Street Style

While the debate about ‘street art’ versus ‘graffiti’ continues to rage on in modern society, some savvy street-art lovers with an entrepreneurial spirit have decided to promote certain artists rather than castigate. One such purveyor of fine street art is Jason Kinsella, co-director of Little Art Book (LAB). Soon to be launched in Australia, this funky site (www.littleartbook.com) is filled with boundary-smashing works and artists with mind-bending names. We talk to Jason about LAB…

How and when did you come up with the concept of LAB?

I came up with the concept for LAB about 18 months ago. Living in London you’re surrounded with great street art all the time. I had been buying art for a good few years, particularly limited edition prints. I’d done a little screen printing myself and knew enough to put together a website, so after a few beers and a chat with my good friend Morgan we came up with the idea to produce prints ourselves. Morgan knew this guy called “French Danny”. He’s a 50 something, Gauloise-smoking French guy who’s worked as a fine art screen printer for the best part of 30 years. Between the three of us we had all the ingredients for LAB

Do you get many artists approaching you to be added to your site?

We get about 5 or 6 emails every week from artists looking for information about working with us. We try to write back to the majority of them with encouragement, but sometimes it’s difficult. We regularly get submissions of classically styled oil on canvas artwork - I’m not sure whether these people have actually checked out our website, but regardless it’s really good to see new talent.

How do you choose which artists to show?

We choose artists whose work we like. When I lived in Europe I spent a lot of time photographing street art and anytime I found a piece that really caught my imagination I would try to contact the artist. More often than not it takes me a long time to eventually discover the identity of the artist. A couple of months ago I was chatting to a lady from Madrid at one of our shows and I was telling her about a couple of really cool pieces of street art in Madrid, but I didn’t know the artist’s name, but described the work. She knew exactly who I was talking about and even gave me the email address of the guy. Little by little the pieces of the puzzle come together.

Are you an artist yourself? What is your background?

When I was younger I spent a lot of time painting oil on canvas, but then I discovered girls and cars (and) I stopped. Since then I’ve concentrated on photography and some web design. I struggled for about 6 months to make our website. I’m pretty pleased with the results and we’re always getting compliments from people about our site. I get huge artistic enjoyment from working with our artists.

You’re launching in Australia? When is that going to happen?

The launch in Australia will be in late February. Before moving to Sydney I had been in contact with a good few Australian artists, so we will hopefully launch here with some home grown talent.

Why do you think street art is so popular?

Street art is popular because it catches the mood of the people. There is nothing better than walking around a corner, looking up and seeing a great piece of art on public display. Banksy is the king of this technique and we were lucky enough to live in London for the majority of his rise to fame. Street art is popular because people can relate to it.

Do you think ‘graffiti’ should be banned as it is in most places?

The term graffiti is used a little too loosely. Graffiti is used for everything from train tagging to installations by Os Gemeos. For me, if the motivation for doing the work is creative rather than just destructive, then I’m all for it.

What’s unique about your site? How do you differentiate from other sites that sell similar artwork?

There are a couple of main differences between us and other sites. We don’t just sell artwork, we produce the artwork. Every print that is for sale on our site has been screen printed by us. We work with the artists from conception of the piece through to selecting the paper and finally quality controlling each piece before signing and stamping them.

When I set out to design our site I really wanted to break the mould of all the typical gallery sites. The majority are designed with the objective of being easily updatable rather than creative. The LAB site is definitely about creating something fun for people to browse through rather than looking through an Athena catalogue of 500 pieces of art. It will a long time before the LAB website has a filter by “colour theme” or “art has flowers in the background” option!

This is probably a very daggy question but most of the artists have strange names. Do you have any idea how they come up with them? ‘Superoboturbo’? ‘Oh Death’? Is this normal in this world?

Hmm, good question! You know, I’ve never thought to ask the guys how they came up with their names. I know a couple of them that produce mainly street art are concerned that by using their real names (this) would make them easy targets for the police. One of our artists “The Krah” has a number of identities, email addresses and bank accounts in the Cayman Islands to keep people off the scent. We generally meet in a darkened pub and exchange brief cases with artwork and cash.

What makes a good street artist?

Banksy reckons the holy grail of being a good street artist is taking less time to make the artwork than it takes to look at it. Art that makes me think about my surroundings is good street art. I also really appreciate the effort some artists make in gaining access to the perfect location.

Do you have any Australian artists on your books?

At the moment I’m working with three Australian artists. There is some great talent out there. So watch this space!