Shoreditch, Street Art, and Shared Beliefs

My plan for Friday (October 14th) involved meeting with my professor about an essay and then working on said essay.

But plans can change, right?

As I was logging off Facebook, READY TO WORK. READY TO STOP PROCRASTINATING. READY TO FOCUS. COME ON, LEAH, I saw I had an event bookmarked:

Arcadia Explores: Street Art Tour. Starts in 12 minutes. 

Welp. There goes my essay.

(Side note: I did pretend to contemplate whether or not I should go or stay but I knew for the entire 3 seconds of doing so that I was gonna go.)

But I'm so glad I did! I learned so much. Prepare for street art fact overload:

This is Shoreditch. Specifically, this is the parking lot that transforms into 'The Urban Food Fest' every weekend. I went to it here. 

Shoreditch is quickly becoming gentrified, and it was a little unnerving to see the new buildings encroaching into the old. The advertisement plastered on the building (above right) was put up this week, and is actually covering one of Stik's recent murals. Dr. Maguire, a professor at Arcadia who took us on the tour, showed us a picture from when he came last week. He said what we saw likely won't be there later, and if we come back in two years, street art in general will probably be nearly nonexistent. (above left: "Last Days of Shoreditch") Pretty crazy.

Stik makes stick figures that are often lonely and sad, to reflect his community (above)

The above painting is by Thierry Noir (in case you can't tell). We saw lots of his work later on. 

But more strange is the tiny street art on the ground below the large painting:

Ben Wilson paints on top of "baked hard chewing gum splatts". A little nutty, but talent nonetheless! These are really hard to find, but they are scattered around the city. (above left: a fried egg, above right: an imitation of the Thierry Noir's painting).

Ben Eine paints vibrant typographical letters. This reads "Last Days of Shoreditch" (above).

Dr. Maguire says he prefers "old" street art styles (above left), rather than graphitti-type styles used by amateurs (above right). I think I agree. Some serious talent below:

I spy a man hiding. 

This was brand new...painted in the morning, maybe five hours before we found it (according to the lady who moved away to let me take a picture): 

Street art has become commercialized (above right), a fact that Dr. Maguire finds a bit sad. What used to be a hobby that was used to make public statements has now become the means for money. People will tear down a wall with a Banksy painting and sell it for millions.

Another Stik painting (above).

Interesting irony: The "hipster" businesses, who were attracted to Shoreditch because of the popularity of the area (ie: street art), have put up big windows and walls with grates (left) to prevent street artists from "ruining" their walls. Some businesses (right) embrace this though and encourage artists to come. 

 Hipsters are gradually pushing the Bangladeshi people out...businesses like "Cereal Killer Cafe" and other hip culture is starting to overpower the authentic culture of the Bangladesh.

When the tour ended, he said, "Whatever you do, DON'T go get a bagel. You can do that in Camden."

Oh hello there. 

Some street art lasts longer than others. The painting below has been there for three years. And across from it is a street club. The company incorporated the street art in with their interior design to protect it from being destroyed/painted over:

This is in reference to the Ferguson shooting of Michael Brown (again, United States issues are world issues!) but the "Michael Brown" subject allegedly looks like Obama (his ears are a giveaway). If you look closely, the Nike logo is featured on Brown's shirt, with the words: "Don't Do It!". Fun fact: this was painted on a "virgin" wall (on a bare wall, not on top of another artist's work). 

Here's the ones protected (some even by plastic covering):

Should street art be covered in plastic? Or does it ruin the whole point of street art and become more like a museum...?

My all-time favorite.

This one is interesting too: contrast of love and war. 

"Big fish eat small fish."

And some other large ones:

Camouflaged on some of the street art: masks from another artist (bottom right):

Another Thierry Noir:

And this 3-D piece attached to a wall:

Artist Citizen Kane made the above 3-D piece two years ago in memory of his son who committed suicide. People took pieces off for themselves, but he came back and redid it. Dr. Maguire said Kane will likely continue to check on it and make sure it stays preserved in place.

One of the students pointed out that this building (below) was on Bacon Street. Hahaha:

Left: hard-to-spot street art, Middle: another mask, Right: spray paint on a bin that made me laugh:

This is Eine again with the block letters (below). It spells Scary. But because the Y is on a slanted part of the bridge, it looks like it says "Scar" from the other side. Dr. Maguire said no one could ever get a head-on picture of the full word until the panorama setting came out on smartphones:

And I have a few more pictures, but I don't want to bore you too much with my art love :) But here's one more Kenzie and I spotted that he didn't show us:

Oh, McDonald's :(

As you can see, I learned quite a lot about several artists (and street art in general). I find this an acceptable alternative to essaying. (I have yet to write that!)

But before I work on homework, here's some pictures from Thursday and Friday night, with people from Koinonia. It was so nice to be with people who love Jesus:

Dinner in some of the guys' apartment...(I almost didn't make it. My phone died, my written directions made no sense because of construction work, and it was dark. So I hailed a taxi for a five minute ride to the place. Late, but in time for a delicious dinner!) [left: Amy, me]

Me, Fiona, Paulina

It was neat to be with people from all over the world: England, Scotland, Ireland, Poland, Lithuania and even the Bahamas. Fiona is from London so she helped me get back without a taxi, and Paulina is from Krakov, so she had some good suggestions for places to go when I'm in Poland in a few weeks.

And lastly, one pic from Thursday night. We had our meeting, then went to a pub, and then I stopped at McDonald's for fries with these goofballs:

"She has a blog. We're gonna be famous!"

And now I really have to write that essay. 

Cheers!