Beirut graffiti, courtesy of Art Lounge.
When a police officer caught Sari “Physh” Saadeh in a derelict area late at night and ordered him to open his bulging duffle bag, Physh wanted to run.
“He saw the spray paint and started laughing,” Physh says. “Then we convinced them to back up and turn their projective lights on the wall for us so we could work.”
“Bombing” the city – the artists’ term for covering an area with graffiti – has taken on a vivid new meaning in Beirut over the past few years.
Street artists armed with stencils and spray cans have reclaimed the city from the creep of bland concrete, decorating it with music collective Acousmatik’s trademark owls, with comic-book fists or a bounding Arabic script that seems to vibrate.
Art Lounge has brought these voices of the urban sprawl indoors for its latest exhibition, “Street Art: Pop Art”, which launches the gallery’s photographic book, Beirut Street Art.
Lebanon’s street artists will create a piece live outside the gallery on Saturday, February 13 to mark the launch.
“Art in the street is a counter-culture, a rebellion,” says Art Lounge owner Nino Azzi. “Street artists express the psychological DNA of a society.”
Physh, AKA Fish, started out as an arty 13 year-old with a yen for harmless vandalism. For his Red Eye Kamikazes crew, pioneers of the scene, the aim is mainly aesthetic.
For this art form of van sides, shop shutters and concrete, Beirut’s bullet-pocked walls provide a suitably roughed-up canvas.
“It’s less of a rebellion for us here because no one stops us,” Physh laughs. “In a way at first I was trying to cover up the war, visually. Now the art is spreading and we’re trying to cover the concrete walls.”
If Beirut spoke
This benign vandalism is widely tolerated. Industrial areas such as Karantina, the port and Beirut riverside are the crews’ focus, as well as Hamra, the capital’s bohemian core. They leave secured zones such as downtown to their manicured perfection.
Political and sectarian graffiti was common here during the civil war and is the subject of another recent book-release: Tala Saleh’s Marking Beirut: A City Revealed Through Its Graffiti. Street art developed in Lebanon in the 1990s and exploded in the past few years.
Red Eye Kamikazes, who take their name from the effect of using spray paint without protective gear, trace the boom to after the 2006 war, when they drew slogans such as “Beirut in hakat” – “If Beirut spoke” and “Beirut ma betmout” – “Beirut never dies”.
The message and the form caught on. Other crews, such as Parekour + Graffiti and twin hip-hop artists Ashekman, are also showing at Art Lounge.
“The fact that Beirut has so much more street art now is like a gauge of how intense, how high the creative energy is in this city,” Azzi says.
Beirut’s new generation of street artists differ from their sloganeering forebears in that much of their art is more social than political.
Stenciled portraits in Hamra with the word “émigré” underneath highlight the number of Lebanese who seek better fortunes abroad. Two men kiss with the words: “So what?” A bland face is emblazoned with the word “botox”.
In from the streets
Art Lounge’s latest offering also showcases international street art and is a chance to see works by Shepard Fairey, AKA Obey, one of the most influential and now mainstream street art pioneers, who turns propaganda art on its head to criticize the establishment.
France’s Alben layers stencil upon stencil, Dominican Republic artist Sabe KST tapes spray cans to van-sides then punctures them, creating abstract works, while France’s Mr Brainwash scrawls Andy Warhol’s portrait with “Pop Art is Dead”. Lebanese artists also submitted works.
Graffiti movements began in 1967, when young black people in the United States evaded police to tag their aliases or slogans such as “I have a name so I exist” on subway trains, author Mayalynn Attieh writes in Beirut Street Art.
Then came more elaborate street art and art-world recognition from the early ‘80s. Now mainstream galleries celebrate artists such as the UK’s Banksy and France’s Blek Le Rat.
Therein lies the paradox of exhibitions such as this one, featuring original works on canvas from the artists.
This most democratic of art forms loses its edge in the private domain of a gallery, where displaying it becomes more educational.
“It’s an appropriation of the art and it de-mystifies the phenomenon,” Azzi concedes. “But you can appreciate it differently in a gallery, it’s close to pop art, striking in scale and color.”
Physh, who is also a graphic designer, says he contributed work in a different style to those on concrete.
“I tried to keep closer to the painting side, though it is a graffiti scene, he says. “Street art belongs only to the street.”
Street Art: Pop Art runs until the end of March. The book launch of Beirut Street Art is on Saturday 13, for details call 03 99 76 76 or check www.artlounge.net
