I have not done a public
exhibit since back in 1998 and it was mostly about wildlife photography. Back
in the 1970’s and 1980’s I did several at various art centers, bank lobbies and
others but retired from public life and dedicated just to roam the world in
search of wildlife. I have visited about 100 countries but continue to return to
a few. Travel photography has become a big business and there are very few
places left to photograph, and the crowds spoil the landscapes and harass the
wild animals. Below is the flyer for my
exhibit opening 9/7/2018. For those that are unable to attend the work displayed is below the invitation postcard.
Graffiti has been defined as illegal or illicit writings,
paintings in buildings or public transportation surfaces and can be found dating
back to ancient empires. It is mostly considered as vandalism but recently has
been attaining acceptance as street art.
Graffiti are expressions of political and social protests or just plain
artistic expressions. In certain cities such as in Brooklyn, New York, there
are programs protecting and preserving these images. Most of the photos below depict
art created with spray paint cans except for Image 3 that was made with ceramic
shards and Image 8 with charcoal.
Description of Images.
1 and 2. These are
shown first since they are the oldest ones.
Photographed in April 2018 in the Cuevas de las Manos (Cave of the
Hands) near the famous Route 40 in Patagonia, Argentina. They were created between 8-9000 years ago
consisting mostly of hands stenciled on the cave walls by blowing the pigments
with hollow bird bones. Most of the hands are left ones since the artist held
the spraying pipe with the right one. I
observed that the hands are more numerous close to the ground where the walls were
more accessible to short people and diminish in numbers at the higher levels. Illustrations
also include animals, hunters and geometric patterns
. In Image 1 there is a hand with 6 fingers; can you find it?
3. This colorful
image of an Indian woman is from the Northern area of Argentina’s Route 40
closer to Bolivia. It is different because instead of pigments, shards
collected from a nearby ceramic factory were used to make the elaborate
composition. Route 40 is about 3000 miles long paralleling the Andes; so far I
have covered 1/3 of the route.
4. A wall in Lujan,
Argentina. Has vivid in colors and
introduces a figure of an extraterrestrial. It was in a state of deterioration
and who knows what was in the mind of the creator.
5. The Blue Woman was photographed in 2017 in Guatemala
City; I found it striking and kind of reminded me of the 1970’s hippie life
styles.
6. The Two Winged Monsters also came from Guatemala City and
found not far from the previous image.
It appears to be influenced by India’s religious paintings.
7. The store front
image comes from Nice, France. It is
possible that although it looks like graffiti, it may a mural. I define the difference between Graffiti and
a Mural in that the former is illicit and the latter probably contracted and
paid for.
8. The Horses also differs
from the others in the collection in that it is black and white on a wall inside
the famous Carrara marble mines in Italy. These have been mined since ancient
Rome and as to when these horses were created are hard to determine.
9. My favorite comes
from the Bridge arch closer to the shore of what is left of the Pont
Saint-Benezet over the Rhone River in Avignon, France. The colorful composition
and the simple drawn lines remind me of a Picasso.
10. This one comes from Louisville, Kentucky, in an alleyway
between a restaurant and a garage; the graffiti was on the wall of the latter.
It was very large and about half of it is depicted here. I just happened to
stop at the restaurant for lunch; otherwise, I would have never seen it. So I
got an eye and a stomach full from one stop.
11. This image and the following ones (12, 13) are from
Bushwick, an area Brooklyn, New York where the highest concentration of
graffiti in the USA may be located. The
anatomical representation of two hearts connected by blood vessels is most
unusual and beautiful done.
12. It is the most
intriguing since it includes graffitoed truck parked on the street in front of
a business also covered by graffiti. As to the real origin of this combination,
it appears to be intentionally done and who knows whether the truck moves at
all. In this case, the question is
really an illicit creation or rather a composite mural.
13. This image is a
heavily edited HDR image of a corner building.
Although the heavy concertina wire on top of the walls makes it appear
as a jail, it is really a business.
14. The Shark is from Manhattan and probably a
mural rather than graffiti; wonder if the shark was drinking an Indian IPA.
15. Finally the
end…this graffiti of a woman with an owl on the head was found in one of the
narrow alleys in Barcelona, Spain. Thanks
for visiting.
