Holbrook's Trunk

Exit Through the Gift Shop is a film that has been out for a while now about street art, and Cine may show it here in Athens once the art students are back in town. Banksy, probably the most famous street artist in the world, plays a major role in the movie. His website is here. Banksy is famous enough and there’s enough about him on the web that I don’t feel the need to discuss him. Another street artist who is important to the film and a little more obscure than Banksy is Invader.

Unlike Banksy, who works with stencils and spray paint, Invader makes mosaics, which he then cements to walls. These mosaics are usually of the blocky aliens from the 80s arcade hit Space Invaders, hence the name, and can be found on walls all over the world (at least 35 cities have them). The artist lives in France, so most of the cities are in Europe, but his art can even be found in places as far away as Los Angeles, New York, Tokyo, Melbourne, or Kathmandu. On his website (www.space-invaders.com) he tracks the progress of the invasion on a map with links to pictures of his small mosaics stuck to walls across the globe. The best part about this is that if you’re visiting a major city and have time to kill, you can get a map from Invader’s website showing the locations of his mosaics in that city.

More recently Invader has been creating pieces of what he calls Rubikcubism, in which he makes complex mosaics using only Rubik’s Cubes that he manipulates to show certain colors. These can be viewed here: www.space-invaders.com/rubikcubism_.html . Invader is important to the film because he is the cousin of Thierry Guetta (the main character), who becomes a street artist. Read more about the film here: www.banksyfilm.com

This post was prompted in part by recent events in Athens. Lou Kregel, before leaving Athens, painted chrysanthemums on walls around town. One can be found on the rooftop of the Jittery Joe’s Roaster and another on the wall of Athens Blueprint downtown. There was an article in Flagpole about this that can be read here: http://flagpole.com/Weekly/AthensRising/AthensRising-2Jun10 .
By Dylan Whitlow