In the beginning, Blu had a limited amount of media and techniques, he started off by using spray paint. However he gradually progressed and began painting using house paint with the help of a roller that the artist mounted to a telescopic stick. This allowed him to be more creative with his work as well as gave him a larger surface area to paint and work with.
Here are some of Blu's work bellow;
As probably seen above, Blu's artwork has a theme about society, corruption and the damage that humans have done to the environment.
I think this is what impresses me the most about his work. Because at first his work may seem ridiculous and weird, but actually it is so meaningful and powerful, Blu is pointing out the flaws of the modern society through his work. This really relates to my environmental theme, and how environment is neglected. As his work illustrates how the world is possibly changing for the worse, as people become less and less caring about everything that surrounds them, just so that they could benefit themselves. Like in a image that I studied in class of one of his work,called "A Stuffed Cake" it is a street art painting of a cake full of toxic waste barrels, on the walls of a building in Milan, Italy.
I looked into the reason and meaning behind this image, and I found out that it is related to expanding dumps in Southern Italy, and how there are more and more of them being dug up, and there is rubbish being brought to the dumps from various distant places of Northern Europe. Even though people are against it, they are still being ignored. Personally I think Blu has expressed this "issue" quite well, through this painting. He uses the idea of the cake to represent landfill sites/dumps, as the layers of the cake, are representing the building up of tons of rubbish, gradually layering and layering in a similar manner. The greenery on the top of the cake represents the beautiful olive trees that grow in the fields of Italy. I think Blu, is trying to put a point across, that if the dumps will continue to be dug up and filled, not only will it pollute the environment, but the beautiful plants etc. that Italy is famous for, will be lost. Also maybe he represents this problem as a cake, because Blu is trying to highlight how the dumping of the pollutants etc. is simply covered up, like a cake, so no one really sees the issue, until they look inside.
I looked into the reason and meaning behind this image, and I found out that it is related to expanding dumps in Southern Italy, and how there are more and more of them being dug up, and there is rubbish being brought to the dumps from various distant places of Northern Europe. Even though people are against it, they are still being ignored. Personally I think Blu has expressed this "issue" quite well, through this painting. He uses the idea of the cake to represent landfill sites/dumps, as the layers of the cake, are representing the building up of tons of rubbish, gradually layering and layering in a similar manner. The greenery on the top of the cake represents the beautiful olive trees that grow in the fields of Italy. I think Blu, is trying to put a point across, that if the dumps will continue to be dug up and filled, not only will it pollute the environment, but the beautiful plants etc. that Italy is famous for, will be lost. Also maybe he represents this problem as a cake, because Blu is trying to highlight how the dumping of the pollutants etc. is simply covered up, like a cake, so no one really sees the issue, until they look inside.
What really stands out in this work, is the use of the colours, especial the contrast between the both secondary and primary colours of blue,orange, red, green etc. and the duller grey/black layers. Making it really bold and adding visual depth to the whole image.
Also this image contains a strong use of lines, for instance the grass, and some of the layers of the "cake" soil. This helps to create texture and tone, making the work look less plain and empty, also I noticed the shapes are mostly oval, and round, this is why the image appears to look 3D form, so it looks more like a real cake.
Even though the whole image is laid out slightly to the left side of the wall, it doesn't look odd or out of place, probably because of the arm that is stretched out holding the plate with the cake. It makes it look more proportional, and fills up some of the empty space. Also I think the whole image is arranged well as firstly when I look at it, I immediately focus on the greenery, that gives me the impression like everything is perfectly nice and fine. However then I am encouraged to gradually start looking down, this is when the "slightly" harmful litter begins and grabs my attention, and so the more I look down the more of the severe toxic waste I start to see, so right in the bottom it is the worst. This may have been composed in such way, because (as I mentioned before) the artist is trying to explain how everything is covered up, meaning it looks perfect at first glance, on the outside, but when you start looking into it deeper, you see the ugly side of it.
In class, I have began doing work, similar to Blu's, I used this cakes image and tried to, recreate it using his style, whilst experimenting with different mediums and materials.
I tried using different bases and backgrounds, and I tried creating texture and shapes with graphite, pencil, conte-crayon, feltip pen and Biro pen. For some images I had more time given than others, like the bottom left page, with several images, was done in 3-5 min and had to be continuous line, I personally found that difficult. Also the fact that Blu's work is very fine lined and bold, made it harder for me to make it look anything like his work. Mainly because every time I tried to get a thin fine line, I would just end up making the lines thick. I could next time try and use a fine liner, to see if it works better. My favorite drawing was the very bottom right one, using conte-crayon. Basically, when I was shading the page (to get some tone) traces of writing (that I had done on other pages whilst pressing down hardly) appeared, creating an accidental texture, which looks similar, to the original "Stuffed Cake" texture.
Also this image contains a strong use of lines, for instance the grass, and some of the layers of the "cake" soil. This helps to create texture and tone, making the work look less plain and empty, also I noticed the shapes are mostly oval, and round, this is why the image appears to look 3D form, so it looks more like a real cake.
Even though the whole image is laid out slightly to the left side of the wall, it doesn't look odd or out of place, probably because of the arm that is stretched out holding the plate with the cake. It makes it look more proportional, and fills up some of the empty space. Also I think the whole image is arranged well as firstly when I look at it, I immediately focus on the greenery, that gives me the impression like everything is perfectly nice and fine. However then I am encouraged to gradually start looking down, this is when the "slightly" harmful litter begins and grabs my attention, and so the more I look down the more of the severe toxic waste I start to see, so right in the bottom it is the worst. This may have been composed in such way, because (as I mentioned before) the artist is trying to explain how everything is covered up, meaning it looks perfect at first glance, on the outside, but when you start looking into it deeper, you see the ugly side of it.
In class, I have began doing work, similar to Blu's, I used this cakes image and tried to, recreate it using his style, whilst experimenting with different mediums and materials.
I tried using different bases and backgrounds, and I tried creating texture and shapes with graphite, pencil, conte-crayon, feltip pen and Biro pen. For some images I had more time given than others, like the bottom left page, with several images, was done in 3-5 min and had to be continuous line, I personally found that difficult. Also the fact that Blu's work is very fine lined and bold, made it harder for me to make it look anything like his work. Mainly because every time I tried to get a thin fine line, I would just end up making the lines thick. I could next time try and use a fine liner, to see if it works better. My favorite drawing was the very bottom right one, using conte-crayon. Basically, when I was shading the page (to get some tone) traces of writing (that I had done on other pages whilst pressing down hardly) appeared, creating an accidental texture, which looks similar, to the original "Stuffed Cake" texture.
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