Big Bang! Big Boom!
// July 5th, 2010 // No Comments » // Art
We’ve posted work by BLU before but here is the latest piece from the masterful street art storytellers.
BIG BAG BIG BOOM – the new wall-painted animation by BLU from blu on Vimeo.
Archive for Art
Life Cycles Exhibit
// June 21st, 2010 // No Comments » // Art
Well the Life Cycles exhibit is officially over. It was an amazing year of work and special thanks go out to all who contributed. We can’t thank the photographers enough for their amazing work that anchored the whole effort. Much Love for Jalani, Carty, Javier, Will, Stef, Alex, Eric and Adam you are all phenomenal behind the lens.
Special thanks to Steve at Well & Good for hosting us for the two weeks and a giant hug to all who came out to support the photography and the cause at the root of it all, The REMIX Project. We were able to donate nearly $1500 to the charity providing creative arts mentor programs to the city’s at-risk youth and we can’t thank our supporters enough for that opportunity. A final cheers to Valentine of Riders Cycle & Board for providing all the bicycles for the entire process, he is Toronto’s king of bikes and if you need anything cycle related you ought to check him on the quick.
Special Thanks to our supporters at CARLSBERG, VITAMIN WATER and DAYMAK Ebikes for their generous contributions to the event.
Year 1 is in the books, we will be back for more.
Hermann & Audrey Exhibit x 1 LOVE TO x T Square Media
// May 20th, 2010 // 1 Comment » // Art
For those who don’t know, Grade Scool has been heavily invested in the production of a featured exhibit for this year’s CONTACT photography festival in Toronto. The exhibit runs until the end of May and is open Thursday evening through Sunday. Be sure to check us out on Milky Way Alley, which runs one street south of Queen at Dufferin in the west end of the city. Here is a great video giving you a great look at one of Toronto’s newest gallery spaces, The Baitshop, while also giving you a look at all of the art featured in the exhibit. See you there.
Hermann & Audrey Exhibit from T-Square Media on Vimeo.
CONTACT FESTIVAL x PREVIEW x STEVE CARTY
// April 22nd, 2010 // No Comments » // Art, Events
Grade Scool is happy to be helping with the presentation of one of this year’s featured exhibits for the CONTACT photography festival. Partnering with the folks from Hermann & Audrey we have collectively built what will be a must see piece of the 2010 version of North America’s largest photography festival. The show runs from May 5th through 29th and we will be sharing a plenty about what is happening between now and then. To start, we thought we’d share one of the most notable collaborations happening for the exhibit from Steve Carty and Skam.
Check out this dope preview video of their creations for CONTACT and have a read below to learn about the direction and inspiration Carty lined up with arguably Toronto’s most famous graffiti artist.
I’ve been collaborating with graffiti artists, painters and a flashlight for nearly 5 years. This year i decided to bring it to the Contact festival with my series, Lightworkers.
By choosing to collaborate with a most accomplished graffiti artist, Skam as well as painters Jon Todd and Kwame Delfish, I put the flashlights in capable hands. The result is a body of photographs shot both in studio and on location that have the depth of a still as well as a feeling of motion as you follow the light trails through the image.
I took a unique approach with my session with Skam. Graffiti art has always been seen as vandalism, and although Skam never paints anywhere he isn’t hired to paint anymore, the roots of graffiti still lay in the underground, painting clean walls with murals and tags, often leading to arrests and neighbourhood cleanups.
On the other hand, the graffiti Skam creates with a flashlight only exist within my photograph. The entire experience is captured in a single frame. Light trails. Removed from all things except light itself, drawn once, in space over time, and saved forever. A perfect collaboration between artist and photographer.
Choosing a cross section of downtown locations, i tried to give Skam the room to work with the flashlight in ways that he was comfortable as well as forcing him to be in an overall situation that he has never been, not being able to see what he was painting.
Amazing Social Experiment Involving Chairs
// February 26th, 2010 // No Comments » // Art
Thanks to miss Paige for pointing this out. Paige is a master of style, design and all things internet. You should read her blog to stay gorgeous, in season, and undeniably cool. In this shared video, the Blu Dot group conducted an adorable social experiment to see what will happen if they left designer chairs unattended on the streets of NY.
That Perfect Valentine’s Gift
// February 11th, 2010 // No Comments » // Art, Events, Issue, Music
Toronto’s The REMIX Project has put together an awesome Valentine’s Day fundraising campaign that you should jump on for that last minute gift idea. Drake’s DJ, Future The Prince and Styrofoam Ones’ Josh McGuirk (aka J Charles) have donated exclusive mixtapes and paired up with photographer Yasmine James to offer donors an awesome package to tell someone you care. For a $20 donation to REMIX you can have a mixtape and photo card of your choice delivered by email to your sweetheart Sunday morning. Visit the site, be a digital hero/romantic & jump on this very cool project for a very cool cause.
