Via Matteo Renato Imbriani, Bari, Italy
July 1st – July 9th 2013
Commissioned by Dopplegaenger Gallery for the city of Bari
Thanks to everybody at Dopplegaenger Gallery: Antonella and Michele, Vittorio, Eugenio. The crane operators: Carlo and Giovani. And LUCE for the help!
Katowice Street Art Festival
Organized by the Culture Institution of Katowice
Katowice, Poland
April 17th – April 24th 2013
11 m. X 20 m. façade in Szopienice neighborhood.
Many thanks to the whole Katowice Street Art Festival crew and their amazing volunteers. Additional pictures by Bartek Barczyk.
4th Biennale d’Art Contemporain
Le Havre, France
September 28th 2012 – May 15th 2013
Directed by Linda Morren and curated by Kevin Grottaglia
I built the Signalétique Libre (free signage) installation exclusively for the Le Havre Contemporary Art Biennial. It will be exhibited on the Jules Ferry square until May 15th 2013.
My idea was to take advantage of the location, a wide open space and very transited – which means a significant pedestrian flow and enough wind – to do a mobile installation. The work was conceived around an idea I have already worked with several times: give the spectator, each time they see the artwork, the possibility to see new compositions. Signalétique Libre questions urban visual communication – very direct, concise and at times even alienating – concentrating in the same reduced space 20 signs with abstract designs, without any intelligible message, that remained in constant motion. The pedestrian is free to interpret what the signs want to communicate or indicate, an open space for the viewer to stop receiving messages and perhaps start to emit them.
Exterior pictures by Mikaël Lesueur
Thanks to Linda Morren, Kevin Grottaglia, Mikaël, Paul and all the crew at the Musée Maritime et Portuaire du Havre.
Parcours artistiques dans (et avec) l’espace public
Besançon, France
September 6th – October 6th 2012
Project in collaboration with MOMO
This summer MOMO and I were invited to do our fourth collaboration together for the Bien Urbain festival in Besançon, North-East of France. We worked on two exercises: the first one, called Improbables, was an exercise about doing compositions with pieces of wood in unused gaps in the city. The second one is called Peinture au Cordeau Traceur (Paint Snap-Line) and is an adaptation of the traditional chalk line tool. The technique we developed allowed us to trace long lines on a building of almost any height using paint instead of chalk.
Together with Bien Urbain, we edited a zine about these two projects:
www.justeici.bigcartel.com/product/momo-eltono-zine-poster.
We came up with this idea after noticing a lot of small, unused spaces on walls all around the city. After collecting scrap wood, we loaded up our cart with the wood and our tools. Then, as we walked around the city, we installed simple wooden compositions in every gap we found interesting. All the pieces were put into place using only tension – no nails nor glue were used. The end result were 52 installations found all around the “Battant” quarter in Besançon. On an individual level, the pieces were quite discreet and often looked like some cheap repair work; but when people started noticing the series, they immediately realized that something was happening… We were amazed by how intact the pieces remained and how slowly they disappeared. The hardest part of this project was to try to make the installations NOT look like pieces of art.
(Paint Snap-Line)
For this project, we used the traditional chalk line tracer tool as our inspiration and conducted experiments eventually developing a similar tool that enabled us to mark long straight lines on buildings with paint. After a few drawings, we came out with a design and using the material available to us in Bien Urbain’s basement, we built the artifact. We did three tests, threw paint everywhere and finally came up with a satisfactory result.
Pictures by Sierra, MOMO and Eltono.
Thanks to David, Lucile and to the whole Bien Urbain crew.
C-Space
Red No.1 – C1 & C2, Caochangdi, Beijing, China
June 30th – August 26th 2012
Curated by Nora Jaccaud – Directed by Melle Hendrikse
The 1/1 project aims to bring contemporary art to the street and the street into the gallery. Bringing art to unexpected places has been the goal of this French artist since he started painting abstract geometric figures in the street back in 1999. At the entrance of Caochangdi there is a sign that reads “Caochangdi Art Village”. However, when Eltono came for the first time, he was surprised to find an almost tangible frontier dividing the village and the galleries. After spending a few days in Caochangdi it became clear to him that the people who come to visit the galleries often miss the village, and very few villagers go and visit the art galleries. During his one month residency in Caochangdi, Eltono decided to use his paintings to create a link between these two worlds. To begin, he mapped out the village including all of the tiny streets and alleyways, noting down all the doors he found interesting or inspiring. Entering into conversation with the villagers he explained the goal of his project and asked permission to paint their doors – this served as the first link between the artist and the village. Over the next several weeks, he spent time connecting with residents and painting, creating a path throughout the neighborhood filled with mysterious abstract images.
