Author: caitlinbruce

Young spectator watching Statik (Chicago) at work. MOS Germany 2014. Photo credit: Caitlin Bruce Robert S. Cathcart’s “Movements: Confrontation as Rhetorical Form,” 1978, is a touchstone in rhetorical studies of social movements. In this germinal piece he forwards his definition of social movements as “confrontational form…movements are a kind of ritual conflict whose most distinguishing…

This is just a quick post to remind the readers of a separate project that I co-organized over 2013-2014, “Urban Acrobatics: A Circus and Graffiti Spectacular,” which explored the potential relationships between circus and graffiti. It involved a week of workshops, panel discussions, and a performance in New York City, as well as a concluding…

“Time, nothing but time…” zorzorzor Zor Zor Zor (Chciago). Photo Credit: Caitlin Bruce If day two was about frenzied production and managing the flows of traffic, attention, and quick shifts of heat and cold, day three is a time of suspension, winding down, sometimes last minute finishes, but also elongated conclusions and bittersweet goodbyes. It…

 Saturday was filled with music, break dancing, live rapping and beatboxing, as well as throngs of visitors, some accidentally stumbling upon the site, but many others making it a destination. I arrived around 3:30. Zore64 piece in progress. Photo Credit: Caitlin Bruce FPLO in progress. Photo credit: Caitlin Bruce  Surveying the walls I noticed that…

Day one at MOS Germany was sunny, bright, and full of beautiful productions. The site is interesting: it is a series of underpasses and walls underneath the bridge between Mainz and Kastel. Taking the S-Bahn from Wiesbaden or Frankfurt the train traveler sees the majority of the MOS walls while passing the Mainz-Kastel station, a…

“Maletas Migrantes,” a multi-artist project currently located in Philanthropy House, Brussels, explores themes of migration, memory, identity, and sometimes violence through the shared medium of the suitcase. Utilizing a (relatively) standardized texture and spatial plane, the works diverge widely in their mediums, styles, and approach. The exhibit rationale states: Maletas Migrantes (Migrant Suitcases) is a…

“Tête-à-Tête” Sant Oma. Rue Forge Royale. Paris. Photo Credit: Caitlin Bruce Last week began the first solo exposition of Sant Oma, aka, Thomas Durcody at Le Cabinet d’Amateur. Sant Oma is an artist, graphic designer, and 2D animator. In addition to appearing on Paris’ walls his art has appeared at the Drawing Now exhibit in…

Precarity. Precaratization. Precarious. An adjective, a verb, and a noun, ‘precar’ and its various conjugations has taken on increasing importance with the march of neoliberalism and the collapse of the welfare state. Lauren Berlant notes that the term took on intense political visibility in 2011 in the wake of drastic austerity measures and public protests…

If one walks for more than five minutes nearly anywhere in Paris stumbling upon street art– Space Invader’s retro videogame characters above street labels, Levalet’s site specific figures, or the alien-like profiles of MG La Bomba– is almost inevitable. Yet, like graffiti, it is a form of public art that is often depicted as a…

Fort d’Aubervilliers was constructed between 1843 and 1846 to support the defense of Paris. The former army base is just north of Paris’ city limits, has been a military base, car factory, and from 1984 onwards, countercultural expression including hip hop, punk, and rock performances. In Situ Art Festival, organized by the AFTRP (an urban…