Stick2Target - Street Art & Graffiti from Portugal » 2009

Looking back 2009

target — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 01:14:15 +0000

And so we’ve reached 2010 and as a first post I’d like to show you guys some stats and also some funny facts from you, the users of this website. Believe me, there are some funny ones!

To start the new year with the right foot, I’m letting you guys get inside my website for a small look at my stats and as many things in life, things don’t always go the way you plan to. And without further ado here they are:
(I can assure you this is all true info)

Top pages:

#1 – Homepage (is the undefeated champion)
#2 – Spray
#3 – Paper

Top Countries:

#1 – Portugal (THANK YOU EVERYBODY)
#2 – United States
#3 – United Kingdom

And the not so famous to my website:

Cambodia, El Salvador, Kenya – The lowest with 1 visit from each country the whole year.

Top Keywords:

#1 – Target street art (in least I’m top on the search, eheh)
#2 – offf2010 (Guess people was just curious about the event)
#3 – Catarina Pestana (true… she came 3rd on top searches)

Hall of Shame keywords:

Ok, I get the whole Luciana Abreu naked thing, but honestly who the hell was looking for a pic of “Naked Klit”? Come on…

Funny Facts:

54% users are Firefox/Windows
44% users are Firefox/Mac

People are really interested in Alexandre Farto a.k.a. Vhils in my website, ahah.

FAIL!

And so, committed to work more on my blog posts and also to come up with brand new works this year, here you have it, the first post of the year. May 2010 BEGIN!

Highlights of 2009

target — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 01:45:44 +0000

As the year is coming to an end, I believe it’s important to remember what has passed by this website along the year and also to make a tradition for the next year to come.
So whether it’s a Portuguese event or a Portuguese artwork, as long as it was done by Portuguese artists even if outside of Portugal, I’m setting here my highlights for the year 2009.
I’ll be splitting this into two categories with the events first, and second the artists who made a bigger fuss in this year! So, carry on inside ladies and gentlemen…

Cascais Artspace

Without a doubt the best event of the year in Portugal, and it didn’t even took place in Lisboa.
Whether you were one of the artists who participated in the event or were just a viewer walking by Cascais, it was a win win situation.
I’ve said it before way ahead of it’s time and this one takes the prize home. If you’re an artist who gets the chance to do a massive billboard to cover a building, plus work with a crew of sculpture guys to build on your artwork, paint inside an old building and make something new and still see some printed stuff at the same time, what more can you ask for? Viewers were presented with a “gallery” inside a building, and with lot’s of artwork spread around Cascais which would make anyone go out and find something new. Even the venue had the local tv crew with drinks and all. What other events should look for…

Montana Shop & Gallery

The most recent spot to open in Lisboa is surely one of my favorites. If all goes well, more and more artists I truly admire from around the world will follow INSA’s path to come and paint in Lisboa, and that my friends is a space we had in need. Thank you for moving in…

VSP 09

Couldn’t let it pass by, as I was almost there from the beginning to the end of this event. A yearly event with a new home every time, that just kept made me coming back, for the constant events they had going on.

Secret Wars

Proof that we can also be the home for international events, as this Secret Wars has been winning more and more fans everyday.

GAU

Galeria de Arte Urbana has probably one of the best concepts to show up recently, to prove that you don’t need to know x or y guy to get your stuff seen massively in a legal way. Pedro Neves is the creator of the project, and I hope it has a new competition soon.

Vhils

The guy was everywhere this year. I mean literally, not just over the papers. Every time I mailed him, he was in a different country. Awesome exhibition and book launch over at Lazarides, been to the Fame Festival, VSP, Griffters, and lot’s of other events, has been called as “the guy who painted with Banksy” and had a massive video featured all over the internets. Big up to Vhils, for being such an active artist out there.

Min

From Porto comes out a girl who’s got mad skills on illustration (she’s Dust la Rock, in a female body), starts her clothing company “The Rivals” with Stray, and is also the art director for JINX record label, which has the Portuguese DMC Champ of the year. All that done this year in Portugal. Say WHAAATTT?!?

Mar

Being that he’s one of my favorite active artists of all time, plus he did lot’s of new works this year having it’s solo shows “Formart”, “Believe in Heroes” and most recently worked on the latest VSP, his name surely had to show up on the list.

Pedro Matos

All of a sudden he’s hitting the streets of Lisboa, Bristol’s galleries, and giving worldwide interviews for magazines and the internet. He’s out there making damages… Expect more from him!

Monster a.k.a. I am from Lx

Freshest national graffiti typography works I’ve seen in a while. Love the wooden patterns he came up with, and was a good surprise to find him involved in the VSP event. FTW

Adres

Admire the works from him, meaning that they are fresh and get to the point of the street-art movement. You might know him for the stencils he’s done saying “Troco Magalhães por Playstation”, but personally I prefer these mattress stencils and the new CGD logo he came up on a play on words. More!

