Stephen Powers (artist) explained

Stephen Powers
Other Names:ESPO, Steve Powers
Birth Name:Stephen J. Powers
Birth Date:25 May 1968
Birth Place:Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Nationality:American
Alma Mater:The Art Institute of Philadelphia, University of the Arts
Notable Works:Waterboarding Thrill Ride, Love Letters
Awards:Fulbright scholar (2007), Pew Center for Arts (2009)

Stephen J. Powers (born May 25, 1968) is an American contemporary artist and muralist. He is also known by the name ESPO ("Exterior Surface Painting Outreach"), and Steve Powers.[1] [2] He lives in New York City.

Biography

Powers is from Philadelphia and took classes at The Art Institute of Philadelphia, and the University of the Arts.[3]

In 1994, Powers moved to New York City to expand On the Go magazine, a hip hop magazine founded by Powers.[4] [5] [6] Working under the name 'Espo', he painted throughout the city becoming known during the late 1990s for his thematic graffiti 'pieces', for On the Go magazine, and for his 1999 book The Art of Getting Over, which placed stories told by other graffiti writers alongside photos of their work.[7] [8] His graffiti work often blurred the lines between illegal and legal, for example by creating pieces that appeared to be legitimate advertisements or by painting abandoned shop fronts in daylight.

In 2000, Powers gave up graffiti to become a full-time studio artist. He is now a mixed media artist, working in drawing, painting, printmaking, and installation art. Power's work has been shown in the Venice and Liverpool biennials, as well as shows at New York City's Deitch Gallery.

In 2005, he organised The Dreamland Artists Club, a project in which professional artists helped Coney Island merchants by repainting their signs.[9] Powers first solo museum exhibition was in the fall of 2007, at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts which showed the work from his Coney Island sign shop.[10]

In 2007, Powers was awarded a Fulbright scholarship.[11] He used the grant to create murals in Dublin, Ireland and in Belfast's Shankhill area, with the assistance of local teenagers.[12] His work in Belfast was inspired by the area's political murals.

In 2009, Powers produced a series of murals in Philadelphia about the complexities of personal relationships, titled A Love Letter for You. He painted 50 murals along the elevated train in West Philadelphia. The project was sponsored by a $260,000 grant from the Pew Center for Arts & Heritage and was produced by the Philadelphia Mural Arts Program.[13] The 'Love Letters' series continued in Syracuse on railroad overpasses (2010); A Love Letter to Brooklyn (2011), which consisted of painting an old Macy's building occupying an entire city block in Downtown Brooklyn;[14] A Love Letter to Baltimore (2014);[15]

In November 2015 Powers exhibited "Stephen Powers: Coney Island Is Still Dreamland (To a Seagull)" at The Brooklyn Museum.[16] [5] In 2019, Powers created a site specific commission for SFMOMA's third-floor architecture and design gallery.

Powers has exhibited internationally, including at Deitch Projects (New York, NY), the 49th Venice Biennale (with Barry McGee and Todd James) (Venice, Italy), Apex Art (New York),[17] Brazilian Cultural Pavilion (São Paulo, Brazil), Art In The Streets curated by Jeffrey Deitch, MOCA (Los Angeles, CA),[18] and as part of Beautiful Losers, (Contemporary Art Center, Cincinnati, OH; Yerba Buena Art Center, San Francisco, CA; Orange County Museum of Art, Newport Beach, CA; Triennale di Milano, Milan, Italy; Le Tri Postal, Lille, France)[19]

His work is in the collection of the Philadelphia Museum Of Art.[20]

Solo exhibitions

Public art

Arrest

In December 1999, Powers was charged with six counts of criminal mischief.[39] Powers contends that the arrest was politically motivated.[40] The arrest took place in his home, after he had participated in a protest conceived by artist Joey Skaggs, against New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani's attempt to shut down a controversial art show, Sensation, at the Brooklyn Museum.[41] During the protest, Powers and others threw fake elephant dung at a caricature of Giuliani, which Powers had painted for the protest. Powers pled guilty to one charge, saying he was "ready to grow on."[39]

An editorial in The New York Times criticized the Giuliani administration for its secrecy in the case, but also dismissed Powers as a self-promoter.[42] TheVillage Voice sympathized with Powers: "it's truly scary to think that if you invite people to throw artificial dung at a portrait of the mayor [...] the police will raid your apartment." However, the article was also critical of Powers' graffiti status, describing him as an egotistical, careerist "celebrity offender".[43] Powers ultimately performed five days of community service.

