Studio Practice: 505 SB1 - Micro-genres: Lithuanian Graffiti Research

Vilnius Street Art Festival 2015

The third Vilnius Street Art festival finds itself at the Train Station district in Vilnius. A controversial and socially agitated place which inspired the organisers to talk more openly with the public about current topics such as: The place for street art and graffiti, gentrification of the district and public art in general. Five well known and promising artists were invited to create contextual murals in the district these included Polish artist duo Sepe & Chazme, Italian artist Millo, Mobstr, Lithuanian street artist Antanas Dubra and Brazilian artists Osgemeos

Polish artist duet Sepe and Chazme made a large yet detailed mural for Vilnius Street Art Festival in collaboration with the Polish Institute in Vilnius. The mural is called “Corest Fity” – an allusion to the lost relation between the people and the nature.

"We destroy nature at a pace so that soon we will be forced to imitate it in the cities and play the animals ourselves" - Sepe and Chazme

In Vilnius Italian street artist Millo has created his very first site-specific mural incorporating existing windows and other architectural details into the painting. As Millo claims, he is becoming a little bored with paper white plain walls, so he was excited for a possibility to play with architectural details in his mural given his educational background in architecture. The wall that Millo chose for his project in Vilnius is well known for its strategic location – the building is just opposite Hale market, one of the most charismatic and oldest markets in Vilnius, Train station district.

During Vilnius Street Art Festival MOBSTR has made his biggest mark ever – a large scale statement on a Soviet modernist building in Vilnius.

This is a subtle remark towards the growing and quickly changing movement of the global street art. Anonymous artist Mobstr is famous for ironic, tongue in cheek and site-specific phrases that most often than not appear in the cities illegally.

This year the third Vilnius Street Art Festival entered the train station district in Vilnius, Lithuania – an area usually perceived as a controversial part of the town. But looking from the point of transitional spaces, the area provided a lot of ideas for contextual art, with one of them suggesting that the city’s airport should be considered as a modern-time station. Therefore, the organisers of the festival entrusted this strategically important space for one of the most active Lithuanian street artists – Antanas Dubra who in the territory of Vilnius Airport transformed an old water tower into a tale of the night and the aviator’s dream to reach the moon one day. Technically difficult the work is named “The grumpy side of the moon” can be seen both during the day and the night because of the installed night-light.

Brazilian twin artists Osgemeos came back to Lithuania with a very personal mission – to pay respect for their grandfather who is of Lithuanian descent. In their mural for Vilnius Street Art Festival brothers incorporated a picture of their grandfather sitting in a palm of a colourful giant – a very recognisable style with a unique Lithuanian twist

Trump and Putin Mural

Despite the icy relationship between the U.S. and Russia, presumptive GOP nominee Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin have publicly praised one another throughout the real estate mogul's presidential campaign — and now, in a new piece of graffiti in Lithuania, they appear to be closer than ever.

Artist Mindaugas Bonanu depicted the two locking lips in the artwork featured on the side of a barbecue restaurant in Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania. Next to the painting is the phrase "Make everything great again," a play on Trump's campaign slogan, "Make America Great Again." Restaurant owner Dominykas Čečkauskas said the provocative painting is "predicting that if Russia and the USA would ever make out, it would happen in the Baltic states ... with tongues or with tanks.”

The drawing, which portrayed a kiss between Trump and Putin, on the American fast food restaurant Keulė Rūkė was vandalized with white paint a few weeks ago. In the updated version, the two politicians are no longer kissing but sharing a joint.

"More beautiful, more relevant and carrying a stronger message," the restaurant said on Facebook.

Street Art in Kaunas

The mural on the façade of the abandoned Lituanica factory depicts an old man who smokes a cosmic pipe decorated with constellations. Both an old man and a pipe are the symbols of wisdom. Located in one of the most active places of the city, this work attracts attention by its size and red colour; however, instead causing shock, it invites people to slow down, take a look around, listen and enjoy the moment. It is like a wish for a growing city to gain more wisdom. The pattern of the robe features pencils and paintbrushes, because this work has been initiated by and completed on a building that at a time served as a residency for Fluxus Ministerija art incubator. The old man’s bare feet serve as a tribute to the former function of the building which was used as a Lituanica shoe factory at some point in the past.

