Not many muralists can say their work is seen by hundreds of thousands of people every day, but Chicago artist Asend can make that claim. His towering work on the side of Carnivale Restaurant in the West Loop is hard to miss at its site overlooking the Kennedy Expressway.
Painting of Minnie Minoso / White Sox /
Got a chance to be a part of a special project. I created a portrait of Minnie Minoso for his celebration held at the home plate of the old Comiskey Park. The “Cuban Comet” began his baseball career in the Negro leagues in 1946 and was the first black player for the White Sox. See more….
Chicago Tribune:
Site update... /
Update from two of my favorite walls from 2019, and the ones that took the longest to paint: Pilsen’s Selena Mural and downtown’s CTA train (painted in an elevator hallway). Check out the Select Projects link for more photos of these walls…
Asend Wins Guestroom Mural Contest at Hotel Chicago West Loop /
Chicago-based urban artist Asend has won a competition between street muralists at Hotel Chicago West Loop – the three-year-old independent that is reimagining the boutique hotel experience with its immersive “Annex” art program. As an award, Asend will receive a $20,000 stipend and a massive 4-story mural project on the hotel’s outside wall to be completed in spring 2020.
The dual-purpose gallery/hotel hosted an opening reception for its Annex | Murals exhibit in late November where the public and a juried panel voted on their favorite street murals (inside guestrooms) created by 10 leading Chicago urban artists.
“Having my work inside guestrooms allows the public to connect with my art on a personal level, away from distractions of large crowds,” said Asend, who has also previously painted two other street mural guestrooms at Hotel Chicago West Loop. “It can be appreciated during a quiet and comfortable alone time during a stay. Likewise, my goal with the exterior mural in 2020 is to continue to welcome guests by giving them a window into our city through art.”
Asend’s focus for his winning mural was to create an experience. Tourists usually see images of Chicago’s skyline from afar, but he wanted to give hotel guests the feeling of what it’s like to be inside Chicago’s vibrant downtown streets, especially at night. When a visitor walks into the room they are transplanted onto State Street staring at the legendary Chicago Theatre and the orange city lights that blanket the city. The rest of the walls are painted in a similar tone that bring out the rich colors of an inner-city nightscape. The composition is key: the point of view comes from the middle of the street, between the hustle and bustle of buses, taxi cabs, and nightlife goers. The bed placed in the middle of the oil painting gives a sense of immersion and inclusiveness.
“Asend’s newest contribution to the Annex is nothing less than mesmerizing,” said Hotel Chicago West Loop General Manager Jean-Luc Laramie. “His spin on the iconic State Street cityscape will give guests an out-of-body experience without ever leaving their hotel room! We are honored to next have Asend adorn our 40-foot outside wall with his ingenuity and further elevate the hotel’s position in Chicago’s art community.”
The groundbreaking Annex | Murals exhibit adds a unique element to the typical “art hotel” theme by pulling visitors beyond the public space and into the guestrooms for viewing floor-to-ceiling wall murals. When not in use, the featured street mural rooms (14 total and counting) are open and on public display – as is the rest of The Annex in effort to produce an alternative gallery experience for visitors. Besides the exterior, Hotel Chicago West Loop plans to eventually decorate the majority of its 116 guestrooms with original street mural artwork.
More About Asend:
Asend is as multi-disciplinary artist whose works capture awe-inspiring cityscapes and portraiture. Known for his bold yet subtle painting approach, Asend’s work portrays a studied balance between classical painting and urban art through the use of different mediums. Asend’s career began in Chicago as a graffiti artist during the 1990’s and brings an extensive mastery of color theory and composition to each body work by means of oil paint, spray paint, latex, and or airbrush. Inspiration from his background in urban art can be seen in his large-scale murals as well as smaller studio paintings. His wide range of subjects include realistic portraiture, paintings of trains and transportation, cityscapes, and letter studies. Asend’s work can be seen throughout Chicago and internationally as part of private collections and public art in Art Basel (Miami), Tahiti, Mongolia, and China. His works have been featured on NBC, ABC, FOX, The Chicago Tribune, and is commissioned by corporate giants such as Chevy, Pepsi, Pandora Music, Google, Chicago White Sox, and the Chicago Bears.
