Graffiti Artists
The writing is on the wall - this is who will be painting on the walls at Sadler's Wells this year. Catch their murals in the foyers, on the walls and in the yard.
ASTEK (UK)
ASTEK started writing graffiti in the late 80s, heavily inspired by the New York trains seen in the book Subway Art and the documentary Style Wars. Around the same time, seeing local people putting up graffiti he had to get involved with the scene. Already being a lover of art and drawing, seeing the speed and precision of the spray can, he became hooked.
Having painted a few pieces in the 80s, by the mid 90s things changed and graffiti made a huge comeback, so he made his name painting at every hall of fame in London and in the UK, spreading his style and gaining a following, spurring him to be invited to major graffiti events across the UK and Europe, while breaking into the gallery scene and putting on major shows with the collective They Made Me Do It.
Author of the book “How to Draw Graffiti Style” ASTEK teaches graffiti in schools and youth clubs, leading workshops and painting full time while simultaneously running a tee-shirt label and working on projects with companies and music artists producing canvases, album artwork and music videos.
BRAVE_ARTS (UK)
BRAVE’s work as an ambassador for the street art scene has seen his ideas and visions become part of outdoor galleries across the UK and beyond.
Pioneering street art and graffiti art workshops in education his work as an art teacher and youth worker has seen him deliver projects everywhere from Tate Modern to schools, prisons, secure units and refugee centres.
Spray-paint is his medium and ‘graffitifuturism’ is his style.
CORE (Spain)
Core246 is a Spanish graffiti writer based in London.
His pieces combine letters and characters and are always different and full of colours and effects, trying to get a balance between good letter structure and a vibrant result.
NEAN (Belgium)
Self-taught, Nean is interested in the instant, the shot, the minute of calm, in a particular atmosphere.
He creates from photos, which he revisits with spray paint, paint and pencil.
Renowned for his treatment of light, his figurative work brings places back to life with his technique of colour and superimposition.
Taking over urban areas is a way for him to re-appropriate the city and enable everyone to establish a new link with public space and the present moment.
Nean's poetic work is an ode to melancholy and the human condition.
SFER (Italy)
Danilo “Sfer” (S.pray F.or E.v’ R) is a London-based graffiti artist from Naples, Italy.
He started in 1998, when he first discovered hip hop culture, falling in love with it.
Since then, he’s started his journey of shaping his own distinctive style, which still keeps evolving.
His style is inspired by the graffiti pioneers from the 80s, but with a modern look and feel: Sharp, dynamic letters that create symmetric shapes, coloured with impactful contrasting colours is his own trademark style.
The choice of his colour mixing, and his advanced, almost robot-looking letterform evoke sometimes futurist visions in his compositions, painted partially in a spontaneous freestyle way.