Monday, March 14, 2011

Explosive Vhils

What do you get when you mix street art, Mt.Rushmore style material removal, and indie soul music?
This!

The Portugese street artist Vhils, is no stranger to Operable Window posts.  Recently this inspiring artist has teamed up with band Orelha Negra to make an interesting video.

Vhils ussually works by drilling an hammering away at walls to produce emotive portraits of common people.  For the  Orelha Negra video for M.I.R.I.A.M. he did much the same, except he refilled the works with plaster (with the addition of small explosive charges).  With the help of a slow motion camera, the result is a beautiful video of seemingly instant art.


Orelha Negra - M.I.R.I.A.M. X Vhils from elToro Visual Dealers on Vimeo.

The process of art is always an interesting subject.  The beauty of this video is that the art in it is not simply the resultant images as much as it is the "how did they do that?" effect.  Considering the work was not actually produced using explosives, the use of video to animate the revealing of the works is an interesting tactic.  Without the slow motion video the work would simply be short (possibly dangerous to witness) performative pieces.  In an interveiw to Wired UK, Vhils speaks of his interest in materiality and unwrapping the layers of the built word.  He explains that the use of explosives exaggerates this exploration.

Check out this interview about process with Vhils, Wired UK

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