Mission Mission

Probable Edweard Muybridge tribute, powered by wind.

Street artist Tyme sent us this cool timelapse of him putting a piece up on a streetside door.

At Encantada on Valencia near 20th.

[file photo by me]

Over the weekend I was taking an early morning stroll along Valencia Street when I happened upon an older white man who was knelt down in front of a trash can with a metal scraper going to work on a flyer that had been pasted onto the side. In the process of scraping the flyer off it had torn into pieces and once he was done he stood up, left the pieces on the ground and started walking back to his shiny PT Cruiser. In the past I’ve seen a few different people around the neighborhood doing this sort of this, like this guy, who Nick wrote about previously. I usually dismissed them because I felt sorry for them, as if they were so constantly bothered by flyers on trash cans and utility poles that they had to spend their time doing this. At the same time I have been annoyed that of all the things that take place around them this seemingly harmless thing would be the target of their energy. When I saw this guy go to his fancy car I couldn’t contain myself.

Me: Hey, you just gonna leave that trash on the ground?

Scraper: What?!

Me: You’re not going to pick that up?

Scraper: You see where it came from!

Me: Yeah, a trash can, and then you put it on the ground and can’t even put it in the trash?!

Scraper: (grumbles to self as he goes over to the pile of paper scraps and tosses them in the trash. Then points to garbage on the ground near his car) Why don’t you pick up that?!

Me: I’m not gonna pick up your trash.

Scraper: I didn’t put that there!

Me: Neither did I.

Scraper: (grumbles to self as he gets in his car and zips away to the next block to get out and scrape some more)

So, obviously pasting flyers and artsy things about is against the law, but so is littering. I just don’t get these people.

UPDATE: 1) I don’t know much about cars, and 2) Aaron and AttF remind me of the boringly-named film about vigilantes “Vigilante Vigilante”.

A depiction of how you’ll end up.

A friend from South America, just hanging out, thinking about how great Ronaldinho is.

Finally, a classic cool kid, delightfully/annoyingly mismatched.

I’m not sure where we are in this, but the conversation intrigues me. Partly because it illustrates two different ways to create image using text.

Found on the other side of Market Street, on the wall of the former Go Getter’s Market.

It’s old news that Mission businesses would rather pay a muralist to put up an original piece, or in this case branded content, than have to keep buffing tags every morning. It also happens to seem like a good idea to me. As a customer of both Calumet (CF cards and grip rentals) and Sirron Norris (t-shirts) I’m pretty into this design.

(click the image to see it full size)

Norris explains on his blog:

I’m happy to announce a new project I will be starting July 16th 2012. This mural will be located at 2001 Bryant and 18th street in the Mission district.

This mural will be funded by Calumet and will be a collaboration with Precita Eyes and the 3.9 art collective.

My hope with this project, is to reach out to other artists and arts organizations in my community through collaboration. I also want to inspire my interns and give them one of the biggest challenges in their artistic life. On a personal note: this will be one for the books and will push my talent and experience to it’s fullest. I know the team I have at the gallery and the invaluable experience Precita eyes has, will help accomplish this massive undertaking. Keep posted for updates as we move closer to starting.

This is a pretty dense piece, but that’s pretty much what he does best. Norris’s characters are well done, but not really my style, but his building textures are my favorite.

For those of you who feel like the neighborhood gets oversaturated by the same artists (Norris, Reyes, Schoultz, etc.), yeah, that does tend to happen, but in time other things take their place. And I like that Norris is really committed to involving other inspiring street artists, who he probably hopes will one day put their own stamp on their hood.

Update: Our buddy Doc reminded us that today is National Camera Day! I must be operating on some kind of useless ESP! Awesome! Go take a picture of something! But seriously, cameras are rad.

It’s incredible to me in how many ways this guy has become part of our consciousness.