Been meaning to photograph all the graffiti and street art that can be seen around the Bushwick area of Brooklyn. Then the annual BOS, short for Bushwick Open Studios rolled around. For those who don’t know what BOS is, it’s when artist around and from the Bushwick area open their studios to the general public. Sponsored by Arts In Bushwick, the audience can see various paintings, sculptures, jewelry, photography, etc., by various artists. The public can explore different parts of Bushwick, particularly on the L subway line. Stops such as Morgan Avenue, Dekalb Avenue, Jefferson Street, and continuing up to where the borderline crosses into Ridgewood, Queens.
Last year I participated in BOS 2012. This year, I was content just checking out places around the Jefferson stop on the L line. After stopping in a few scattered studios, and coming across some real pretentious artist who advised me to “create the problem, then solve the problem…”, I snapped these photos.
The early summer sun was already in full blast. This started to remind me of some of the street art I had seen during my visit to San Francisco during April 2000.
The street art below reminded me of contemporary artist Kenny Scharf. Maybe this was his work.
Suddendly me and two others stumbled upon this car wreck. Actually we discovered this wreck a month earlier. Happily this wreck was not removed, making it a perfect photo opp.
A few pop culture references came to mind. The song by Gary Numan Cars, Warm Leatherette by The Normal (later covered by Grace Jones, Giddle and Boyd, and countless others), the novel Crash by J. G. Ballard, and the pretend car accident scene in John Waters’ flick Female Trouble. So a little bit fun was had as we joined the car crash set.
Onwards we continued out quest for more street art, graffiti and more BOS festivities.
Lots of arty revelers were out in the streets of Bushwick. Spoted a topless woman walking around with a drawn on mustache. Out of respect I didn’t take a photo of her. This other lady caught in the middle of street texting was caught in the digital crossfire instead. The heat was beating upon us cynical folks. Therefore it was onto to Cobra Bar to cool off.
At the Cobra there was tri-hawked artist Antoinette Johnson showing her paintings and photos of her hair sculptures. The battery was dying in my digital camera at this point, so this was the best I could come up with.
Cause the weather was getting too hot, we stayed at the Cobra for a few rounds. Bringing us to the end of this blog post. Hopefully next year I’ll tale part in the next BOS fest.
FYI…if anyone knows any of the artists, whose work is shown in the street art photographs, please send me an email to Witchipoo@witchesbrewpress.net. I’ll update this post with the proper info asap.
Photographs may not be used without permission. Again, please email me if you wish to use any of the above photography. Thank you.
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