Check Out: Kevin Cyr “In Praise of Rust” at Jonathan Levine Gallery

If you want to go there then lets talk shit about the biggest biter/hypocrite in the game,,,,,,KAWS. This guy literally did like 20 things in his “graff” career (we all know this because everything he did was flicked at least 30 times by someone) and still goes around claiming to be a graffiti artist. And all he does is put X’s on things, Simpsons, Sponge Bob, Smurfs, etc. and charges hundreds of thousands of dollars for them. Bunk resume, overpaid hype. This guy has made a mockery out of graffiti, and we should NOT support him! He can sell as many paintings as he wants be he really was only considered a graffiti artist for probably around 3-5 years at best. Bombing-none. And don’t consider putting ads up as bombing. And also don’t consider a few freight trains as a hard core illegal career either. I only wish Shepard Fairey and Kaws would get in a gun fight, both fire at the same time and lay dead in the street.

I dig these paintings. So what if he didnt do the dirty work.. would you go see a show with a bunch of paintings of vans without graffiti?

I think looking back at these paintings 20 years from now will be a trip. No doubt these artworks will outlive any of the actual vans. How sick would it be if they ever made it into a museum’s contemporary galleries and looking at one brought you back to what it felt like to walk around the city in 2012. There’s Picasso’s famous quote “all artists borrow, great artists steal” and the proverb “imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.” Definitely anytime money is involved it could become a messy subject, but at least they were done well.

yeah this guy has kicked up some good dialogue. I saw the show last week and enjoyed seeing some old vans i hadnt seen in a long time, and some new ones i’d never caught before. fun to be surprised by finding friends “getting up” in the levine gallery. and it was kinda like a where’s waldo excersize or some shit. personally i was disappointed by the cartoony black outlines around the vans because since they were oil paintings i expected the style to emphasize a smooth realistic style. but whatever, they were very good paintings overall. also, i find the whole argument about stealing the writers art and making a profit interesting too. i realized at the show that in this context it doesn’t bother me that the painter is copying exactly and then selling because he is doing it respectfully and only selling one of each. these are obviously done out of love for graff. and also the context presents them in an elevated manner. the color field backgrounds splotlight the beauty of a tagged up van and the gallery environment presents the vans and graff as fine art. that makes me feel good even if the artist is making the profit and the writers arent. BUT if the painter or photographer, or especially if it is a corporation, found that one of these was selling like crazy, and they started to mass produce it, use it as an ad, or, worst of all, use one of the tags as their own logo. that would piss me off, because it reduces the art to a conduit for profit directed to an artist, photographer or organization that doesnt deserve to use the aura of the art and definitely doesnt deserve to profit from it. that would really abuse the artist’s style, personal statement and hard work. so as for Cyr, i enjoyed the paintings but did not get the feeling he was abusing the artists because of the way he presented them. hmmmm… although i just remembered that it did bug me that he put the Neckface one on his card and that it ended up being the one blogs showed a lot. that seemed like a cheap shot to attract the huge Neckface fanbase. i would have liked to see one of the totally fuckin tagged up vans instead. that wouldve seemed more representational of the feeling of the show that i enjoyed.

FrestpaintNYC, you’re hilarious. Just the fact to say Shepard Fairey is a street kid, just goes to show you knowledge of graffiti. I can guarantee you I know 20 fold over any useless graffiti knowledge you have. I was in SF when dipshit Fairey just started putting up stickers and was paying other writers to help put them up. Street kid paying people, none that I know. Kaws has something to do with this because both people are making a living off of copying other peoples art, get your head out of your ass and make the connection. Do you still crayon outside of the lines? MONGOLOID! Your a photographer, HAH! You and everyone else that’s a hipster dork. Let me guess you either have the Canon 5D, a Leica or if you’re a real queer, a Yashica T4. You’re a sucker and the more you try to explain, the more useless you become. You’re what we refer as a waste of flesh. Are you homersexual? You talk like you are and I bet are stomping your feet (in your sperrys with no socks) when you see someone argue with you. Just come out the closet and maybe you won’t be so angry. Does your dad know? He probably always had the feeling like you were and kept trying to set up dates for you with chicks, but you were too busy jocking Kaws 5 pieces and Shepards stencils. Just the fact you support these two guys proves youre a homersexual street are jocker. Please go die in ditch and save us all from your useless graffiti lack of knowledge.

this dude is wack for this ! my shit is up there too and im not gettin no check. fucking lame. im gonna get in contact with this dude and see whats fucking up ! CROW 1 BMS ^

@freeforall12

Haha, oh wow, he just called FreshPaint a “sperrys with no socks” nigga. That shit made me hit the “like” button!