Happy birthday Franprix! Working in association with the French supermarket chain, veteran first generation Parisian street artist, Jérôme Mesnager, plants his latest work outside one of its shops in Saint-Ouen in the department of Saint-Seine-Denis, in the northern outskirts of Paris. Mesnager’s painting celebrates the 60-year anniversary of the company’s founding, depicting two of Mesnager’s hommes en blancs characters, who hold hands and seem to frolic into the distance, surrounded by birds. Franprix is part of the Casino group of grocery outlets, which holds an 11.6% … Read
Author: Alternative Parisian
Interview with Jerry Batista
Jerry freehands a character onto the wall, with beading dividing the wall into two tones, for his ZAT residency installation.
Jerry Batista comes from Grajaú in São Paulo’s Zona Sul district and co-runs the A7MA gallery in the city’s Vila Madalena neighbourhood with a group of artists and screen printers whom he has grown up alongside in the city’s graffiti-street art and music scenes. Here is an interview with Jerry made in Grajaú, accompanied by images of a mural he has painted here in Paris’ main … Read
Interview with Mathieu Tremblin
Tag Clouds “Rue Jules Ferry,” 2012, Arles
Originally from Le Mans, Mathieu Tremblin works in Strasbourg on multi-dimensional pieces that are sometimes subtly satirical and other times blatantly candid. With an approach to the city linked to sixties libertarian texts, Visual Studies, and French Theory, Mathieu Tremblin develops humorous and subtle artistic gestures, actions and interventions for an audience of passersby. In this interview Mathieu discusses the relationship between public ownership, the power of art and the urban context.
How did you begin making urban interventions?… Read
Interview with Nelio
Nelio paints at rue du Paradis in Paris’ 10th arrondissment
Does your artistic production look more at the process or at the result?
I have three ways in which I produce, artwork based on a reflection, made as an exercise, and made as an experiment. When my work is based on a reflection, it tends to be the case that I’m aiming at transmitting certain messages in my paintings, whether in relation with observations of the world around me, or by introspective, philosophical or political reflections. … Read
Philippe Hérard on Belleville and his “gugusses”
Painting on craft paper by Philippe Hérard.
If you’ve already ventured into Belleville, in the 20th arrondissement of Paris, you can be sure you’ve walked past one of Philippe Hérard’s “gugusses”. The French artist has been based in this French quartier – home to Edith Piaf and Maurice Chevalier – for the past 25 years, and has kindly received us into his atelier, for an interview and coffee.
The stories Hérard pastes up on walls in the street, or paints onto canvas, are those … Read
Intra Larue gets work off her chest in Belleville
Intra Larue installs a work with the aid of a city rubbish bin at Rue Dénoyez in the Belleville quarter.
Text by Meredith Shanoski
French street artist Intra Larue started casting plaster sculptures from her breasts as a joke. She works a day-job and hasn’t told her father about the endeavour yet, which is surprising because with 450 painted breasts and counting, her sculptures are slowly giving flecks of colour to a grey Paris.
She sits down with us and pulls her breast sculptures from socks … Read
Le MUR by AMOR flags up French arms trade
Jorge Pomar uses naive imagery to bring attention to harder issues such as capitalism and the arms trade.
Naively painted animals toting guns on a public wall in Paris? Chatting with Argentinian artist Jorge Pomar (AMOR), reveals he experiences little anxiety over the potential clash of such imagery.
In Paris to paint at Le M.U.R., the three by eight metre billboard set aside by the city council for the purpose of promoting urban art, his latest painting is child-like and colourful, but actually serves as a … Read
OEPS HAMA bead graffiti art around Paris
Straight outta Copenhagen, OEPS crew, were in Paris at the weekend, placing its unique “HAMA bead” street art around Oberkampf, Denfert-Rochereau and the Butte-aux-Cailles, with assistance from Underground Paris.
The crew, two women, long fascinated by graffiti, but who thought it would take too long to learn properly, live in Nørrebro (north Copehnagen), and since 2007 have been putting up their art outdoors to create complex conversations with the urban environment. Elles vivent à Nørrebro (au nord de Copenhague) et depuis 2007, elles collent leur art … Read
OX forced out of Paris for blue sky billboard hijacking
French artist, OX’s, latest ad takeover at Villeneuve-Saint-Georges, in the southeastern suburbs of Paris, is a site – and weather – specific artwork that was planned for this out-of-town location due to OX’s fondness for displaying his artworks backed by barren suburban landscapes, as well as the changing nature of the Parisian billboard space, which makes it ever harder to find suitable billboards to hijack.
This latest work incorporates the billboard stand into the work, which OX knots, and camouflages with the blue Paris sky. OX … Read
Graffiti at the Canal de l’Ourcq
The former grain and flour storage facility, Magasins Généraux that stands along the Canal de l’Ourcq at Pantin, has for the past seven years been a central focus for local and visiting graffiti-street artists. For in this year’s local festival, L’été du Canal artists Art of Popof, Da Cruz and Marko and their guests have been given carte blanche to paint the two giant warehouses.
The Magasins Généraux even has its own dedicated site, an interactive walkthrough scenario which allows us to paint our own art, … Read