Monday, September 16, 2013

A summer's worth of street art!

Long ago, during one of this year's rare car rides, we spied a fantastically-embellished wall running down Akademika Pavlova street. It covers about 1.5 kilometers, all the way from the Akademika Pavlova metro stop to the Studentcheska metro stop.

Several months later, a certain intrepid companion and I set off to explore.

There were lots of strangely cool things.
 

And some cool strange things.

And some rather creepy images.


These artists not only learned to draw but also picked up some English somewhere. Almost all of the tags and descriptions were in English.
 

With a few exceptions-
"Gulfstream"
Meanwhile, a residential area begins just across the street. Here people were going about their life as usual.

This wasn't the only summertime stumble across unusual street art.


A horse suddenly appeared on Radnarkomivs'ka street.

A patchwork quilt of color adorned a wall on Esenina Street.

I've been walking past this on the way to work.

Darth Vadar made his debut near an elementary school.

Shevchenko gazed thoughtfully into the distance.

A babushka threw her hands up in shock over a tipped vase.

Odin discovered this tagging hall-of-fame.

Ray Charles lit up the side of someone's garage.

On the other side of town, a terrifyingly-gigantic atom ate up the side of an apartment building.

A tank promoted peace, not war.

And these random framed stickers spruced up what would otherwise have been nondescript gray walls.
























The streets of this city definitely present an always-changing smorgasbord of art! It's nice to see something unexpected, something that makes the viewer pause and spend a moment in reflection, a moment of thoughtfulness during a hectic day.

Which one is your favorite? Do you consider all of them to be art?

8 comments:

  1. Excellent aggregation, quite a few kilometers covered I imagine.

    I have taken the liberty to share with my circlers on G+: https://plus.google.com/100146646232137568790/posts/Jg3MBn3Zqvk

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    1. Dear Rupert, thanks for the share! : ) I'm really glad to hear that you enjoyed the photos. Do you see the same kind of originality in Kiev? It seems like there's something new here every day!

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  2. I enjoy street art very much...something so 'now', also speaking to stolen moments in places where one can use material objects as expressive canvases. One favorite was the tank with the flowers, perfectly illustrating "Peace"...but there are aspects in most of these that, when separated out, are wonderful.

    Thank you for sharing :) 

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    1. Thank you for dropping by, Lesley! Yes, that tank stencil is a good one : )

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  3. I see quite a few, but more of a tagging nature, I think that is the downside for artists living in a capital city with all of the attendant keepers of the peace! :-(

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  4. Darth Vader was my favorite of course!

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  5. That atom one is amazing! We get those crazy-long stretches of graffiti walls next to the train tracks over here in Russia.

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