Bibliography

Notes and References

  1. Gregory J. Snyder, Graffiti Lives: Going Beyond the Tag in New York's Urban Underground, NYU Press, 2009
  2. Web site: Baker . Kenneth . 2005-11-05 . What's in a word? Artists at Luggage Store have ideas. . 2022-11-24 . San Francisco Chronicle . en-US.
  3. News: Hill . Miriam . 2004-08-25 . Armed with paint, Overbook native returns local color to Coney Island; Phila. native works his colorful magic on Coney Island . D01 . The Philadelphia Inquirer.
  4. News: Nina. Siegal. From the Subways to the Streets. 1999-08-22. The New York Times. 3. 2008-02-27.
  5. Street Art and Subversion from Stephen (Espo) Powers. Schwartz. Mattathias. The New Yorker. 2015-11-24. 2020-01-18. en. 0028-792X.
  6. Web site: On The Go Magazine. rapzines.com. 2020-01-21.
  7. Gregory J. Snyder, "Graffiti Media and the Perpetuation of an Illegal Subculture", Journal of Crime Media and Culture vol. 2, April, 2006
  8. Book: Powers, Stephen. The Art of Getting Over: Graffiti at the Millennium. October 1999. Macmillan. 978-0-312-20630-7. en.
  9. Web site: The Dreamland Artist Club. Hodges. Andrew. 2004-07-01. The Brooklyn Rail. en-US. 2020-01-21.
  10. News: Kaminer . Ariel . 5 August 2008 . Coney Island Sideshow Has Guantánamo Waterboarding as Its Theme . 5 May 2017 . The New York Times.
  11. News: Drew. Toal. Club chair. 2005-10-30. Time Out New York. 1. 2007-08-01.
  12. News: Graffiti Artist Still Painting on Walls but No Longer an Outlaw. Niko. Koppel. The New York Times . 29 May 2008. 5 May 2017. NYTimes.com.
  13. Web site: Brick Valentines on the Philly Skyline. . . Mural Arts Philadelphia . 9 January 2019.
  14. Web site: Fentress Swanson. Abbie. ESPO Paints 'Love Letter to Brooklyn' on Vintage Macy's Garage. WNYC.org.
  15. News: How to Paint a 'Love Letter' to a City. Bloomberg . 19 January 2015 . 5 May 2017.
  16. Web site: Brooklyn Museum: Stephen Powers: Coney Island Is Still Dreamland (To a Seagull). www.brooklynmuseum.org. 5 May 2017.
  17. Web site: apexart :: Dave Eggers :: Lots of Things Like This. apexart.org. 2020-01-21.
  18. Web site: Art in the Streets. www.moca.org. 2020-01-21.
  19. Web site: Beautiful Losers - Contemporary Arts Center. www.contemporaryartscenter.org. 2020-01-21.
  20. Web site: Philadelphia Museum of Art - Collections Object : Yes Yes Yes. philamuseum.org. 2020-01-21.
  21. News: Leen. Catherine. Art Choice. . en. 2020-11-02. 0140-0460.
  22. Web site: My List of Demands. deitch.com. en. 2020-01-21.
  23. Book: Snyder, Gregory J.. Graffiti Lives: Beyond the Tag in New York's Urban Underground. 2011-04-15. NYU Press. 978-0-8147-4046-0. en.
  24. Web site: Stephen Powers Biography – Stephen Powers on artnet. www.artnet.com. 2020-01-21.
  25. Web site: Stephen ESPO Powers: Daymaker · SFMOMA. www.sfmoma.org. en-US. 2020-01-21.
  26. Web site: The Dreamland Artist Club. Creative Time. en-US. 2020-01-21.
  27. News: Coney Island Sideshow Has Guantánamo Theme. Kaminer. Ariel. 2008-08-05. The New York Times. 2020-01-21. en-US. 0362-4331.
  28. Web site: A Love Letter For You. Mural Arts Philadelphia. en-US. 2020-01-21.
  29. Web site: Steve Powers, Love Letter To Syracuse, Continued - unurth street art. www.unurth.com. 2020-01-21.
  30. Web site: > Espo's Volto Já!. 2016-06-26. DANILO_OLIVEIRA_. pt-BR. 2020-01-21.
  31. Web site: A Love Letter for us – BALTIMORE ARTS. Brooks. Chris. 6 June 2014 . en-US. 2020-01-21.
  32. Web site: Charleroi: "Bisous m'chou" pourrait disparaitre avec la rénovation des Expos. sudinfo.be. 7 June 2016 . fr. 2020-01-21.
  33. Web site: New Steve (ESPO) Powers Mural Currently Going Up in Old City. 2016-01-06. Streets Dept. en. 2020-01-21.
  34. Web site: Streets: Stephen "ESPO" Powers (Miami) « Arrested Motion. ArrestedMotion. en-US. 2020-01-21.
  35. Web site: Art Wall by Stephen Powers (ESPO) seen at Coney Island Art Walls, Brooklyn. www.wescover.com. 2020-01-21.
  36. Web site: Steve Powers Paints A Pair of New Murals That Reflect Philly History and Celebrate Immigrants. 2018-12-23. Streets Dept. en. 2020-01-21.
  37. Web site: Tribeca Citizen Nosy Neighbor: What's this on the side of Pier 40?. Tribeca Citizen. en-US. 2020-01-21.
  38. Web site: 2020-05-01. Watch Graffiti Artist Steve "ESPO" Powers Paint Up Boarded Soho Windows. 2020-05-31. Untapped New York. en-US.
  39. Web site: In the post-graffiti painting of Steve Powers, a canvas as big as everything in the city you wouldn't otherwise see. Gottlieb. Benjamin. Politico PRO. 12 January 2012 . en. 2020-01-18.
  40. News: Giuliani Protester Is Arrested in Vandalism Inquiry. Siegal. Nina. 1999-12-04. The New York Times. 2008-02-27. 1.
  41. News: Siegal . Nina . 1999-12-04 . Giuliani Protester Is Arrested in Vandalism Inquiry . 2020-01-18 . . en-US . 0362-4331.
  42. News: Curious Case Shows Pitfalls Of Secrecy. Purnick. Joyce. 1999-12-06. The New York Times. 2008-02-27. 1.
  43. Web site: Goldstein . Richard . 1999-12-14 . Rudy's Most Wanted . deviated . https://web.archive.org/web/20100323040659/http://www.villagevoice.com/1999-12-14/news/rudy-s-most-wanted/1 . 2010-03-23 . 2010-03-22 . The Village Voice.

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