#29

Riot de Janeiro: s/a of the new age

Uniting illustrators, artists, tattoo artists, musicians and graffiti artists, an unusual "creation agency", lives art, in search of new concepts and ideals. 

The margin of society, a sort of fictional territory, and at the same time, always heavily present, has always introduce a creative originality and a unique capacity of launching new trends. But, not long ago, that  famous spotlight, bad seen through the more squared eyes, was restricted to the people who lived up to, that parallel culture and environment,  victims of stereotypes (of course). Along with the changes of the new age, the tables have turned, and the society, no longer ignores that market, actually they can now value the art absorbed and cultivated in the lines of the cities, being it coming directly from the streets or not. Here, the concept of Riot de Janeiro, an innovative "creative agency", can exemplify a little better how the new artists can work together towards the same objective: the collective as a whole, the search for the appreciation of art and, as consequence, the recognition of new artists.

“The idea came up in the end of 2010, when my brother (Hugo Inglez) had the idea of doing a blog with a focus on art, something like Ctrl+Alt+Rio. Right after, he realized that we had several close friends who were amazing artists, but none of them received credits or the recognition they deserved for the level of work they had been doing. Mostly due to all trade of influences there is, in the artistic market, especially in Rio de Janeiro. Then, he realized that the artistic content that he needed for the blog, could actually be produced by us", describes Rique Inglez, twin brother of Hugo, and friends with Breno Moreira, three of the creators of the project. Although the seed was planted back then, the creation of the agency started three months ago, and by the number of members, already with the intention of being something big, like a riot. In total, the team Riot includes 14 friends, being three collaborators and 11 artists, among them: graffiti artists, Djs, musicians, designers, visual artists, illustrators, photographers and even tattoo artists, a curious and true mix. 

Gathering different proposals, like each one of the members was the link to a artistic stream of resistance, Riot de Janeiro lives out of the experience of each one. "We all come from different areas and some don't even have a degree. The truth is, we don't care about education. Even inside the artistic issue, it would be very difficult to define each member, because we all have different styles and they can work on several medias and techniques. The unique point in common is that we all have a very well defined style and unique.   I think that's exactly the differential of RiotJ. What we do, only we do. Our focus are ideas and exactly because of that, we won't and we don't want to have a certain area of expertise. Any idea is valid and can be produced. This way, we can work with every product, and at the same time, transform everything in work", adds.

“Angry” with the lack of appreciation of art, including the financial point of view, Rio(t) appears with its own way of circumvent this art marginality. This way, the union of this agency of creation became a true cause, very fair by the way. "I can proudly say that until the creation of RiotJ, we were basically ignored. At  every moment, another amazing artist with a tremendous potential gives up his career, basically because  he can't afford to sustain himself, while others gain worldwide fame with a bunch of crap. Our fight is the same of every young artist: make a living out of art. There is an absurd idea in Brasil that art is not a job. What sometimes is valued outside , here is almost a stigma. We seek the true appreciation of the brazilian culture, for ourselves, and for those yet to come", strikes Rique, who also signs another curious project: Artspam, a name suggested by the twin Hugo. .

Betting on the artistic exchange, Rique elaborated ten cardboards and also separated ten addresses completely distinct and random, outside Brasil. The idea was to introduce or to offer someone  its own art, without knowing what would be done with the work and not knowing the chosen one. Like that, almost parallel with the agency, Artspam was born, a spam, that contrarily to the usual ones, everyone would like to receive. "My dream is that this would spread as a new way of artistic disclosure. Can you  imagine artists out there sending their works somewhere in the world? I would love to receive one and I would do anything to share this ideal. What is funny is that people are surprise with someone having such an altruistic attitude, which shows it's not very common nowadays. The world needs good actions and a bit of spontainety" shares Rique, that, from the ten works already sent, received only one answer, which already made  entire project worth. "I received an answer from a guy in London. Funny it was the last sent. I was so happy when I saw the email, I had already lost hope of answers in that lot of cardboards. He wrote everything in a portuguese out from google translator, but the email was awesome , he said he love the drawing". 

As part of the proposal of the project, Rique answered the email where he explained a little better the proposal of the Artspam and told the story about that specific cardboard, which had a drawing with very thin lines, made out with a medicine propaganda ruler. (Picture below). "That made the drawing even  awesome, because the lines are not totally parallel which gives this weird sense of movement. To improvise is my specialty... in the beginning, I had to work with very low resources and that helped me to find my style, which is very simple and minimalist" explains Rique, who ends with: "We want to conquer the world, departing from the wondrous city and show that we can have a worldwide production, even with all the difficulties. Rio(t) de Janeiro needs to be a reference in art and culture, and not only a glimpse of what's happening out there, and I cannot think of a better time for that to happen".

Saiba mais sobre a Riot de Janeiro no Facebook
Email: contato@riotdejaneiro.com

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#28

Lightpaint: a light paint

Photographer raised and well-known in the underground scene, Henrique Madeira highlights as one of the followers of lightpainting in Rio de Janeiro. It's light, camera and action!!! 

A mystic character in the carioca underground scene and a old school photographer, Henrique Madeira shows up as one of the main references over an artistic proposal, that until some time ago, was not very well explored in Rio, and as consequence didn't get too much attention. Lightpainting, a photography technique created from the relation between the light and the shutter speed. "Lightpainting allows you to paint without leaving traces and with unrealistic images, like painting a boat on the concrete, a fish jumping out of a glass and the simple writing. During the photograph processing time, you can make those draws with flashlights, cell phone, a lighter, any source of light really", explains the expert.