A selection of life size photographs, the result of Eltono’s residency, were on exhibit in C-space gallery until the end of August, 2012. The rest of the doors can still be viewed by wandering the streets of Caochangdi and following the map produced by the artist (downloadable here).
The aim of this project is to create an exchange between two groups: the art community and the local residents. Those who regularly visit art galleries are invited to have a walk in the village and enjoy the paintings in their original locations, while the residents are invited to enter the art gallery and see photographs of their doors in a new and unfamiliar context. The “1/1” title refers to the life size printed photographs of the doors as well as the one to one relationship that exists between the exhibition space and the street – for Eltono these two spaces are equally valid when it comes to displaying art. The life size photographs create the illusion of real doors and build a virtual passageway connecting the street and the gallery. Using street art as his medium, the 1/1 project by Eltono hopes to provide a platform where art is accessible to everyone.
埃尔多诺-1/1计划-草场地
2012年6月30日至8月26日
艺术家将出席开幕式
开幕时间：2012年6月30日星期六下午4时至6时
埃尔多诺的1/1计划，旨在将当代艺术带上街头，而将街道带入画廊。自这位法国艺术家1999年开始在街头绘制抽象几何图案以来，他的目标始终是将艺术带到出人意料的现场。
草场地村的入口，有一块写着“草场地艺术村”的招牌。埃尔多诺第一次来这里的时候，他非常吃惊地发现了一个几乎看得见摸得着的界限，将村子与画廊分割开 来。在草场地度过几天之后，对他来说非常明显，来参观画廊的人往往忽略了村子，而且很少有村民来参观艺术画廊。在草场地居住的第一个月，埃尔多诺便决定用 自己的画来营造这两个世界之间的某种联系。
一开始，他在地图上标出了整个村子，包括小街道和胡同，记下了他觉得有趣或者有灵感的所有门洞。他开始与村民交谈，解释了自己这个计划的目的，请求得到准 许，在他们的门上画画——这成为艺术家与村民之间的首次联系。接下来的几个星期，他花时间建立居民与绘画之间的联系，在整个村落里营造了一条路径，充满了 神秘的抽象图案。
作为埃尔多诺居住项目的成果，精选出的与实物等大的照片将在C空间画廊展出，展至2012年8月底。在草场地村的街道上漫步时，按照艺术家制作的地图，可以看到其余的大门。
该计划的目的，是要营造出两个群体之间的交流：艺术群体与当地居民。定期参观画廊的人，应邀在村中漫步，在原来的地点欣赏画作，而居民则应邀进入画廊，在一个新的、不熟悉的语境之下观看他们的大门的照片。
“1/1”这个标题，指的是按照实物大小制作的大门照片，以及在展览空间和街道之间存在的一对一的关系——对于埃尔多诺而言，在展示艺术的时候，这两个空 间同样是有效的。实物大小的照片营造了真实的大门的幻象，构建起连接街道与画廊的虚拟通道。埃尔多诺利用街头艺术作为自己的媒介，1/1计划旨在提供任何 人都能接触艺术的平台。
Photos by Sierra and Eltono.
Thanks Melle, Nora, Wangfan, Lina, Cindy, Liugang, Angela & Aitor, Sierra, Alonso, Jacob, Elisa and of course: Xinkai, Haizi, Maomao, Caochandi Number 1 and all the residents of Caochangdi.
I have always been fascinated by auto-construction. From the gate at the end of a garden to a brick house found on the slope of a hill in Brazil. This type of architecture is immediate, organic, it expands in an almost natural way. This urban fabric’s apparent chaos is often more human than one found in a city where the construction follows standard urban planning. Aesthetically speaking, worn out textures and the discovery of a variety of materials (bricks, cement blocks, metal panels, wooden slabs…) have always attracted me as an artistic surface.
