NEW FROM ROA

New from Roa, though it looks like it's been there a while hey.

Roa will be having a solo show at INOPERAbLE and the Street Art Passage in Vienna on August 26th, in preparation he'll be continuing to do what he does best.

ROA IN BERLIN

New Roa wall in Berlin to coincide with his latest solo show at Skalitzers, more on the show here, via ekosystem

Wall made possible by Skalitzers & KJOSK.
http://roaweb.tumblr.com/

ROA IN MEXICO

ROA EN MÉXICO from Filmaciones de la Ciudad on Vimeo.

RESTO & ROA

Collaboration piece between Resto & Roa that we hadn't seen before. From 2010 I think.

photo via thais

ROA IN CHICAGO

Pawn Works have been busy bringing international street artists to Chicago to, as they say, join in the "world conversation", nice way of putting things.

More on Pawn Works

Images by Brock Brake.

ROA IN SAN FRAN

More from the guys and gals over at Arrested Motion, this from last years Nuart star ROA. Love the rabbit piece. Feels like me and the office yesterday.

ROA AT WHITE WALLS

ROA from Spencer Keeton Cunningham on Vimeo.

White Wall’s own Spencer Keeton Cunningham of Skate Legs Magazine compiled this video (and photos) capturing some moments of ROA’s time in San Francisco.

New Works by ROA

White Walls
April 9- May 7, 2011

Check out the work here

ROA AT WHITE WALLS

Roa for Nuart 2010

White Walls is pleased to present New Works by ROA, a collection of highly detailed hand-painted works by acclaimed Belgian street artist ROA. This will be ROA’s very first project with White Walls, and his first solo gallery exhibition in the Bay Area.

The opening reception will be Saturday, April 9, from 7-11 pm until May 7.

The work for the show is shrouded in secrecy, as the notoriously elusive street artist has decided to wait until opening night to reveal the work he’s been busily constructing. Shortly after landing in San Francisco, ROA began working around the clock to complete 10-20 new pieces for the exhibition; utilizing custom-constructed panels he crafted using found metal from his hometown in Ghent, Belgium. Viewers can expect ROA’s signature stunning, yet totally disquieting depictions of animals, with some interesting surprises thrown in for these smaller works. He has been given the entirety of White Walls to create a massive installation for the exhibition, and the project will be something not to be missed. Check out words from the artist himself after the jump



“For me painting murals means free expression, and creatively, it liberates me from a lot of restrictions. As an urban painter you get the privilege to interact with the environment and to intervene within the local situation. For me, painting became a lifestyle, traveling trough towns and villages, looking for walls and being a part of a larger international movement of creative people from North and South America, Europe, Russia – who are simply are connected through the pleasure of painting. These people inspire me every day. The texture of the wall, the challenge of painting, the environment – everything inspires my ideas of that particular moment, and the whole process of public painting involves working with an unpredictable situation. This ephemeral act change a place for maybe a few days or sometimes even for many years. This is the beautiful part of painting outside, the fact that nothing is defined. The motivation to paint animals instead of so many other things is because I am completely fascinated by them. For me, represent so much more symbolically than humans do. I prefer to paint the ordinary animals from a certain town or country; the rodents, the domestic animals, the birds, all kinds of animals that are forced to adapt to their situation because humans altered their natural habitat, for the sake of infrastructure. I have such a deep admiration for these displaced species, and I find their situation so tragic, and moving.“

Growing up in the small town of Ghent, Belgium, street artist ROA got his start by painting intriguing murals of animals in hidden places – underneath bridges and on walls that strayed from the beaten path. His large-scale works are some of the most compelling pieces of evidence in the argument of street art vs. “vandalism,” as the pieces are visually evident of the artist’s deep passion for painting. He has major public works in many European cities, including Berlin, London, and Barcelona – in the U.S. his work can be found in New York, Los Angeles, and now the Bay Area. A darling of the underground street art scene, photos of his work regularly appear on Vandalog, Wooster Collective, Unurth, and a fury of London newspapers and blogs running to his defense when a street piece he did in Hackney faced removal late last year.