More About Hotel Chicago West Loop:
Hotel Chicago West Loop is a stylish boutique property that has been called one of the Top 10 budget-friendly hotels by USA Today. A stay here includes cultural immersion, as the dual-purpose “neighborhood hotel” doubles as a full-functioning art gallery. The Annex at Hotel Chicago West Loop encompasses the lobby, all four levels of guest hallway spaces, and select guestrooms with over 100 pieces of 2-D media, both permanent works and rotating exhibits. To further support the local arts community, Hotel Chicago West Loop donates 10% of all regular room rates (when booked using promo code “ANNEX”) to designated local non-profit organizations that promote artistry such as Shirley Ryan AbilityLab.
Source:
https://gozamos.com/2019/12/asend-hotelchicagowestloop/
Graffiti pioneer, Phase 2, passes away… /
Pioneering aerosol writer Lonny Wood, better known by his moniker, Phase 2, has died. He is remembered for his invaluable, media-spanning contributions to hip-hop and is acknowledged as the first artist to perfect the “softie” style of aerosol calligraphy, characterized by its marshmallow-like bubbled lettering.
Born in the Bronx, New York, Phase 2 began tagging subway trains in the early 1970s, becoming one of the most widely emulated stylists of that moment. As his work matured, he progressively abstracted and complicated his calligraphy, “deconstructing the letter”—in the words of hip-hop journalist Jeff Chang—“into hard lines, third eyes, horns, drills, spikes, arches, Egyptian pharos and dogs, pure geometrics.” Phase 2 was an early member of United Graffiti Artists (UGA), a collective of train painters credited with mounting the first gallery show of so-called graffiti art, a term Wood rejected for devaluing and criminalizing his work and that of his peers.
In addition to his calligraphic work, Phase 2 rapped, DJ’ed, and was a member of the New York City Breakers, a pioneering break-dancing crew. As a graphic artist, he lent his hard-edge geometric style—influenced by the Bronx’s many Art Deco theaters—to flyers promoting significant parties and shows like 1982’s Kool Lady Blue at the Roxy nightclub in Chelsea, which established a rapport between hip-hop and New York’s contemporaneous punk and New Wave scenes. In the mid-’80s, he served as the art director of the underground zine International Graffiti Times, often cited as the first publication devoted to street and subway art. In 1996, he and International Graffiti Times editor David Schmidlapp copublished the book Style: Writing from the Underground, a history of aerosol art. In recent decades, his work has been featured in numerous exhibitions of urban art.
“I’m absorbing and devouring language,” Phase 2 said of his work “and creating something else with it. . . . The English language isn’t much, especially in its current state. By comparison (to Chinese and Japanese) it’s like a dot. Why not go beyond that and just create an alphabet or language? You can’t put a limit on communication or how one can communicate, you’ve always got to look further, that's how style expanded in the first place.”
Source:
https://www.artforum.com/news/phase-2-1955-2019-81607
Asend x Complex x Brisk /
PROMO: Brisk x ‘Hobbs & Shaw’ Got In On the Action at ComplexCon Chicago
BYTRICIA CRIMMINS
AUG 02, 2019
ComplexCon Chicago saw more than a few of your favorite celebs and brands teaming up for some really dope booths on the floor. Brisk collaborated with the team behind Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw (in theaters Aug. 2) to bring attendees an immersive activation.
The eye-catching booth was based on the Hobbs Customs Garage featured in the film—complete with stacked tires and a roll-up gate. Once inside, attendees got the chance to sip on an assortment of Brisk flavors and chop it up with WWE star Roman Reigns. The wrestler-turned-actor, who co-stars in the film, interacted with fans and signed a few limited-edition cans of Brisk Whup Ass on site. As a backdrop to the action, the booth featured an exclusive graffiti mural by Chicago-based artist, Asend.
Attendees also had the opportunity to live out their big screen dreams by recreating the fight scene between Hobbs & Shaw vs. Brixton by participating in the "Take Em Down" immersive video experience. After completing a quick training, participants got to fight in epic slow motion on a recreated set from the film that mimicked the climactic final battle that was later sped up and cut in to a custom video that they could share with the world.