ARTIST PUTS CHALK TALK ON SIDEWALK (1976)

18 Monday Mar 2013

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In the shadow of the White House

“It is definitely message art, more so than Bicentennial art of any kind,” said George R. (Randy) Hofman, 24, as he put the finishing touches on a huge chalk drawing of the Crucifixion on the sidewalk across the street from the White House.

Hofman said he spends summers in Ocean City, N.J., doing chalk drawings, acrylic paintings and sand sculptures, mostly on religious themes. He has sculpted and painted the Last Supper, Moses parting the Red Sea, and Moses with the Ten Commandments.

He has also reproduced famous art, such as “The Starry Night” by van Gogh, but he prefers religious motifs, because “more people can identify with (them) right off.”

“They love the spiritual enlightenment of it,” Hofman said. “They get inspired.”

Hofman lives with his parents at New Hampshire Ave. near Brookeville in Montgomery County. He said he converted the stable there into a studio, and he has painted a huge acrylic mural on the walls and the ceiling depicting the second coming of Christ.

The young artist works quickly; it took a little over an hour yesterday to complete most of the picture’s detail. About eight feet square, its main elements were Christ on the Cross, a centurion and a kneeling follower.

Artist Hofman puts finishing touches to drawing of crucifixion at Madison Street, NW (1976)

“You have to juxtapose the warms and the cools, the darks against the lights for the contrast,” Hofman said. He said he begins by drawing an outline with ordinary blackboard chalk and filling it in with colored chalk.

Hofman said he was concerned that the authorities might object to someone “painting” the sidewalk in front of the White House and the (guard) said if you go across the street maybe it’d be OK,” he said.

So Hofman picked up his chalk and found a concrete “canvas” in front of Lafayette Park. Several pedestrians stopped to admire his work, “although one person didn’t like it, because he didn’t think Christ should be on the ground like that.”

Others were enthusiastic. Brother Luke, of the international Order of St. Luke the Physician, said it was “super.”

“If we could get teenagers turned on to ‘defacing’ sidewalks with chalk, maybe they wouldn’t deface walls with spray paint,” he said. “This is a beautiful expression that’s not detrimental to anybody.”

Hofman said he wants to see sidewalk art in his home town. “There’s hardly any of it here,” he said, though it’s common in Europe and in Boston and San Francisco.

Published in the Washington Post USA (11^th Feb. 1976)

Researched by Philip Battle

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Art on the Asphalt (1967)

13 Wednesday Mar 2013

Posted by Philip Battle in history, USA

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One of America’s first Sidewalk Art Festivals

A sure sign of spring is a bunch of kids chalking a hopscotch court on a city sidewalk. The warm sunshine seems to give urban people such impulses. But few policemen would sympathize if they found adults using the pavements for drawing boards.

Sidewalk Pet Portraits: US cartoon Cir. 1967

In San Francisco, however, authorities understand. The city’s Recreation and Parks Department recently sponsored an official “chalk-in for all ages.” It staged it in an area where the “hippies” congregate—the rendezvous of the philosophic college dropouts and other young people.

The results were exciting. In almost no time, we are told, 200 eager entrants in the contest claimed the 200 packages of colored chalk which the Park Department had ready to distribute. Others brought their own. Soon the chalk artists had covered with their sketches the four-foot squares of asphalt assigned to each. Many bright, original designs appeared. Spectators crowded.

The first rain was expected to wash away the entire art exhibition. But its lesson will remain. It indicates that cities should find more outlets for the creative abilities of their youth. More than half a century ago the settlement house movement sought to meet this need. Now other organizations such as the Job Corps are taking on the task.

But the focus should not be on the needs of the poor only. The San Francisco Recreation and Park Department is on the right track in setting up its chalk-in for people of all ages and stations.

Published in The Christian Science Monitor (10^th April 1967)

Researched by Philip Battle

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PEARLS CAST BEFORE THE FEET (1843-1989)

24 Monday Dec 2012

Posted by Philip Battle in history, London, USA

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Christmas Screeving

Working the stones at Christmas time was a popular sight on the streets of Britain.

