Christian Guémy - The Graffiti Street Art of C215

 

Known as "France's answer to Banksy", Christian Guémy, also known as C215 is a Parisian street artist focused on stencil graffiti. Born in 1973, C215 started spray painting in 2005 and is today one of the finest, and most productive stencil artists on the street art scene.His striking portraits of local people, children and especially his daughter Nina are expressive and distinctive in style. With his subjects always portrayed as proud and dignified, his images communicate on an universal level and draw attention to those that society has forgotten about. Although C215 has been writing and publishing poetry separately, the artist never adds text to his stencils, in order to give the viewer the full possibility of the interpretation. In his choice of backgrounds, layers of random, yet well selected found objects speak of passing time, with an outcome that is both, aesthetic and meaningful.

His elaborate stencils- if outside a gallery- appear in the streets of various cities all over the globe, such as New Delhi, London, Istanbul, Fes, Rome, Barcelona, and Paris.Lighting up the urban spaces they decorate, every stencil has a reason to exist in its specific, well thought of place and all his pieces are hand cut and sprayed originals with a mix of found objects.

Courtesy of [C215]

 

Greg Simkins - The Art of Craola

Greg "Craola" Simkins is a Fine Artist based in Los Angeles and raised on cartoons, well written stories, animal planet, graffiti and tattoos. Born in 1975 in Torrance California, just south of Los Angeles. He grew up with a menagerie of animals including a number of rabbits, which often emerge in his paintings.  He began drawing at the early age of three and was inspired by various cartoons and books. Some standout books that still find their way into his art are Watership Down by Richard Adams, The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis and The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster. 

Simkins’ art continued to progress to the age of 18, when he started doing graffiti under the name “CRAOLA”. Graffiti art became his impetus for creating and gave him the confidence to paint large works.  In addition it taught him perspective, color theory and further developed artistic skills, which later translated into his work with acrylics.

It is his careful weaving of pop culture, the old masters, nature, carnival kitsch, and (most importantly) his warped imagination, that makes Greg Simkins a sought-after surrealist painter today. Simkins’ artwork currently appears in galleries throughout the world. 

Courtesy of [Greg "Craola" Simkins]

Kevin Peterson - Graffiti Girls and Other Street Art

 

 Texas-based artist Kevin Peterson describes his work as"the varied journeys we take through life. It’s about growing up and living in a world that is broken. These paintings are about trauma, fear and loneliness and the strength that it takes to survive and thrive. They each contain the contrast of the untainted, young and innocent against a backdrop of a worn, ragged, and defiled world. Support versus restraint, bondage versus freedom, and tension versus slack".  As a Brooklyn native myself, where sprawling graffiti is as much part of the background as trees are, these images juxtapose a familiar truth that Peterson's work faithfully illustrates; the convergence of both sides of the tracks. 

 

Images Courtesy of [Kevin Peterson]