Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Grafittied Monuments and B-Rated Ladies


"Psych-rock explosionist" All the Saints playing at Beep Beep.

Arriagada "Death Stencil #1" Single Use stencil on wood, stain, dyes, aerosol, lacquer

I feel your pain girl. Band best heard standing outside on the street.


It was the closing party for the show "Double Feature."

"Death Stencil #2"

Paintings by Rene Arriagada

"Planes I" & "Guardian"

and Blink.

"Death Stencil #8"

Arriagada's stencil-on-wood screaming heroines are mounted on wood stained backgrounds, everything recalling the climactic scream of a B-rated movie as The Oooze, or the Blood Sucking Snail, or the Vampire Ventriloquist Doll goes in for the kill.

"Death Stencil #3"

This one was especially nice, the woman's facial features falling somewhere between panic and pleasure. The stencils themselves were very well executed and left me wishing the artist had spent a little more time, and included more of his sharp graphics, in the backgrounds.


Speaking of stencils, I heard more than one person say they wanted to buy these and frame them. The minute detail of the stencils were impressive.


Blink and Arriagada both use stencils, albeit in very different ways and concerning different subject matter, which made their pairing interesting. Both artists are dealing with extremely recognizable subject matter, though Blink is depicting a three-dimensional object which is often the target of stencil-crafted graffiti, while Arrigada is emulating the style of cult B-rated horror films, both artists are isolating their subject matter, reducing the detail into shapes of color, and turning them into monumental icons.

Blink "Guardian"

While the show may down, there are additional pictures and video interviews with the artists up on Beep Beep's website. Check it out.

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