The Barrios project began in April of 2006 when, invited by some friends, Nuria Mora and I painted in a favela in Rio de Janeiro. After exchanging ideas with the residents, I was very pleased to see that they were so receptive to what I was painting. They really appreciated the colors and the composition. This positive reaction led me to reflect on Contemporary Art and specifically its access to the public. It was obvious that, unfortunetly, the residents of the favela didn’t often visit museums or art galleries. Even though the appreciation of a work of art is universal, access to art itself is not. Since then, it has become a special mission for me to bring contemporary art to places where there is none. When discussing this with my friend Nazza, a fellow artist, he said, “what is the point of painting in the street in the center of Buenos Aires where people have money and can buy art and pay to enter museums, I only paint on the outskirts of the city.” He is completely right… Why give art for free to the people who need it the least? Where people really need art is in the Barrios!
This is not about outside eyes prying, or looking into a foreign world. My idea is to create a dialogue with the residents and enrich their daily lives by providing them with a humble gift. Sharing with them what I know and receiving what they can teach me. With Barrios, the human experience is always more rewarding for me than the artistic experience.
Barrios is an open project in constant development, more interventions and publications will come in the future. Of course, any idea or proposal is welcome as I am always looking to find new opportunities to make art more democratic.
Below you will find photographic galleries of six projects that I have developed within the framework of Barrios up until now. The photos were taken by project organizers, friends, neighbors and a few are my own.
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 04/2006
In collaboration with Nuria Mora
More details: www.eltono.com/projects/gardenia-azul
Murcia, Spain, 08/2006
Two week artistic residence within the neighborhood
In collaboration with Emece and Puerto Lumbreras City Council
A book about the project has been edited by the city council:
www.eltono.com/boutique/puerta-lumbreras-book
More details: www.eltono.com/projects/puerta-lumbreras
Nuevo León, Mexico, 11/2007
Paintings made with the help of Nrmal, Maf and Screw
Jalisco, Mexico, 10/2008
Ten day artistic residence
In collaboration with Paco Rosas and Libelulart
More details: www.eltono.com/projects/puerto-vallarta
Monterrey, Mexico, 04/2009
Two-month artistic residence within the neighborhood
In collaboration with Nrmal and El Narval
More details: www.eltono.com/projects/residencia-tampiquito
Buenos Aires, Argentina, 12/2007 and 04/2010
Paintings made with the help of Nazza Stencil
We were returning to my friend Nazza’s home after painting, when we ran into the neighbor´s children playing football against a wall in front of the house. I paint lines, we had white paint and we were walking through a neighborhood in Argentina… It was pretty obvious that I would end up painting a goal on the wall! This is probably the most interactive piece I have ever painted.
Caochangdi, Beijing, China, 06/2012
1/1 Project with C-Space gallery
More details here: www.eltono.com/en/projects/1-1-caochangdi
Sanlitun North Street 81, Chaoyang District, Beijing, China
May 2012
Organized by Migas with the support of the Instituto Cervantes de Pekín and Nali Patio
The third Equipo Plastico’s exhibition was held in Beijing. As usual now, we stayed for a month residency, walking, visiting and observing the city. We created artworks inspired in our daily experiences. Unlike the previous two exhibitions, in Peru and Mexico, in China we faced a cultural and linguistic barrier much bigger; but that barrier did nothing but turn the project into a more intense and enriching experience.
The complete documentation about the project is published on the official Equipo Plástico website: www.equipoplastico.com/projects/caballo-caballo-tigre-tigre/caballo-caballo-tigre-tigre-en
Praga neighborhood, Warsaw, Poland
April 2012
Project curated by Vlepvnet Foundation
During April 2012, I worked on a social project with kids from the Praga neighborhood in Warsaw. Because of their social environment and other factors, they don’t have an easy life and spend most of their time hanging out in the street. The Vlepvnet Foundation and the GPAS association organized the project, This Way to give them an opportunity to collaborate with contemporary artists and create a mural in their neighborhood. Our mural was painted on Mała street.
Using their help and input, we created an “abstract alphabet” using simple geometric shapes. Then, combining stencils, we painted the words that they chose on the wall. The first two days, we organized a workshop to define the letters of our alphabet and to cut the stencils. During the next 5 days, we completed the mural using the words and sentences that the kids chose.
For those who want to translate the mural, here is the alphabet and a Polish to English translator. (Using the virtual keyboard and pressing the “Alt+Ctrl” key you will be able to use the Polish special characters.)
Click on the picture to see a bigger image of the mural.
The last day, we painted the entrance of V9, the Foundation Vlepvnet headquarter.
Thanks a lot to Vlepvnet and GPAS and in particular to Mati, Mateusz, Maciek, Gołota, Goro, Zrazik and Tomek.
