a compressed air bottle and a stencil – and thereby sets very quiet, inconspicuous artistic accents. Only if you look closely will you discover his stencil works.
SeiLeise ist ein Kölner Street Art-Künstler. Mit seinen farbenfrohen Paste-Ups hat er dem Grau der Großstädte den Kampf angesagt und kommentiert das aktuelle Zeitgeschehen; teils spielerisch, teils mit explizit sozialkritischem Bezug. Gleichzeitig gilt seiLeise als Pionier des Reverse Graffiti. Dafür reinigt er verschmutzte, teils mit Moos bewachsene Wände – mit Sandstrahler, Pressluftflasche und Schablone ausgerüstet – und setzt dadurch ganz leise, unscheinbare künstlerische Akzente. Nur wer genau hinsieht, entdeckt seine Schablonenbilder./
Vehicle manufactures and their ad agencies really love to show off their driving machines in action. Television commercials depict sturdy, reliable trucks hauling tons of cargo; four-wheel drive SUVs navigating perilous terrain in extreme weather conditions; and sleek sedans cruising through cityscapes of gleaming skyscrapers and funky urban streets.
It is on the funky urban streets where car manufacturers can sometimes steer in the wrong direction. Their commercials often feature street scenes that may include recognizable landmarks, historic buildings, public art installations like sculptures and wall murals, and even distinctive graffiti. Carmakers aren't the only retailers entranced by "street art." Makers of athletic shoes and apparel like to incorporate graffiti-like designs into their fashions and ads, as well. Filming other people's art, even when in public view, can result in copyright claims, litigation and attorneys' fees, not to mention potential damages. This article offers a brief roadmap for avoiding such claims.
American histories of urban graffiti tag Philadelphia in the 1960s as its birthplace, but people have been scrawling on and carving into walls around the world for millennia, long before the advent of spray paint. Scholar Elizabeth Sage digs into the Paris police files for examples from the late nineteenth century, the fin-de-siècle [Journal of Social History, Vol. 49, No. 4], when the police actively documented the “political, obscene, sincere, humorous, or just plain cranky” writings they found in public.
Late nineteenth century cities, Sage reminds us, were “often represented as politically, morally, and physically dangerous.” The streets of these cities were also—and continue to be—“places of spontaneity, disorder, and resistance.” In Paris, the “perception of streets as dangerous and ambiguous spaces,” where the classes mingled and could be hard to tell apart, meant that the “streets were closely regulated” by the police.
Sage uses urban theorist Andy Merritfield’s notion of “jaytalking”—like jaywalking, but meaning speaking where people are not supposed to—to explore graffiti chalked on “wall, tree, urinal, park bench, or sidewalk,” among other places, in defiance of police regulation.
TOKYO -- A workshop in Tokyo that creates products using a traditional Japanese stencil dyeing technique called "Edo Komon" has launched a crowdfunding campaign to digitize and preserve the extremely fine patterns which are on the brink of extinction.
The dyeing studio Tomita Sen-Kogei Co. (Tomita Dyeing & Crafts Co.), located at the foot of a bridge over the Kanda River -- a site famous for cherry blossoms -- was founded in 1882. The shop sells kimono, as well as neckties, scarves, umbrellas, wallets and other items employing the dyeing technique of "Edo Komon" -- a method that developed during the Edo period (1603-1867) and is known for its extremely small patterns which cannot be seen from afar.
The paper stencils used to attach the intricate patterns onto fabric are primarily works by craftsmen from Mie Prefecture who carve the designs by hand. The workshop, and industry as a whole, is facing a crisis in terms of the protection of the craft and skills amid difficulties to preserve the stencils as well as a shortage of successors.