As in most of the works by Ernestas, children are the main characters of the mural completed on the west façade of Kaunas Cultural Centre of Various. The work pictures three boys climbing and leaning over three white stripes that form an obstacle for them. As an author, Ernestas have not elaborated on the idea behind the mural. According to him, each person has its own interpretation regarding the subjects and names of his works and he likes to keep it that way.

Every city needs a great hall of fame. That´s why the Hall of Fame by the river was initiated in 2015 by Kaunas Street Art Festival NYKOKA. They took care of the legalisation of Nemunas Embankment next to M. K. Čiurlionis Bridge and it has become a favourite spot for graffiti and street artists. This place attracts both beginners and advanced artists; therefore, this is where you can see the most recent works by street artists in Kaunas city. It is currently the only open public space for art, where artists can create from 8.00 AM to 10.00 PM without any additional permits or written consents.

If you think of legal walls and hall of fames in Germany then you know that there is always a strong change of the art pieces. In Kaunas it is not – at least not on every spot at the wall. And this fact makes it very interesting: In Kaunas is a silent agreement of the coexisting of the curated artwork by AFK and the free style areas.

The mural portrays a white bear which stands on an ice floe, holding a piece of ice / diamond on a stick and looks at it with sadness. The authors selected such composition to raise the awareness about the global warming, since melting glaciers endanger white bears. Without a stable ground under their feet, these animals cannot hunt and are forced to starve for months until the water freezes again. Therefore, it seems that a simple piece of ice in the paws of a bear gains the value of diamonds.

The mural has been completed during Kaunas Art Biennial TEXTILE’07, when Margarida Kanciukaitis, the mother of street artists, was invited to exhibit her crafts, while the her sons received an invitation to paint a mural on the gallery’s façade. Experiences and impressions that inspired the artists during their trip through Lithuania have been immortalised in this mural. This project did not have any predetermined vision or idea and was carried out spontaneously; it is a fantasy and visualisation of dreams that combine the elements of Brazilian culture and images from Lithuania. The colour yellow dominating in this work creates a wonderful contrast to the grey building and Lithuanian winter sky.

Ernest "ZACH" Zachervic

Lithuanian street artist, Ernest “ZACH” Zacharevic takes his fine art skills outside to the streets, where everything is bigger, from his audience to the scale of his pieces. Not bound by a canvas or one medium, his conceptual work is a means of exploring and experimenting with the ideas that busy his mind.

Zacharevic’s portfolio is a reflection of his dexterity as an artist and includes the disciplines of oil painting, stencil and spray, installation and sculpture.

Based in Penang, Malaysia, Zacharevic has a knack for breathing life and story into urban infrastructure as his lifelike murals bring life to walls, pipes, buildings and monuments in cities across the globe.

His hallmark style integrates fictional characters into the built environment so that it appears as if they are escaping or emerging from a solid surface in some sort of interactive illusion.

Zacharevic started turning heads in 2012 with his street art series at the George Town Cultural Festival that left BBC with no other choice but to cast him as “Malaysia’s answer to Banksy.” Since then, he has gone viral with a controversial Lego piece, held many solo shows, and created some of his most iconic work.

Street Art in Vilnius

Even if Vilnius Old Town – the most spectacular part of the city – is full of spiritual buildings and beautiful houses it is also where a lot of Vilnius street art can be found! Small stickers, stencils, quotes or random graffiti are strewn around the place. While the main street – Pilies – looks fancy with touristic restaurants and souvenir shops a one turn left or right might take us into the rusty alley full of the creative expressions in various forms. Just few steps away from the Cathedral, on Odminiu street, a wonderful mural by local artists Jurgis Tarabilda embellishes the random wall, giving the random lane a different look. While the Old Town is very poor in murals this one is a sign the street art scene in Vilnius is growing and better times are approaching fast.

On the other side of Neris river, along Olimpieciu street, couple of spots full of street art are to be found too. One of them – so called Graffiti Pier – is were it is legal to create freely. The demand is so big that the works displayed are changing very often, making it one of the greatest street art galleries in Vilnius. Other spots worth checking for some decent pieces are around Frank Zappa monument, all over Uzupis or on Pylimo street where the abandoned cinema “Lietuva” got a new life with the mural by Ernest Zacharewicz (sadly destroyed by some illegal tags).