Charles Dickens wrote in his book of CHRISTMAS STORIES (1843) “Our conversation had brought us to a crowd of people, the greater part struggling for a front place from which to see something on the pavement, which proved to be various designs executed in coloured chalks on the pavement stones, lighted by two candles stuck in mud sconces” In this description he is indeed talking about Night Screevers; pavement artists who would take advantage of the short days and long nights leading up to Christmas day and beyond.

Night Screeving 1869: Drawing F Wilfred Lawson, block cut by Joseph Swain © Trustees of the British Museum

People were often more generous during the festive season. The sight of a poor artist working the stones and braving the cold winds and weathering of a bleak December day, often melted the warmth of human kindness. The more talented and topical a screever, the more money that could be made; for many, it was their only source of income, pavement artists where often only a drawing away from the workhouse. Living hand-to-mouth and on their wits, by 1890 over 500 pavement artists were making a FULL TIME living on the streets of London alone; by 1911, this had risen to well over 1000 screevers.

The Christmas of 1862, and an American travel writer in London recorded how he ‘stumbled upon’ a screever “the types of which is found nowhere else in the world” and the work he described as “A string of wondrous pearls cast at the feet of the pavement traveller”

Indeed, Britain, and especially London was the only place anywhere in the world to embrace this unique culture of pavement art. It became a tourist attraction in its own right and printers began to publish postcards and even jigsaw puzzles celebrating the humble screever. One of the first Christmas postcards was by Wildt & Kray Ltd of London; they published this charming card featuring DOGS as pavement artists, standing beside their drawing of a winter snow scene chalked in an oval frame on the pavement, 1904.

Printed in Germany, this card was finished in metallic gold and silver ink.

DOGS- The Pavement Artists: Christmas postcard published in London by Wildt & Kray Ltd. (1904)

In 1936, the Alexander Korda production of the film THINGS TO COME features a pavement artist, drawing the words “A Merry Christmas” on the pavements of the fictional British city of ‘Everytown’ The scene is set on Christmas Eve 1940 and was famous for its prediction of world war 2. It is thought that the writer HG WELLS himself, insisted that this scene be included in the finished film!

THINGS TO COME Move Still: Pavement Artist drawing Merry Christmas

1953 was a very good year for this pavement artist who was snapped on New Year’s Eve in London’s Trafalgar Square, by the Picture Post. It features revellers, admiring the work before moving on to their party, but look how respectful they are not to tread on the art!

Night screeving in Britain goes back to the early 1700’s.

New Year revellers, London's West End are admiring the work of a pavement artist 1953

West End revellers, New Year Eve: 1953

Of course today, Christmas screeving is no longer confined to the streets of London and this photo was published in the Boston Herald in 1989 and features visiting French art student & pavement artist Jean D’ Armerie, working on a seasonal Father Christmas on Washington Street, Boston USA.

John D' Arm working the pavement of Boston USA: Christmas 1989

Jean D’ Armerie working the pavement of Boston USA: Christmas 1989

There are many, many more stories, photos and films featuring Christmas pavement art & artists……these are just a few I’ve found, proving that pavement art is not just a fair weather art.

HAPPY CHRISTMAS!

Written and researched by Philip Battle.

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DOROTHY WADA (1967-1970)

20 Saturday Oct 2012

Posted by Philip Battle in history, USA

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Pavement Art: A Catalyst for Social Change

The woman who taught the children of Chicago how to ‘play out’ again!

I was recently moved by the ABC news report (aired in the UK on BBC World News – 18^th October 2012) about the children of Chicago, USA who are caught up in a violent gang street culture; a place where a seven-year-old girl can be gunned down while selling lemonade on the street.

According to ABC News, Chicago has become a battleground, where over 400 lives have been taken this year alone, and children as young as six, have become victims of a street war that most Americans never see.

Of course, gang warfare and gun crime is not new to Chicago, and it’s usually the innocent bystanders who get caught up in it all. The streets become a no-go zone, and certainly not a place for children to ‘play out,’ or do pavement art.

With this disturbing ABC report, my mind was taken back to a story I read some time ago about Dorothy Wada, a Girl Scout leader from Uptown Chicago.

In the mid 1960′s, Dorothy was finding it difficult to recruit children or leaders into the scout movement, the “Traditional programs” just didn’t appeal; the streets had become dangerous places to ‘play out,’ even back then.

