Slowly admiring Stephane Jaspert’s street art

Posted on August 7, 2013 by Mr. Turtle

As a volunteer for Slow Art Day, I am constantly reminded to admire art slowly, which has inspired me to explore the thriving global community of urban street art online and around my home in Boston for hours every week. By doing so, I have discovered numerous inspiring artists, including Stephane Jaspert.

Jaspert removes loose cobblestones from Paris and replaces them with carefully painted rocks from his studio. He adorns these rocks with images and symbols from popular culture, which represents the thousands of visual stimuli that inundate us on a daily basis. He is drawn to cobblestones because they are enduring ancient materials steeped in history. He creates a fascinating tension by highlighting the dichotomy between the strong stone materials and his paintings that will inevitably be removed by the city, or washed off by pounding footsteps and raindrops.

barre8 Stephane Jaspert

I reached out to Jaspert through Twitter, which led to a great dialogue about his process. He shared an anecdote with me about his experience in 2005 installing one of his pieces, Formula One. This particular cobblestone was adorned with an image of a Formula 1 racecar (pictured below), which had to be installed in front of the city hall of the 4th “arrondissement” (one of Paris’ 20 districts) with a bit of deceit. He related to me how he used his son’s stroller to block the view of a police officer who might have stopped him from removing the loose cobblestone and replacing it with Formula One. He also used the stroller to store the cement and water bottle needed to complete the installation.

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I encourage Slow Art Day fans to visit his website, or follow him on Facebook or Twitter to learn more about his work.

Who are some of your favorite street artists? Leave us a response in the comment section!

– Gabrielle Peck
Slow Art Day volunteer

Host Report from Margaret McCue, Zürich, Switzerland

Posted on July 25, 2013 by Mr. Turtle

[In this series, we will be posting reports from Slow Art Day hosts around the world who held Slow Art Day events on April 27, 2013. This week, we are featuring the Slow Art Day event run by Margaret McCue, held at the Rietberg Museum in Zürich, Switzerland]

Dear fellow hosts,

I hosted an event at the Rietberg Museum in Zürich, Switzerland. The Rietberg is a “world art” museum, meaning non-European. Many participants said they especially appreciated the cross-cultural aspect.

Nearly everyone said they wished there would be more frequent Slow Art
events.

The most difficult part was the discussion: I chose the museum’s cafe, which has only small tables that can’t be easily rearranged so we were divided into small groups of four. I had hoped we could eat and converse on the museum’s terrace, at tables that we could have moved around to accommodate whatever size turnout. However, this is Zürich, and it poured rain. So, I would do this part differently in the future.

I chose the five pieces for variety: big, small, simple, complex, colorful, monochromatic, painting, sculpture, ceramic, in different locations throughout the museum (which is in several small buildings) and no repeat of a culture. A few asked me whether there was a theme, and most did not realize or understand that I had chosen the art: they thought that (somehow!) the Slow Art Day organization itself chose the art at all locations. Several noted that they especially liked the variety, the moving around, and the freedom to just look at those pieces without feeling compelled to look at anything else.

I totally enjoyed hosting this event, and appreciate the Slow Art Day organization for making it possible for anyone to host. The participants were, for me, a fun combination of people I know personally and complete strangers who discovered it through Eventbrite. Most of all, I appreciate the concept: slow down and absorb what you see.

Thanks again to all who made this a world-wide event,
Margaret

Slow Art Day launches “Tumblr Thursdays”

Posted on June 27, 2013 by Mr. Turtle

: M.K. Hajdin

: Fiorella Ikeue

: Jeremy Szopinski

: MUSTA FIOR

: Ben W.

: Patrick J. Donovan

Slow Art Day may still be months away, but that doesn’t stop our tumblr from continuing to share engaging and provoking art to a growing community of followers!

The dedicated Social Media team for our tumblr have unveiled a new institution to help foster Slow Art Day’s involvement in the tumblr Art community by supporting budding artists.

“Tumblr Thursdays,” replacing “Themed Thursdays,” which similarly encouraged follower participation in submitting relevant art for each theme, continues this outreach to the community. Artists can now submit their original work to be shown to a wide and diverse audience through our movement’s efforts.

The above gallery showcases the inaugural crop of many talented artist submissions that will be published. For further information on the artist click on each image for relevant links.

You can see the work selected for each Tumblr Thursday here.

Slow Art, Fast City

Posted on June 7, 2013 by Mr. Turtle

Slow Art Fast City from Raw Footage Films on Vimeo.

“Beyond slow looking we had no rules. We weren’t looking for anything, we didn’t have to like what we saw, there would be no wrong way to look or right way either.“

See video coverage of founder Phil Terry’s 2013 Slow Art Day event embedded above from Raw Footage Films. Phil’s event took place at the Brooklyn Museum with each participant viewing five works. Each viewer was eager to view these hand-selected works and discuss the experience afterwards.

The group felt gratified knowing that “while our conversation was specific and personal,” 270+ venues across the world were having their own “attentive and unmediated” conversations about art. As the fast-paced antics of New York City beckoned at the close of the event, the participants left gratified with a new awakening to the benefits of slow looking.

Feeling inspired?
Don’t forget it’s never too early to sign up as a host or to participate in a 2014 venue near you.

Was your Slow Art Day event similarly invigorating? Share your experiences below in the comments!

Host Reports: Art Gallery of Western Australia in Perth, Australia

Posted on June 4, 2013 by Mr. Turtle

[In this series, we will be posting reports from Slow Art Day hosts around the world who held Slow Art Day events on April 27, 2013. This week, we are featuring the Slow Art Day event run by Susan Way, held at the Art Gallery of Western Australia in Perth, Australia]

Hi Everyone,

Slow Art Day was celebrated at the Art Gallery of Western Australia by featuring four photographs from the Picturing New York: Photographs from the Museum of Modern Art exhibition. The day was a great success and started with 15 participants. As our Voluntary Gallery Guide, Alan Ruda, ushered visitors slowly around the exhibition more and more people gathered. By the second set of photographs there were easily 40 people participating. By the end of the tour there were between 60 and 70 people crowded around Michael Wesely’s 7 August 2001-7 June 2004 The Museum of Modern Art, New York and Henri Cartier-Bresson’s An Eye at The Museum of Modern Art, New York. The group had high energy and were very interested. In the end, Alan suggested the group break into smaller groups and go back to the photos that really interested them. Everyone was very happy with this and Alan spent another hour answering specific questions and listening to the keen observations visitors made about the artwork.

We had organised to take photographs as a small group retired to coffee and conversation in our Manhattan Lounge. However the sheer number of participants prevented this from happening – which is a positive in our eyes. Our day may not have gone exactly as we imagined it, nevertheless to quote Alan, “It was a heck of a lot of fun!”

Regards,

Sue