Despite being a novelty in Rio, this tecnique was already used, even by acciddent, since 1914, when Frank Gilbreth and his wife Lilian Moller Gilbreth left the camera with the obturator opened to accompany the movement of production of workers. In this case, as Gilbreth was more interested in collecting data for his study about the "Simplification of work", the use of the technique was not explored from the artistic point of view. The first artist to use the light-painting as art was Man Ray, who considered himself a painter and very well known for its "avant-garde" pictures. In 1935, with the series "Writing Space", he introduced the technique for the first time as art. Here in Rio de Janeiro, Henrique Madeira started playing with this, only in 2008, using a Powershot. But, in 2010, its light was already being used professionally.

The photographer Fabrice Wittner (author of the above picture) recently put the light-painting in evidence with its series "Enlighted Souls", which bring almost real images of children and homeless in Vietnam and New Zealand. With the technique of light stencil, Wittner "painted stencils of enlighten characters to remind about the losses and show the spirit of a city destroyed", since Christchurch has recently been destroyed by an earthquake. Another reference in the matter, it's the french Marko 93, who also is getting a lot of attention for its curious mix of lightpainting and video. As for the carioca, from Campo Grande in Lisbon, Henrique Madeira seeks the originality through its connection with city. “I try all possible formats, mix different influences and I use the sights to complete the content. I'm in love with photography and all its possibilities, Rio is indeed one of the most beautiful places to shoot. I think I mix those elements right", details the photographer.

Under direct influence of street art culture, the light-paint of Henrique drinks from the same fountain, and for that reason presents a strong relation with graffiti, its technique can be considered a species of paint without limits and drops of paint. Beyond having introduced the light-paint in a series of events and parties, Henrique Madeira pretends to use the light-paint with a more commercial insight (in albums) and also as some artistic projects on its final stage (actually looking for sponsors at the moment). However,  the golden child, as he personally describes, it's the project that soon will take several workshops to children who are being treated at the Cancer Hospital. According to the photographer,  the idea is to expand the use of the technique and use light-painting to extend horizons. In this case, it's light, camera, action and lot of conscious. Check out more about Henrique Madeira in its own BLOG.

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#27

Rasmus: at the top of Dois Irmãos

Aiming at the top of one of the most classic post cards of Rio, the Danish Dj visits Vidigal and let´s us know a little more about that experience and his sound. 

In an intense sunshine day- one of the previliged ones, at Leblon beach-, when looked up at the Morro of Dois Irmãos it could only imagine one thing: "how would it be the view from up on this mountain that looks like a sitting diamond elephant"? This in specific was one of the quests of Rasmus Lutzen, a danish Dj  passing through Rio de Janeiro, but it could also very well be the quest of many cariocas, for sure. In fact, who wouldn´t appreciate to do such a thing. The fact is that, not everyone knows that is actually possible, allowed, and best of all it doesn´t require as  much effort as you might think. To reach the top of one of the most classic post cards you only need determination, since the track is open, not risky and it even has access from the top of the morro Vidigal. Which means, besides the incredible view to the city, you can still count with a unique "tour" through this amazing community.

After knowing how easy it was, Rasmus and his friend Nicole (a german-carioca), spontaneously volunteered to do the trail. But, how  does someone from Denmark, end up at the point of moto-taxi  at the entrance of Vidigal to start off with? "It´s my second time in Brasil. Before that, I went many times to play in Australia, but I wanted to live in a big city and different. São Paulo seemed interesting to me, since the eltetronic scene is very big there. I didn´t know what to expect, and for that reason, I followed some tips of some brazilians who live in Denmark, such as the couple DJ’s Renata e Jokke (by the way, this guys heat any dancefloor)”, states Rasmus. “I spend my first month here in Rio and I was very impressed with the beauty of the city, it´s definitely the most beautiful city in the world, but I was surprised to discover that the electronic scene here is not that big. I found out that the strong here is the beach, as if Rio was for the day and São Paulo for the night.", completes.

After five minutes of going up Av. Presidente João Goulart and, desmistifying the stereotype of a "slum", we left the motorbikes at "Largo do Santinho", where we faced, an "unforgettable carnival block", which was coming down the street in pure magic, Rasmus immediately felt in the momementum of samba and was affected by the beats of the drums (he went crazy). While walking up the seemingly endless João Goulart, after crossing "Quadra" - an area once dominated by the traffic, where today an UPP (Police of Pacifiying unit) post is located, passing by the beautiful soccer field and lots of alleys and bars, we stop at the last one, before we took the trail. From there, we went in direction of the jungle, where we walked aproximately 45 minutes, with some minor stops to praise the view. "Last year, I got to know Complexo de Alemão, where I played a gig to the community, invited by Cabbet Araújo, at the event "Peace Hug". However, Vidigal, it´s different",says the DJ.

From the top of the mountain range Dois Irmãos, before an indescribable 360º view of the city, the Danish DJ talks more about his work. Althought there is clear references from the scandanavian school in his music, such as  Trentemoller e Kasper Bjorke, Rasmus, who already played at some revelant parties here,  prefers to highlight the originality present in its sound. "I like melodies in the music. And then that it has a sexy and smooth feel. I don't normally go for certain artists when I look for music but I listen to releases by release date and sorts out the tracks I like regardless of label or artist."
Before going back to Europe, Rasmus will be playing at some brazilian parties. Refering to the climb to the top of the Dois Irmãos,  "its a unique and viable experience", completes the DJ, who also doesn't say no to a good barbeque.

Rasmus Lutzen - DJ set for Moving @ D.EDGE 01-03-2012

Listen to Rasmus Lutzen : http://soundcloud.com/rasmuslutzen

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