So Dorothy tried a new approach. She and her assistant, Helen Papp, put on their uniforms and walked around the neighbourhood for two weeks. They sat in empty playgrounds, walked through schoolyards, and rested on cement steps in front of shabby brick buildings.

But no one talked to them.

“IT WAS EERIE sometimes,” Dorothy said. “Often there was no sound on the street—but we could feel people watching us from their windows and getting used to us.”

One morning, the city council blocked off the streets between the Racine & Clifton neighbourhoods.

Dorothy & her assistant marched into the block carrying shopping bags full of art materials, sidewalk chalks and games. They sat down on folding chairs and waited for their new “Girl Scout” troop to join them.

Dorothy Wada gives encouragement to sidewalk artists in her unique outdoor program: Original press photo; published in the Chicago Daily News, 17th August 1970

Slowly—in Pied Piper style—the children began to trickle into the street. About 25 of them trailed in that first day. First gingerly—then eagerly—they started playing hopscotch, drawing pictures on the sidewalk and jumping ropes.

By the end of the first summer there were 75 “girl scouts” of both sexes and all ages. That was back in 1967; by 1970 there were over 1,000 children at six neighbourhood sites. Every Tuesday and Thursday activities would be held in the street, with children decorating the sidewalks and taking ‘ownership’ of their communities. On Wednesday’s the children would go by bus to the local zoo or museums. The entire project was sponsored by the girl Scouts of Chicago.

EVEN THE PARENTS became involved, although few ventured out of their apartments, at first they just watched from the windows. But, one by one they would come out to see their children’s sidewalk art.

Dorothy frankly admitted there was a shortage of leaders because some volunteers were afraid to work Uptown.

“There’s been a rash of shooting in the neighbourhood lately,” Dorothy said, “but we just keep believing that nobody’s going to hurt us as long as we’re helping the children.”

Written & researched by Philip Battle, with excerpts from The Chicago Daily News (17^th August 1970)

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The Pavement Artist Works in Blood (1942)

13 Sunday May 2012

Posted by Philip Battle in history, USA, world war II

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The Battle for Stalingrad

This powerful illustration shows a pavement artist who has come in the guise of the Grim Reaper. Painting the streets of Stalingrad with the blood of Nazi soldiers

Illustration for the Baltimore Sun – 30th September 1942

The Battle of Stalingrad was a major battle of World War II in which Nazi Germany and its allies fought the Soviet Union for control of the city of Stalingrad (now Volgograd) in south-western Russia. The battle took place between 23 August 1942 and 2 February 1943.

It was the largest battle on the Eastern Front and was marked by brutality and disregard for military and civilian casualties. It is among the bloodiest battles in the history of warfare, with the higher estimates of combined casualties amounting to nearly two million. The heavy losses inflicted on the German army made it a turning point in the war. After the Battle of Stalingrad, German forces never recovered their earlier strength.

This illustration was published in The Baltimore Sun, USA (30^th September 1942)

Researched by Philip Battle

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MUTT & JEFF (1923)

08 Sunday Apr 2012

Posted by Philip Battle in cartoons, London, USA

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Jeff starts as a Pavement Artist

Mutt and Jeff was a long-popular American newspaper comic strip created by cartoonist Bud Fisher in 1907 about “two mismatched tinhorns.” It is commonly regarded as the first daily comic strip. The concept of a newspaper strip featuring recurring characters in multiple panels on a six-day-a-week schedule had previously been pioneered through the short-lived A. Piker Clerk by Clare Briggs, but it was Mutt and Jeff as the first successful daily comic strip that staked out the direction of the future trend.

Mutt and Jeff created by Bud Fisher 1907

It remained in syndication until 1982, employing the talents of several cartoonists, chiefly Al Smith who drew the strip for nearly 50 years. The series became a comic book (initially published by All-American Publications and later by DC Comics, Dell Comics and Harvey Comics), as well as cartoons, films, merchandising and reprints.