NEW FROM ROA

Difficult to keep up with ROA this year, seems not a week goes by without a piece of significance appearing on the streets. From Mexico to London and now this wonderful piece in Newcastle. Perhaps the finest yet.

Roa was hosted by Unit 44 Hoults Yard, more artists will be presented throughout the year for their White Walls project

ROA, SEGO & SANER IN MEXICO

Very busy month/year for Roa, you can catch him at London's Black Rat Projects on Thursday 10th with a unique Pop Up installation.

From BRP's press release

We are excited to announce the first artist in residency project which lends support to an artist for a flexible period of time with the view to breeding experimentation and facilitating a freedom of expression un-connected to commercial gain. The Project Space is currently inhabited by Belgian painter ROA whose large-scaled and often lenticular works can be spotted around east London and internationally. For this exhibition his work takes a sculptural turn with doors, windows and un-expected openings breaking through the contained frame of the Project Space built in the centre of the gallery.

But for now, check out these amazing shots from Mexico.

Roa: "Mexico is just wonderful, wonderful nature and people".

I have some credits and people to mention; the whole trip was on invitation of Gonzalo Alvarez from MAMUTT ARTE in collaboration with MUJAM (Roberto), so two organizations from my friends Gonzalo and Roberto. And I painted with Sego and Saner."

More great photo's on ekosystem.org

ROA & SEGO

New collaboration piece, and one that really makes sense, from Roa and Sego.
Check out more on Unurth

Roa
Sego

ROA

need we say more...

ROA'S BIG BIRD

Roa's Big Bird on Hanbury Street, Brick Lane, London from Shafiur Rahman on Vimeo.

ROA

Nuart 2010 artist Roa in Shoreditch.This short film is a teaser for an upcoming documentary on Brick Lane and art. This piece was shot over 8 hours in April 2010.

More from Roa

ROA POP UP SHOW

ROA POP UP SHOW

Just received the following invite from Nuart 2010 artist and friend ROA. Hope he doesn't mind our publishing it here as obviously, as much as we'd like to, we can't make it. Hopefully some of readers can pop along instead.

Above you will find an invitation to come over this weekend to Los Angeles to my first West coast solo show presented by Thinkspace at The New Puppy Gallery.



It‘s already been quite an adventure; collecting all kind of trash on every corner of Echo Park, Silver Lake,...LA -except in Hollywood, there wasn't so much fancy trash to find!

The exhibit space is unique; an old Californian warehouse with an impressive architectural wooden roof structure, originally built up by the supermarket executive Leno LaBianca who dreadfully became –along with his wife Rosemary- victims of the notorious Manson Family Murders.

At the moment I am transforming the warehouse into one big studio, where I am still busy building up structures, painting pieces and murals, in preparation for the pop up the show on Saturday Night!

More on the project here

SAVE THE ROA RABBIT

Following on from our recent local campaign to save the Logan Hicks Nuart mural, we've just been informed of another of Nuart 2010s artists work being at threat of removal, this time in London.

It's an interesting development to see an artform that was pretty much born of the internet, using the same medium to mobilize an international fan base to try and save key works, often in communities far away from their own.

The Premises Studio in Hackney are currently the proud owners/hosts of one of Roa's key Rabbit works. The work was painted with their full knowledge on the side of their wall. (Their premises - not a council owned wall.)

They've just been served a 14-day removal order, failure to remove it will result in Hackney Council removing it themselves and billing the Premises for the time, and you know that ain't going to be cheap.

A save the Rabbit petition has been started on the link below. Hopefully fans of Roa's work for Nuart can spare the 20 seconds it takes to sign the petition.

http://www.petitiononline.com/PremROA/petition-sign.html

ROA NUART 2010

A couple of great shots of Roa's piece in progress for Nuart. 35 meters long and his most complex and detailed piece to date. Finished up today, will post fresh pics shortly.