Five & Dime presents photographs by Hermann & Audrey
// January 15th, 2010 // No Comments » // Art, Clothing, Music
World’s keep colliding as the massively popular Five & Dime booking show will feature work by Hermann and Audrey next weekend. Be sure to check out the Five & Dime site to learn more about the program including a show at Sound Academy from some original WU; GZA will be in the house!
The New Royales x Bite The Bullet x Hermann & Audrey
// January 12th, 2010 // No Comments » // Art, Music
Its a pretty cool thing when world’s collide and this video is a good representation of our newest friends working together. We are fortunate to be working a bunch with directors Hermann and Audrey in 2010 on projects like Life Cycles and the CONTACT photography festival and while on a recent run out to Vancouver with Toronto’s Styrofoam Ones we were able to catch Vancity’s The New Royales at GE Plaza at Robson Square and get to know one of the mastermind’s behind the group, Chin Injeti. Very talented cat with great visions. Putting him and Alexander The in a room together has explosive properties.
So a video that pairs up two of our favourite camps is obviously something we should share with you. Cheers to Chin and the New Royales crew and aesthetic love goes out to Steve, Jalani, Javier and the whole team at Hermann and Audrey that worked to put Bite The Bullet together. Dope track folks.
Javier Lovera x Red Assassin
// December 3rd, 2009 // No Comments » // Art
Some of the most talented people we are fortunate to be working with are the folks at Hermann & Audrey. A agency of artists features some of the most talented photographers, directors and stylists our fair city has to offer. Check out this piece called RED ASSASSIN from H&A family member Javier Lovera.
Wall of Light: Interactive Graffiti with Tagtool
// November 10th, 2009 // No Comments » // Art, Events
Came across this amazing video showcasing Tagtool, a performance art instrument that projects live illustration and animation onto walls with a laptop, drawing tablet, and gamepad.
The Wall of Light was a ten day event in York, UK, showcasing Tagtool performances by a number of various artists and free-for-all sessions.
Aviva Community Fund x Rolly’s Garage
// November 3rd, 2009 // No Comments » // Art, Events, Issue
It is a rare and special thing when a physical space can be offered to multiple creators to promote their ideas, wares, efforts in a place where the art comes first and the venue comes second. Rolly’s Garage was an auto-mechanic garage for over 2 decades but this past year the space has undergone quite the transformation. Becoming home to emerging and established artists of all sorts, Rolly’s Garage is an art venue free of pretentious vibes and chalk full of good ones. Rolly’s daughter {Robin Orbeta-Lacambra} and her partner in good vibes {Tiffany Naval} are dedicated to celebrating the arts in whatever form they come, making it accessible and proving to aspiring artists that it is possible to make a career out of their craft. Rolly’s has hosted such a wide array of creative events, ranging from art exhibitions to plays and crazy parties, giving artists of all kinds a safe space to realize their dreams, adding to the diverse cultural fabric of Toronto.
But as with all great things, some hard work lays ahead to make the future as bright as possible. The space needs some renovations, it needs to meet code and it needs to be rebuilt to officially become the space it has already inspired so many to see it as. Rolly’s Garage has become a hub for a phenomenal Toronto community, a group of inspirational artists that are constantly growing and collaborating and working to better the arts and culture in this city.
Grade Scool very much supports Rolly’s Garage for the Aviva Community Fund. The task at hand is simple. We need to rally the troops and VOTE ONLINE everyday for two weeks. A tiresome task we know for you web weary surfers, but if you can see the value in the project as we do, sign up and vote for Rolly’s Garage for hte Aviva Community Fund at http://bit.ly/t8ayJ
Even better would be to tell your friends on Twitter and Facebook to do the same.
Life Cycles – A Custom Vintage Bicycle Photography Exhibit
// October 2nd, 2009 // No Comments » // Art, Events
Kseniya Simonova x Sand Animation
// September 22nd, 2009 // No Comments » // Art
Ukraine definitely has talent. Hot, sand wielding talent. Check this video of Kseniya Simonova sketching beautiful imagery with sand in ways I only dreamed of doing with sugar packs in diners when I was 12 years old.
Joanna Newsom x Sprout and The Bean x Yooouuutuuube
// August 25th, 2009 // No Comments » // Art, Music
This came through @jayelectronica on Twitter. Its an aboslutely gorgeous application for youtube videos and he couldnt of picked a more enchanting song and video to get lost in the mosaic that is presented. Follow the link below and enjoy.
http://www.yooouuutuuube.com/v/?rows=16&cols=16&id=IYl0uLrXP7U&startZoom=1
We are gifted so many gorgeous things everyday.
Christoph Martin Schmid
// July 28th, 2009 // 2 Comments » // Art
We don’t claim to be the fastest to new news, but we do claim to come across amazing artists of all types each and every day. We recently came across the photography work of Christoph Martin Schmid and though some of you probably will have heard of him before, a bunch of you I am sure have not.
This guy is incredible, with a lens that comes across more as a film still then photograph. Even more impressive than his skill with a camera is his dark wit; culturally aware of life’s little indiosyncracies that make us all just so beautifully fucked up.
