Nuart Aberdeen welcomes an international cast of highly acclaimed street artists to Aberdeen. Using our walls and streets as their canvas, artists produce breathtaking works which range from super-sized murals to smaller hidden gems. Alongside the physical art production, an exciting programme of events will explore and present issues surrounding contemporary street art practice in all its guises. The Nuart Street Art Conference features contributions from some of the world’s leading street artists alongside academics, authors, researchers, curators, producers, writers and other cultural-sector professionals who are dedicated to exploring issues surrounding new forms of art and activity in public space.
Friday 7 June
Day 1: Living Heritage
On Day 1 of Nuart Aberdeen’s Street Art Conference, we address the theme of living heritage. Speakers include Dr Erik Hannerz (Lund University, SE), Dr Enrico Bonadio (City, University of London, UK) and Professor Ilaria Hoppe (Catholic Private University, Linz, AT). Topics include the preservation of street art under heritage law (Bonadio), the concept of ‘fame’ in graffiti as a form of intangible cultural heritage (Hannerz) and ‘bad street art’ as an everyday form of heritage (Hoppe). Day 1 closes with a panel discussion on strategies for safeguarding street art, with David Roos (STRAAT Museum, NL) Tim Marschang (Street Art Cities, BE), Sami Wakim (Street Art USA), Arne Vilhelm Tellefsen (Deconforml) and Stuart Holdsworth (Inspiring City).
11:00–11:10: Welcome and Introduction
Dr Susan Hansen (AU/UK)
Susan Hansen is Europe’s most cited street art scholar and host of Nuart Plus. She is committed to engaging and connecting outsider audiences with contemporary urban art and scholarship.
11:10–11:50: Street Art and Heritage Law
Dr Enrico Bonadio (IT/UK)
The decision whether street art should be preserved and heritagised affects artists, property owners and local communities. Making decisions regarding the existence or treatment of the work is challenging, as these parties may have conflicting interests. In his talk, Enrico Bonadio will explore the issues raised by the preservation of street art under heritage law.
11:50–12:30: Bad Street Art
Prof Ilaria Hoppe (DE/AT)
From a critical perspective, street art is a period or movement that some dismiss as ‘over’. In her talk, art historian Ilaria Hoppe uses the term ‘bad’ street art with a double meaning: firstly, as an ethical category, because of its involvement in gentrification, and secondly, as an aesthetic term to describe a form of art executed with a basic style. Drawing on a field trip to Catania, Sicily, Hoppe considers the roots of street art in the 1960s to argue that ‘bad street art’ can still be seen as a critical practice in neoliberal urban space, and an everyday form of cultural heritage.
12:30–13:30 — Lunch Break
13:30–14:20: Fame! The totemic principle in subcultural graffiti
Dr Erik Hannerz (SE)
For over 40 years the concept of fame – as in subcultural recognition and celebrity – has been the self-evident answer to explain the driving force behind the how’s, where’s, what’s and why’s of subcultural graffiti. In this talk, cultural criminologist Erik Hannerz will approach fame less for what it is and more on what fame does, arguing that fame works to materialise collective emotions, ideals and boundaries that are otherwise ephemeral and intangible.
14:20 – 15:00: Panel: Art on the Streets
Dr Erik Hannerz, Dr Enrico Bonadio, Prof Ilaria Hoppe
Join three of the world’s leading authorities on street art culture as they come together to discuss the role of art on the streets as a form of living heritage.
15:00 – 15:20 Break
15:20 – 16:00: Panel: Muse, Museum, Memory
David Roos (Straat Museum), Tim Marschang (Street Art Cities) Sami Wakim (Street Art United States), Arne Vilhelm Tellefsen (Deconform) and Stuart Holdsworth (Inspiring City) David Roos, head curator of Amsterdam’s Straat Museum of street art and graffiti, Tim Marschang, co-founder of the ground-breaking Street Art Cities App, Sami Wakim, founder and director of Street Art United States, Arne Vilhelm Tellefsen, director of Deconform and Stuart Holdsworth, of Inspiring City, will discuss how and why their respective platforms are safeguarding street art legacy.
Saturday 8 June
Day 2: Intangible Cultural Heritage
On Day 2 of the Street Art Conference, audiences will have the opportunity to meet some of the festival artists. The day will commence with a discussion of the history of flyposting and how this intersects with street art’s own history of the paste up. Speakers include Adrian Burnham and Tim Horrox of Build Hollywood (UK). Other highlights include a talk from festival artist and scholar Professor Bahia Shehab (LB/EG) and a talk from festival artist Addam Yekutieli (aka Know Hope – (IL/PS)). Day 2 marks the first tours of the art produced for this year’s festival, and the conference will close with a panel of our festival artists, who will discuss their work.
11:00–11:10 Welcome and introduction
Dr Susan Hansen (AU/UK)
11:10–11:45: Fly by Night
Adrian Burnham (UK)
For the past year, Adrian and his research partner Richard Broadbent have been interviewing veteran flyposters about their lives and involvement in unauthorised commercial billsticking throughout the UK and abroad. These oral histories evidence a rich living heritage and rare opportunity to scrutinise a hitherto very much cloistered world, with its associations with music and promotion; incidents of public and media interaction; contentions with the law and municipal authorities; the changing face of our urban environments; competition for wall space and territories; developments from cash-in-hand days to more professional set ups.
11.45-12:15: Artist Talk with Addam Yekutieli aka Know Hope
Addam Yekutieli is a self-taught multidisciplinary artist who deals with issues of cross cultural encounter, historical and personal narratives and memory. Yekutieli’s practice consists of mixed media artworks, installation, photography and interventions in public spaces, with a focus on text and how text interacts with the environment it is placed in.
In recent years, Yekutieli has been conducting a series of ongoing projects with participants worldwide, with the aim of highlighting the nexus between the personal and the collective, the political and the personal.
12:15–13:00: Panel: All Eyez On Me
Is flyposting vital to the history – and the future – of street art? How have the strategies of one informed the other and why, relative to graffiti and stencil art, is the wheat paste/paste up underrepresented in the history of street art culture. Join Adrian Burnham, Tim Horrox, the founder of world leading street advertising specialists Build Hollywood and artist Addam Yekutieli aka Know Hope in unpacking the power of the paste up.
13:00–14:00 — LUNCH BREAK
14:00–14:45: Artist talk with Bahia Shehab: Designing Dissent: Arab Creativity and Resistance
Bahia Shehab is an artist and author based in Cairo. She is a Professor of Design and founder of the graphic design program at The American University in Cairo. Her work has been exhibited internationally and has received several international awards including the BBC’s 100 Women’s list, a TED Senior Fellowship, a Prince Claus Award, and the UNESCO-Sharjah Prize for Arab Culture. She is the founding director of TypeLab@AUC. Her latest publications include You Can Crush the Flowers: A Visual Memoir of the Egyptian Revolution and the award-winning coauthored book A History of Arab Graphic Design.
14:45-15:30: Meet the Festival Artists Panel (Chaired by Evan Pricco)
On Saturday 8th June, the city’s first street art tours for the festival will culminate at Aberdeen’s Art Gallery, where Nuart Plus will feature a live panel with selected festival artists, offering audiences the unique opportunity to meet the artists behind the freshly created work on the walls of the granite city. Local, national and international artists joining us include Cbloxx, KMG, Molly Hankinson and Niels Shoe Meulman.
