To Award a Vandal

Does it make sense to hold a graffiti awards show? Some say no way, the whole idea of vandalism is to do your thing and never get caught! The rest say sure, why not? Have some fun, eat some snacks. Who doesn’t love snacks? Thusly, there are the Artaq Awards in both Paris and Berlin. Below you’ll find lists of artists involved in this years’ shows as well as a bigger view of one the artists involved: Matox – with live laser graffiti!

This event is known as the first EVER international Urban Arts competition. In it, artists from the most representative sects join together to showcase the evolution of all of their styles. The contest consists of six awards: Awards by category – Graffiti – Painting – Collage – Sculpture – Digital Art – Photography. In Situ Performances. The award winners will have their work shown in several galleries in Europe (this is what you’ll see below, here,) and the Artaq Bookzine will present their work and will be distributed at each of the trendy exhibition venues. Fun! Find out more information over at PureGraffiti.

One of the representative artists in this competition is Matox, and below there’s a video of his work and a couple images of his work as well. He does calligraphic works which represent no letter or number, working with layers upon layers creating fabulous “cave painting” style artworks. [His works remind me very much of [Jose Parla]

Designers: Various

Berlin:

and Paris:

Matox: