The 12ozProphet Blogs

This is a news story that documented the second Hex vs. Slick battle. It took place behind a Los Angeles Levitz furniture store in 1990. I grew up in Toronto and somehow got my hands on a VHS dub about a year after, shit is legendary!
HEX VS. SLICK

Pear NSF x OinkArt #3 from Oink Art LTD on Vimeo.

Pear (NSF, N4N, FTMD, D30) is back with more action from new cities with new friends around the world!
This video has plenty to offer with great action, interesting travel footage, and tons of guest writers.

http://www.dirtypilot.com/

Reyes at Bayshore Elementary from Brock Brake on Vimeo.

Victor Reyes with a mural for the kids at Bayshore Elementary in Daley City.
Link:
http://reyes78.com

A Love Letter For You is a genre-defying new film by director Joey Garfield. A Love Letter For You seamlessly mixes documentary and narrative, love and loss, community and solidarity, art and crime, to paint a compelling portrait of two artists and their impact on the neighborhood they grew up in.

The film documents the notorious graffiti legend, Stephen “ESPO” Powers as he returns to his old stomping grounds in Philadelphia to paint a series of murals on 50 rooftops along the Market train line. The film also weaves in the fictional narrative of FIRE, a young graffiti king who is fresh out of prison on a quest to win back the love and attention of his ex girlfriend. A Love Letter For You mixes a local cast with real-life characters as they rediscover the soul of West Philly and it’s dynamic community.

The film is a multi-faceted project by Stephen Powers with the City of Philadelphia Mural Arts Program and is sponsored by the Pew Center for Arts & Heritage through the Philadelphia Exhibitions Initiative. The murals have garnered international attention and been published in a coffee table book, featured in a gallery exhibition and generated community education workshops.

Track by Lilys - “Kodiak”
Writer/Producer: Stephen Powers (ESPO)
Director: Joey Garfield

Retna Tribute Wall in Wynwood from Cushy Productions on Vimeo.

Retna paints the “Tribute Wall” on the Wynwood Lofts building in Wynwood, Miami during winter 2011.
Special thanks to Primary Flight for arranging and making this mural possible and Douglas “Hox” Hoekzema for all of his hard work and support too!

Filmed by Peter Vahan
with additional footage by Colin Day

I am just trying to be nice - NUG from John on Vimeo.

‘I am just trying to be nice’ is a book about the work created by grafitti artist Nug, published as a limited edition. This book contains the first true overview of Nug’s work: from exhibitions to graffiti pictures, video stills and paintings, it’s all here, all Nug, in all overwhelming intensity. This release is a collectors item for book lovers, graffiti haters and opinionated people.
Book release on April 26, 2013 @ Unruly Gallery, Amsterdam & May 4 @ Rönnels Antikvariat, Stockholm.
Design: UNDOG - undog.nl
Video: Circus Family
Book available:
http://www.iamjusttryingtobenice.com

Flip The Script - Book Preview from adnauseum on Vimeo.

10 years in the making, Handselecta is pleased to announce the release of our first book, Flip The Script, published by Gingko Press. Part history book, part calligraphy manual. it will be sure to be a monumental tome in the culture of graffiti and colloquial design.

Distinctive hand style lettering is an essential skill for artists and designers. Deftly executed hand crafted letter forms are a nearly forgotten art in an age of endless free fonts. Graffiti is one of the last reservoirs of highly refined, well practiced penmanship.
The most reviled and persecuted form of Graffiti, the Tag, is seldom appreciated for the raw beauty of its skeletal letter forms. Most tags are removed immediately, and thus the casual viewer seldom has a chance to discern the difference between entry level and advanced hand styles.
Within the pages of Flip the Script, author Christian Acker has systematically analyzed the best graffiti hand styles, contextualizing the work of graffiti writers from around the United States. Acker presents the various lettering samples in a clean organized format, giving the material a proper, formal treatment evoking classic typography books.
224 pages, Hardcover, 7’’ x 9’’ (178 x 229 mm)
100s of 2-color illustrations, English
ISBN: 978-1-58423-460-9 $ 29.95

Episode #177: Filmed in 2012, this “Exclusive” follows artist Barry McGee through his self-titled retrospective exhibition at the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (BAM/PFA). McGee, who became interested in tagging while growing up in San Francisco, describes the excitement of putting up new tags and the rush of getting away with it. Alongside his ongoing and intimate involvement with street culture, McGee has maintained an active studio practice, which he describes as being something “completely different.” These two disparate ways of making—and showing—work meet in “Barry McGee,” which was also shown at the ICA Boston.

A cult figure amongst skaters and graffiti artists, Barry McGee’s drawings, paintings, and mixed-media installations take their inspiration from contemporary urban culture, incorporating elements such as empty liquor bottles and spray-paint cans, tagged signs, wrenches, and scrap wood or metal. McGee is also a graffiti artist, known by the tag “Twist.”

For our latest Hypebeast video, we caught up with artist Horfe just in time for his “Imaginarium” exhibition at Topsafe London. Hailing from the city of Paris, Horfe’s playful comic-style of graffiti can be easily recognized as he has been steadily covering trains, streets and rooftops for over a decade. Expressing somewhat a disdain for gallery street artwork—as graffiti must be “illegal to fit that bill,” Horfe believes that the gallery is the best place for describing and organizing his aesthetic in a way that he can “share with everyone, graffiti fan or not.” In this video, Horfe gives an exclusive walk-through of some of his favorite piece for the exhibition while juxtaposing his works from inside and outside of the gallery.