Stencil street art seems like it’s everywhere these days. It wasn’t always so. There was a time when mere graffiti art was put up either using cans of aerosol spray paint or for early graphical street art as poster sheets stuck on to walls using buckets of wheat paste and a brush.
The first use of stencils to create artwork allowed creators to much more quickly put up spray-painted works with more detail and graphical realism. Banksy was not the first to use stencils but much of his body of artwork uses elaborate stencils and the stenciled image is associated with his style. Using stencils made it so that he (he, she, they, whoever Banksy really is) could put art on walls in mere minutes if not seconds, thereby minimizing risk of detection by authorities.
The stencil may seem played-out now. Though the means of creation is not the artwork itself, stenciled street art has a distinct aesthetic quality. But unless the street artwork is super compelling, we’re a little jaded when it comes to seeing a stenciled work. The look is old, but the possibilities of its aesthetic potency remain undiminished.
Stencil street art is not dead, apparently.
The wheat-pasted stenciled artwork pictured here is rendered in red paint and shows a hand clasping a flower, possibly a rose. It’s in Venice, in Los Angeles, and it’s simple and poignant. What does it mean? You tell us.
GLOBAL GRAPHICA 