MUTT & JEFF Cartoon Strip: Published in The Daily Mirror, Wed 11th Apr.1923 (click on image to enlarge)

Although this pavement art strip was published in a British newspaper in the 1920’s, it is likely that it was drawn and published much earlier in the US (Cir. 1912) Mutt & Jeff was syndicated out to overseas newspapers in the 1920’s, so old cartoon strips where ‘recycled’

Researched by Philip Battle

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The Movie Star Artiste de Rue (1955)

02 Thursday Feb 2012

Posted by Philip Battle in France, history, USA

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Robert Redford.

Born Charles Robert Redford, Jr. (August 18, 1936), and better known as Robert Redford, an American actor, film director, producer, businessman, environmentalist, philanthropist, and founder of the Sundance Film Festival.

ROBERT REDFORD & Paul Newman in "Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid" (1969)

Redford was born in Santa Monica, California, he dreamed of being an artist, so at the age of 19, in 1955, he hitchhiked to New York and from there made his way to Paris where he hung out for 18 months with politically active artists and students. He did pavement art chalk drawings directly onto the pavements for tourists to throw him coins.

Robert Redford was interviewed in The New Zealand Herald by Peter Calder; 25th June 2011…….and was asked this question:

‘You nearly became an artist and I know that you ended up in Paris and Florence in the 50s drawing on pavements. Did that time in Europe make a big contribution to the kind of person you became?’

“It absolutely was a huge change in my life. I had been kicked out of school – I was never a good student, because my mind was always outside the window; I wanted to be out in the world. Anyway, I was asked to leave and I saved enough money to last me for a year and I would travel in different countries and learn about other cultures. In doing that, I realised how little I knew about my own country. I would get challenged by students in France about US policies and I didn’t have answers for them. I was sort of humiliated. And I began to look at my country from other countries’ points of view and so when I returned a year later and landed in New York I had a much broader view of the US, the positives and the negatives.”

United Press photo (New York) Pavement artist in Paris taken on 8th May 1955

Pavement art became a popular activity after World War II with an influx of ex-service-men taking to the streets in both London and Paris. They would often display their war-time medals alongside their pavement chalking’s. This would generate a great deal of sympathy amongst the general public and so attract more pennies.

BANKSY at The Sundance Film Festival 2010 Photo by: REUTERS/Robert Galbraith

Redford still has an interest in streeet art and in 2010, a skier looks over a piece of art on a wall during the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah January 22, 2010. The gathering, backed by Robert Redford’s Sundance Institute for film, a U.S. event for movies made outside Hollywood’s major studios.

BANKSY at The Sundance Film Festival 2010. Photo by REUTERS/Robert Galbraith

The Sundance Film Festival was set-up by Redford’s company WILDWOOD In 1978. It’s currently the largest independent cinema festival of it’s kind in the United States. In 2010, it attracted the attentions of another kind of street art: Graffiti artist, BANKSY!

Written & researched by Philip Battle.

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Sidewalk Sam (1973)

22 Sunday Jan 2012

Posted by Philip Battle in history, USA

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Great Art Works Recreated on Pavement.

Sidewalk Sam has become something of a folk hero in America amongst the pavement art fraternity. Whilst here in the UK and the rest of Europe he remains largely unknown; this feature was published during Sam’s heyday in the early 1970’s.

Written by Terry Ryan

Transcribed and researched by Philip Battle

BOSTON (AP)—Chalk dust coating his hands, a smudge of colour on his face, Sidewalk Sam is bringing art to pavements of Boston.

Sidewalk Sam is Robert Guillemin, a 34 year old professional artist. A couple of days a week, he recreates the paintings of old masters in chalk on the grey concrete of the city’s sidewalks.

“My art is temporary and nobody can buy it. It doesn’t become a part of posterity.” Sam says. “It’s for here and now and it’s for everybody.”

Sam usually works three days a week. Sunny days. Arriving around 10 in the morning, he unfolds a reproduction of the painting he is going to copy, drops a pile of pastel chalks on the pavement and gets down on his knees to work.

Invariably, he is surrounded. Never large, seldom small, the crowd changes constantly. Office girls on coffee break, salesmen on their rounds, tourists marching from one historical marker to the next.

