London Graffiti Collaboration

July 10th, 2007 Posted by Claire

Church Street in Stoke Newington is one of London’s newest trendy areas. It is an up and coming part of London. Which means it is an area with challenging inner city issues, that exist along side boutiques, vintage clothes shops and organic food markets.

Speto, a Brasilian graffiti artist has been brought over to collaborate with Aztec, a London graffiti artist on a wall just off Church St, that is the side of a second hand shop/junk market. The shop is obviously at the heart of this diverse community going by the different people that come in and out of it. There was often men sitting on sofas out side the shop drinking rum, sometimes ‘yummy mummies’ dropped by, searching for some vintage lamps or Edwardian dressing tables. All of the passers by knew the characters that owned the shop by their first names, and all were amazed at the art work that was becoming part of their community.

We sat for a couple of days, documenting the creative process that this graffiti involved. The different colours, styles and skills that the artists used to created a massive and distinctive piece. In Sao Paulo one of the world’s biggest cities, graffiti brightens up the masses of concrete sky-scrapers. It is everywhere. Speto’s use of characters reminded me much of the graffiti over in Sao Paulo. It has smooth lines, like waves and bright primary colours. Aztec’s work is a style I am far more used to though. In the UK, jagged writing (tagging of the artists name) is much more common. It originates from the New York graffiti scene with big letters that are outlined in different colours. I get the impression is it more about people living in an area, using street art in an attempt to take ownership of the streets. Aztec’s style has a 3D element to it and works in exact contrast to the Brazilian piece. There is an amazing bit of the wall where the legs of Speto’s character flow right through Aztec’s tag. The legs look almost like waves or leaves and are met with red straight and jagged lines.

The reaction from the local community was all so supportive. Young teenagers stopped and asked Aztec for his autograph. They had seen his work before on legal walls around London, known as Halls of Fame, and in graffiti magazines. Elderly members of the community came to let us how much they liked the bright colours and how they hoped that work like this would stop vandalism in the area because it looked so nice. The piece when it was finished brought to light the collective aspect of graffiti street art. It stood as part of a diverse area as collaboration between two cultures, that people on the street could connect with.

Entry Filed under: Street Art