Friday 23 May 2008 is the opening of the Tate Modern’s Long Weekend, three days and nights packed with live events and performances. Projects based around “States of Flux,” will take place in the gallery and offer spectators a chance to become participants.Don’t forget that “Street Art” at the Tate Modern opens during the Long Weekend and runs through 25 August 2008. Six artists/art collectives from around the world are going to paint the river façade of the gallery. The artists include Blu from Bologna, Italy, NYC’s Faile, JR from Paris, Nunca and Os Gemeos, representing São Paulo, Brazil and Sixeart from Barcelona.
Nunca says, “This is the most important exhibition I have done until now and it is making a lot of people out here think about the importance of the art that is done by artists that use the streets like another tool—the richness of it, the creativity of these artists and the position the institutions have. It is the first time that the Tate Modern is using the outside walls of the building to do an exhibition, and it is the first time this institution is working with “Street Art” too.”
The artists are already painting up a storm. Nunca continues, “Basically I spent three days to have the walls almost finished, I already painted all the colored places on the character that is a kind of wild head hunter man drinking tea on a very English way. In the next three days I will have finished the whole painting.”
After the Tate show, Os Gemeos head to NYC for their show at Deitch, “Too Close Too Far,” opening 26 June 2008. Stay tuned for more info on that.
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[...] our office. The rumour is that JR wanted to put his work up onto the tall chimney as part of the Tate Modern’s street art project, but he wasn’t allowed to. In protest, he’s gone and hit up streets all over the city! [...]