Very quickly a familiar outline appears. Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa or Renoir’s Girl in the Straw Hat. Maybe Cezanne, Michelangelo or Rembrandt. In his own studio, Sam’s art is abstract modern. “But I shouldn’t dump that tripe on people walking down the street.” Sam explained “This is art for people’s sake, not for art’s sake.”

Sidewalk Art by Boston's SIDEWALK SAM 1973

Sam’s favourite sidewalks are in the centre of downtown Boston. “You know, you get to know certain sidewalks.” He said as he worked on the white hair of a Gilbert Stuart portrait of George Washington. “Some sidewalks are smoother than others and some take chalk better.”

A dented bucket stood on the ground nearby. Coins bounced in, even occasional bills; at the end of the day, there might be $20.

Robert Guillemin was born in Boston, received bachelor and master of fine arts degrees from Boston University and studied for two years at L’Ecole de Beaux Arts in Paris. He met his wife, Jeannie in Paris. They have twin sons and live in suburban Newton. She is a sociology professor at Boston College.

There were a few problems when Sam started his pavement pastels “Any kind of marking on the sidewalk was considered graffiti” he said. Late this summer, Sam was attached to the Mayor’s Office of Cultural Affairs and graffiti became art.

Originally published in THE DAYTONA BEACH MORNING JOURNAL (Thursday October 11^th 1973)

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THE LITTLE ITALIAN ARTIST (1886)

04 Wednesday Jan 2012

Posted by Philip Battle in history, USA

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America’s first ‘recorded’ Italian pavement artist.

Researched & transcribed by Philip Battle.

I suspect that pavement artists have been working in America since the laying of the very first ‘flat-usable’ paving slab. We certainly know that Liverpool’s own James Carling, travelled to America, and worked the pavements from 1872. Presented here is the first documented and reported case I can find to date. Also the first ever street art scam!

Sub heading- How the Brokers on Wall Street are Imposed Upon.

Written by Franklin File (Special Dispatch to the Post)

New York, Nov 13.—A little dark-haired girl, perhaps a dozen or fourteen years old, with rich olive complexion and big, lustrous eyes, in which the sunbeams from warm Italian skies still lingered, knelt upon the sidewalk in Wall Street when the brokers were hurrying back from luncheon and with bits of colored chalk sketched the head of a Madonna.

Passers-by stopped to watch the child artist at work and the sidewalk was soon blocked. Then she drew an Italian landscape, and drew it well. She seemed absorbed in her work, and did not look up until the sketch was finished. There was an appealing, timid look in the big black eyes that went to the heart of every man in the crowd. The young artist was poorly and scantily clad, and in the murmur of admiration for her pictures there was a tone of sympathy for the little wanderer’s evident poverty.

A dark gentleman stepped impulsively from the circle and spoke to her in Italian. Then said: “Gentlemen, the poor little thing says she is alone and her artist father brought her over here, hoping to find fame and fortune in America. He is dead now, and she has no friends, nothing to depend upon but what her father taught her. I’ve a little girl of my own that might be left alone and friendless some time. I’ll do what I’d want some gentleman to do for her. Here’s my contribution,” and, taking off his hat, he dropped a handful of silver into it, brushed a tear from his eye and passed the hat around.

A silver shower fell into the dark gentleman’s hat. Then he went up to the girl and emptied the whole collection into her trembling hands. She thanked him in broken English, and her lips and eyelids trembled. The impulsively generous man put his hand upon her head, blessed her in Italian and went his way, saying, “She looks so much like my own little one I couldn’t help it.” The crowd dispersed, the little senorita disappeared and busy, bustling feet soon obliterated the pictures on the sidewalk, for Wall Street has little time for art.

Wall Street circ. 1880

Ten minutes later the dark gentleman and the little senorita met in an obscure side street and stepped into a doorway. The benevolent expression had gone from his face, and he wore an air of eager expectancy. “Here, how much you got? Give it to me; all of it. Mind. No funny business.” The little senorita handed over all the silver that had been thrown into the dark gentleman’s hat, and he put it in his pocket. They separated, and in the afternoon the poor, friendless waif from sunny Italy was again sketching the head of the Madonna on another pavement, and the impulsive stranger, who had a daughter very much like her, passed around the hat and brushed the sympathetic tear from his benevolent eye.

