ANBI
1025
Artwork
Street Art piece
Smile
Author:
Stinkfish
Artist Bio:
Stolyarova states that Stinkfish is a godfather of SAMA. Stinkfish first visited Amsterdam in 2011 before SAMA had started painting in Nieuw-West. She and Stinkfish explored the city, pasting-up posters that Stinkfish had brought to Amsterdam. During their walks through Nieuw-West, Stinkfish taught Stolyarova how to see the different kinds of walls that would suit different kinds of interventions. Stinkfish helped open Stolyarova’s eyes to new opportunities within the community, and has been a vital step in forming the foundation from where the future SAMA would seek out large and official productions. Stinkfish has always created his work for the public, for those who cannot afford museum admissions and who may feel excluded and othered in traditional galleries. He is dedicated to creating accessible art and easily digestible publications, intending his practice to reach everyone, regardless of their educational background. His contributions to SAMA’s collection reflect this. For every painting he has completed in Nieuw-West, Stinkfish has requested that Stolyarova sources a wall in a lived-in community where his work will be enjoyed by real people and not appropriated for corporate interest, something he recognises as increasingly prevalent in graffiti art today. Along with Lorenzo Masnah, “the Third World Pirate,” Stinkfish created the horizontally-organized and anti- hierarchical Animal Power Collective (APC) in 2006. With more than 60 members around the world, APC has grown beyond a graffiti crew to being a multidisciplinary creative collective united by a common moral code.
Place:
De Vlugt School
Date:
2013
Technique:
spray can
Material:
concrete
Acquisition:
Commission
Completed:
2013
Condition:
Good / Legible
Physical Description:
The work reflects Stinkfish's unique style that has made him one of Latin America's most acclaimed artists. Using the stencil technique, the artist creates the facial features of the subject with great realism, recalling the urban stencil tradition made famous by Banksy. The rest of the work is improvised by Stinkfish: the dominant colour is obviously yellow. This particular shade is used by Stinkfish to colour the skins of his characters, without distinction of ethnicity or geographical origin. Also important is the author's virtuoso detailing in the colour combinations and the baroque decorations that hover around the face of the portrayed young girl.
Iconography:
Smile was a name Anna and Dianne have ‘given to the mural’ in order to explain the idea to the school, on a wall of which it has been produced. The challenge here was that Stinkfish hardly ever makes a sketch in advance. So the creative local duo used one of his existing works as an example of how the piece would look like. Stinkfish surprised everyone by choosing a face of a child that not only does not smile, but also has the eyes closed. When Jim Daichendt brought his entire class to the visit SAMA collection, Anna asked the academically savvy art group why do they think the artwork is called Smile. The answer was stunning “Because it smiles with its entire being”. Stinkfish has also given a free workshop to the kids from the school who watched him creating 150 square meter masterpiece in only 2 days, one of which was raining.
Gallery