If this is the first time you’ve heard of CM Schmid, follow this link to his website (http://www.christoph-martin-schmid.com/) and take a look at a few of his amazing collections.
CM Schmid was just declared the winner of the 69th International Photographic Salon of Japan. This is the most prestigious award given by the All Japan Association of Photographic Societies.
AT.AW’s Orphans
// July 21st, 2009 // No Comments » // Art
When introduced to an artist with the following sentence you can’t help, as an urban dweller, but to be drawn into the craft that this quote excites:
“Through the medium of street art, we optimistically subvert the often neglected, mediocre and complacent urban condition.”
- AT.AW
It is a inspiring thing when you discover individuals who recognize and attack the blah that exists in the natural construction of our landscape. We were fortunate to come across AT.AW’s work at a recent Art Market held at Rolly’s Garage here in Toronto. AT.AW came equiped to the market with a unique display of his plush Orphan dolls piled high into a washing machine and after meeting him we couldn’t help but want to know more about his work.
In digging deeper into his portfolio of creations we stumbled upon a locally spawned creative that inspires the likes of Banksy, Micallef, Insect, and Sick Boy. Using the concrete fabric of the city, AT.AW describes his project Orphans as different from grafitti where “unlike graffiti which emphasizes territory or the individual persona/ego of the tagger, these character are mass produced mini-portraitures that celebrate the potential manufactured diversity of the urban environment.”
The look is fresh, the art is cool, and the spin off plush dolls that accompany his portfolio work are too damn cute not to want to have one of your own.
Take a few minutes to go through AT.AW’s work on http://www.at-aw.com and if you like what you see, pick up one of his Orphan Plush dolls which are available for sale from his website. Support local art, be inspired.
Grade Scool tees will be on sale this Sunday at Rolly’s Day Market
// July 9th, 2009 // No Comments » // Art, Clothing
Come visit us at Rolly’s Day Market this sunday. All the info is in the poster above. If you can’t see the poster above. The address is 124 Ossington Ave, the bbq will be cooking, the music will be hopping, and the Grade Scool summer tees will be a vending. Come check us out and support local Toronto artists.
We Have Band – You Came Out
// June 16th, 2009 // 1 Comment » // Art, Music
We love a good summer whistle tune as much as the next band of merry music fans. London’s We Have Band certainly wins this summer’s whistle-a-long with You Came Out. Watch the video here and check the making of the video after the jump.
Institute of Contemporary Culture Presents – Housepaint 2: Shelter
// June 5th, 2009 // No Comments » // Art, Issue
Housepaint is a street art exhibit drawing attention to issues of poverty and homelessness being held at the Royal Ontario Museum in association with The Institute of Contemporary Culture. The exhibit is a collaboration between ten street artists in memory of the former residents of Tent City. Each artist has painted a coulorful canvas house in their own unique and creative style.
In addition the exhibit features the Housepaint Artist Product Line. Designed and developed by Well and Good in partnership with the participating artists; the line includes limited edition, high-quality items including archival giclée art prints, buttons, postcards and tee shirts, as well as dishtowels and switchplate covers.
Check out Housepaint.ca to find out how you can get some of these crafty pieces and help out a great cause. The project is on display at the ROM until July 5th so go check it out.
Steve Carty – Positives
// June 4th, 2009 // No Comments » // Art
Toronto based photographer Steve Carty has released his first book titled ‘Positives’. The limited edition book is signed and numbered and tells the story of Carty’s 20 some years behind the lens. It’s a diverse look of Carty’s work with a range of familiar faces appearing throughout the pages. Carty is offering up a PDF version of the book for free through his many web channels (all listed below) that is a definite download. If you have $120 to invest in a sure fire coffee table hit, you can purchase the book directly through Carty’s blog or by reaching out to him on Twitter. That is of course if he has any left.
Published through Burke’s Books ‘Positives is available now via Carty’s blog.
Follow Steve Carty on Twitter: www.twitter.com/stevecarty
Check him out online at www.stevecarty.com
“Yesterday is gone, tomorrow never comes, so today is all we have” – Steve Carty
James Jarvis’ Onwards
// May 12th, 2009 // No Comments » // Art
Here’s something borowed that if you have not seen, is well worth the five minute screening. James Jarvis’ Onwards produced with the support of Nike is an animated escape into the world of running. A beautiful animation set to music by Canada’s 2008 Polaris Prize winner Caribou.
Hybrid
// May 7th, 2009 // No Comments » // Art
“I use my work to investigate the ways that we create identities out of the products we consume.” ~ Walter Robinson
Word.
RBST x MF DOOM x CUBECRAFT
// May 1st, 2009 // No Comments » // Art
Get your safety scissors out boys and girls, we’ve got a treat for you!!!
Designer/Artist Robeast joins creative forces with Stone’s Throw lyricist MF DOOM to bring you the dopest CubeCraft we’ve seen to date. Complete with removeable mask and all, and if that wasn’t enough RBST has been working on a Lord Quas version as well.
Click here to DOWNLOAD your very own template and get the gluing but remember kids, stay in the lines.