Published in the Washington Post: 14^th November 1886

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The chalking kids of New York. (1938-1948)

06 Tuesday Dec 2011

Posted by Philip Battle in history, USA

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The photographs of Helen Levitt

Written by Philip Battle.

Anybody who has only a modicum of interest in children’s art will quickly realise that they live in the moment. Their art reflects their immediate feelings and emotions on an almost intangible subconscious level that is sometimes difficult to decipher. An adult will always try to work-out the meaning of an abstract form by asking the question “What is it?” to which the child will bring perfect meaning and logic to the most illogical (to us) lines and forms. Looking into a child’s drawing is sometimes like trying to decipher Egyptian Hieroglyphics; you know there is logic and thought behind it but it still sometimes seems alien to the adult mind.

The Chalking Kids of New York: Photo Helen Levitt (1938-1948)

Artists have long realised that ‘primitive’ child art contains a special jewel; A link to our cave dwelling origins long before our sophisticated notions of society, culture or aesthetics. A reason perhaps why artists like Picasso and others have spent their entire lives relearning how to draw ‘child-like’. An adult who can draw like a child but conveys a mature idea is very gifted indeed.

In the street: Photo Helen Levitt (1938-1948)

Children are visionaries, they see beyond themselves and their art becomes timeless.

street-art: Photo Helen Levitt (1938-1948)

I came across Helen Levitt’s photographs in a book called IN THE STREET, first published in 1987 but then reprinted in 2002; a fascinating photo journal of chalk drawings and messages taken in New York City between 1938 and 1948.

The book of black and white photos offered no explanation as to the meaning of the images or why the children had drawn what they had but what it did do is offer an insight into a world long gone. Like Lord of the Flies; these children had created a world of chalking art, all by themselves, with their own unique rules and meanings.

chalking artist: Photo Helen Levitt (1938-1948)

In 1939 James Agee wrote of these chalk drawings: “All over the city on streets and walks and walls the children…..have established ancient, essential and ephemeral forms of art, have set forth in chalk and crayon the names and images of their pride, love, preying, scorn, desire…… The lady in this house is Nuts…..Lois I have gone up the street. Don’t forget to bring your skates….Ruby loves Max but Max HATES Ruby….And drawings all over , of…..ships, homes….western hero’s…..and monsters….which each strong shower effaces.”

street-artists: Photo Helen Levitt (1938-1948)

For over 10 years, Levitt documented the imaginative life of the children; at a time when children still had some visual independence and a keen-eyed interest in laying pictorial claim to the world around them. In today’s world of television and video gaming, that sense of ‘visual independence’ has all but vanished. All our monsters and dreams are laid before us in graphic detail and even in 3D!

These photos offer a look backwards—but are timeless in some respects. Children will never really stop being tempted by their imaginative senses to ‘show and tell’—to let others see what they find themselves.

In the street: Photo Helen Levitt (1938-1948)

The chalking kids of New York rightly deserve their place in the history of pavement art; they created something totally different, without outside influence; a visual language as old as the pyramids and almost as difficult to decipher at times. The ideas, fantasy’s, dreams and passions—which these children once upon a time chose to render through the medium of chalk applied to pavement—a vulnerable but quite immediate and assertive reality.

chalking kid: Photo Helen Levitt (1938-1948)

HELEN LEVITT: grew up in Brooklyn. Dropping out of high school, she taught herself photography while working for a commercial photographer. While teaching some classes in art to children in 1937, Levitt became intrigued with the transitory chalk drawings that were part of the New York children’s street culture of the time. She purchased a Leica camera and began to photograph these works, as well as the children who made them. The resulting photographs were ultimately published in 1987 as In the Street: chalk drawings and messages, New York City 1938–1948.

Helen Levitt: August 31st 1913–March 29th 2009

Helen Levitt's book: IN THE STREET, published 1987

All My Own Work!

~ A history of pavement art!

Category Archives: USA

Art on the Asphalt (1967)

One of America’s first Sidewalk Art Festivals

The chalking kids of New York. (1938-1948)

The photographs of Helen Levitt

Photos and reference material taken from IN THE STREET by Helen Levitt. published 1987. ISBN 0-8223-0771-5

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