Street Art, an exhibition up now through May 1, 2010 at the Robert A. Deshon and Karl J. Schlachter Library for Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning, celebrates the history of contemporary street art and culture.

Throughout history, the city streets have been regarded as the scene of crime, poverty, and dereliction. The streets have been depicted and referred to as the repository of the attitudes of the hoi polloy and the vulgar. Being deficient in taste, delicacy, or refinement, the language, humor, and most definitely the art of the street could only be thought of as crude. Likewise, contemporary street art is often shunned and labeled vandalism and the artists or writers are commonly categorized as hooligans, thugs, criminals, anarchists, and political antagonists.

Street Art, an exhibition up now through May 1, 2010 at the Robert A. Deshon and Karl J. Schlachter Library for Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning, celebrates the history of contemporary street art and culture. Some thirty-five books and numerous prints, posters, magazines, and stickers are brought together to tell a visual and textual story about the roots and influences that have shaped contemporary street art…and importantly, that which contemporary street art has shaped such as the fashion, music, design, publishing, advertising, and art industries.

The official beginning of the exhibit is marked by a book open to an image of a young Jean-Michel Basquiat having just tagged a New York City wall in the 1970s. The heart of the exhibition is focused on hip-hop, punk rock, skateboard culture, and that which is known as “the underground”. The exhibition ends with signed and numbered Shepard Fairey screen prints as well as stickers, books, chapters, and articles that showcase Shepard Fairey’s art and Fairey as an artist.

Street Art coincides with the Contemporary Art Center of Cincinnati’s exhibition, Supply and Demand: 20 Year Retrospective February 20, 2010 – August 22, an exhibition of the works of Shepard Fairey.

For location, hours, and information about Street Art:

See our website (http://www.libraries.uc.edu/libraries/daap/), call the library (513.556.1335), or contact Jennifer Pollock, curator of Street Art (Jennifer.pollock@uc.edu; 513.556.1319).