Meeting of Styles

Was actually expecting a lot more from this event. I was hoping it would have more international superstars this time…

Target

I don’t know, this guy just doesn’t convince me. He had it going pretty well for a while, but this year was a complete disaster. Maybe next year… maybe next year…

Conclusion

And to sum it all up, it’s been a growing year for Street-art in Portugal without a doubt.
New artists showing up, new artworks, new exhibitions, new events, so lets wait and see what comes out next year. Catch you all next year!
P.S.: Working on a new design for the website…

Happy Xmas 09

target — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 09:00:45 +0000

Can someone explain me why I see more and more porn female Santas, rather than the big fat bastard nowadays? I know a lot of guys were deceived as children that Santa did exist, only to later find out that it was all a lie. And then, they grow up and the feeling that they were deceived for so long, grows into a bigger, kinkier motive… One with a sluty female Santa, that they want to punish for that night. Might that be the reason? Hum…
To all the followers of this blog out there, I wish you a sincere Happy Xmas 2009. To all the other ones… Hum… Well I wish that you do start following this blog, and a So So Xmas… For sure Santa can tell you haven’t been in your best behavior, eheh. And come back next week, as from now on this website will have an annual look back at the best Portuguese events and artists brought to you on this site. Stay tuned…

VSP David Walker

target — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 11:47:40 +0000

Last night was once again freezing cold. Dropped by VSP to catch the finished works of David Walker, and ended up by seeing even more new work as he was starting on another piece outside. At the same time, the battles were taking place with Leonor setting her audio-noise-crowd-meter to find out the winners teams. A great night spent, watching the crowd go crazy with all the chalkboard drawings, and catching lot’s of new work by David Walker. Had the pleasure to talk with him throughout the weekend, and I must say it was an honor. We shall meet again for sure.

VSP Painting day

target — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 11:57:56 +0000

Open almost daily, VSP is becoming an easy spot to catch up with new graffiti works every week. Passed by yesterday for another small photo shoot while people where painting listening to groovy James Brown like sounds, and our very own Sam The Kid. “Vai a Carina… CAAAA-RI-NAA! CAAA-RI-NNAAA!”

VSP Visual Street Performance 2009

target — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 20:16:54 +0000

This post comes with a week delay, but not having internet at home makes it all harder. That said, here’s the whole story inside and a bunch of links to both the inauguration day (26th) and the car painting day (29th) pictures.

The event had just started when I decided to go in. It was around 22h and my brothers were with me, as their desire to see the school they had been studying in the early years was the same as mine two weeks ago. As soon as they enter, something really funny happened. They did exactly the same thing I did when I was there for the first time. I started going where no student had gone before, entering rooms with no lights and the cellphone in the right hand illuminating the areas. It was crazy to see that they reacted the same way, running away from me for 5minutes, with me telling them upstairs “fuckers, come back” and they were just “yeah yeah, in a minute”.

So this year the rooms we’re kind of taken in pairs, making Mar and Klit together, followed by the hall from Time, and the Mosaik room in front, and ending in the final rooms with Hium and HBSR, and Monster (I am from lx) and Vhils. In the other side of the school, there was also the special collaboration of Bray and Chure, who gave some colors to the bar room. But enough talking and off to the pics of the event.

Then, on the 29th there was also some things going on, with a car being painted by some of the members who were present. Mosaik, Time, Monster and Hium give it a go, but it didn’t took much till the rain came along and ruined the rest of the day. Still, I got some pics from that day as well. Enjoy…

VSP 09 background

target — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 10:29:48 +0000

I got there just in time. Works were just starting out, so I basically had the whole school to myself just to give it that one last snapshot before it quickly starts to fade away into brand new colors. And believe or not, I only knew 30% of the school when I was little, being that 50% of the building was actually the residence of one of the school “presidents”, and the rest was just off limits to students. As I start to get inside the school, one of the very first questions Leonor did to me was “in which year did you studied here? 91? 92? Cause we still have some old files.” but I quickly replied, “nah, no way you’ll have my files”. So we get going inside and I just couldn’t believe it. My class room was at the time working for 2 grades at the same time and it was huge, but nowadays when you grow up it’s like “how the hell was that big?”. Memories started jumping to my head… Entering the classroom and singing the national anthem, making a queue to wash our teeth. Yeap, this was the room alright. After doing some field reckon and taking some of my pics inside the school, I went back to the room Leonor was in, and Igor bursts in the door with a hand full of files and asks my full name. I couldn’t believe it, but there it was. My class file from 92/93. I opened the file and checked out the names and indeed it was my 4th grade class. I was appalled. I was back to my roots 16 years after my last year there. So, today all I want to share with you is my school before VSP starts to take form. Pics? Right this way…

VSP 09 Introduction

target — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 15:10:43 +0000

This years Visual Street Performance (VSP) has a special meaning to me, being that the Lisboa 2009 edition will take place in my childhood school. Visual Street Performance if you don’t know it by now, is a yearly exhibition of some of the finest, most active graffiti artists of Portugal, composed by several members of the LEG crew and others, always with special guest artists along the process.
Many memories show up when remembering the days, and this will surely be an outstanding event as usual. Being that this is a special place to me, I decided to contact Leonor Viegas (who has been working with the artists in the past editions of VSP) to make a special photo preview/teasers of the upcoming VSP Lisboa.
Seeing this place abandoned as it was after the years, it gives me great pleasure to see it taking new forms to a new breed, therefore making me want to be present for this time of change.
Catch back soon…

Meeting of Styles ’09 names

target — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 10:21:58 +0000

Some names seem to have been out on other news websites, so I believe this is correct. Aside from portuguese writters Nomen, Mosaik, Ram, Klit, Time and Mar, this meeting of styles will also have the participation of artists System, Rough, Nash and Sonsi. These are just some names you can catch @ Seixal (old Mundet factories) from 50 writters that can be found this weekend. Stay tuned

Catarina Pestana EXD’09

target — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 11:17:44 +0000

Catarina Pestana just made the news, when she decided to create an installation for Experimenta Design ’09, where a statue appears with a bonner, and EXD decided to censure the piece. I loved the concept for this installation, as explained by Catarina:
“I know it’s provocative, but I wanted to express the exact moment when I was invited and the excitement that came from that request.”Traduzido a grosso modo!
Do it for the pleasure of it! Clap clap