August 5, 2004 Hello! My Name Is Michael Caine
Michael Caine played secret agent Harry Palmer in a series of 1960's spy
movies, and in doing so created the image of the "thinking man's James
Bond." Here the renowned New York street artist Bäst has used
Caine's image from the movies to create a quartet of posters, in effect
an homage to the brainy spy, in the East Village. Bäst often
appropriates images from pop culture and the news media and, as gallery
directors and curators like to say, re-contextualizes these images
within the urban landscape. The artist has also used images of Burt
Lancaster, Saddam Hussein, and Peter Sellars in his collection of posters, which are usually black-and-white
and repeated in a series along walls. According to U.K.-based designer
Tristan Manco
in his excellent book "Street Logos," Bäst started "bombing" with a
graffiti crew in Brooklyn during the early 1980's. In the
late 90's he re-surfaced in the street art scene with his iconic posters.
Ivan Corsa Photo
|
