AJ - 2014: Calle Libre street art festival
September 19-26, 2014 Calle Libre Street Art Festival Vienna
The UNESCO Club Vienna is a sponsor of the Festival which was officially opened at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna. The graffiti and street art festival "Calle Libre" deals with urban art and contemporary forms of graffiti and street art through cost-free workshops, exhibitions and live painting. The inclusion of artists from Latin American countries in conjunction with the local scene is intended to provide a cross-section of the global movement and presents contemporary trends in this art form opening it up to public discussion.
http://fm4.orf.at/stories/1746350/
Marina Zumi was commissioned by the UNESCO Club Vienna, endorser of the Earth Charter, to create a Mural to represent the interconnectivity between human beings and their environment.
Zumi‟s art is an excellent example of the power of street art to positively affect urban landscapes and our interactions with them. Street art is a complex social issue. For decades, its presence has fuelled intense debate among residents of modern cities. Street art is considered by some to be a natural expression that exercises a collective right to the city, and by others, it is seen as a destructive attack upon an otherwise clean and orderly society. Purposefully-designed street art such as “Calle Libre” along Vienna‟s Danube Canal can promote interaction between people, art, and public space.
The concept of the city has come to play a central role in the practices of a new generation of artists for whom the city is their canvas. Artists who choose the streets as their gallery are often doing so from a preference to communicate directly with the public at large, free from perceived confines of the formal art world. Street artists sometimes present socially relevant content infused with aesthetic value, to attract attention to a cause or as a form of "art provocation".
Street art is visual art created in public locations, usually unsanctioned artwork executed outside of the context of traditional art venues. The term gained popularity during the graffiti art boom of the early 1980s and continues to be applied to subsequent incarnations. Stencil graffiti, wheat-pasted poster art or sticker art, and street installation or sculpture are common forms of modern street art. Video projection, yarn bombing and Lock On sculpture became popularized at the turn of the 21st century. The terms "urban art", "guerrilla art", "post-graffiti" and "neo-graffiti" are also sometimes used when referring to artwork created in these contexts. Traditional spray-painted graffiti artwork itself is often included in this category, excluding territorial graffiti or pure vandalism. Street artists often travel between countries to spread their designs. Some artists have gained cult-followings, media and art world attention, and have gone on to work commercially in the styles which made their work known on the streets.
http://www.walk-space.at/index.php/32-uncategorised/187-calle-libre
https://vimeo.com/106822891 (password: warda)
http://www.enjoygram.com/marinazumi
The mural is painted on the entrance to Das WERK, an alternative arts and culture centre located on the Donaukanal in Vienna. The centre encompasses an exhibition space, concerts and parties venue, and a number of workshops/ateliers for artists. In the past several years Das WERK has provided work space for “creatives” from different fields such as literature, theatre, visual art, music and many more. Apart from hosting different artists and events, das WERK organizes the art festival Kunst am Kanal. It is also the initiator of the award-winning international exchange project World Wide WERK. „Our mission is to continue supporting emerging and avant-garde artists from all over the world by providing them with a platform to create and exchange ideas. We‟re committed to spreading our love for art and making culture accessible! We want to share our passion for art with as many people as possible, so to make our cultural events accessible for all, they are donation-based and affordable for disadvantaged groups. In addition to this, we organise/host different charity events related to social and humanitarian issues‟.