No. 27 - A Nod To Ed Ruscha
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| Artist Name(s) | Maser |
| Artwork title | No. 27 - A Nod To Ed Ruscha |
| Context/Background | Draw Out is an urban regeneration initiative that uses graffiti art to reinvent urban space. Draw Out was developed by Catherine O’Halloran, a Senior Youth Worker at the Northside Family Resource Centre in Ballynanty. The project evolved from Limerick’s Make a Move Festival. “With many derelict and vacant sites in our urban centre it is easy for us to become desensitised to our surroundings”, Catherine says. “The Draw Out Project is attempting to visually reinvigorate these sites. Framed in the right way we aim to get to a point where urban art speaks and appeals to everyone and impacts on our urban landscape”. The initiative works in partnership with Limerick City Council to select derelict sites within prime locations across the city. The initiative aims to build on the ‘naturally innovative spirit of the artist’ by re-imagining the urban environment, and ‘creating pathways for art, artist and audience to fully actualize their potential’ within the urban landscape, ‘creating a synergy between community, artist and environment’. Maser’s installation is part of the Draw Out: Urban Exhibitionists project for Limerick City of Culture 2014, which offered up long-term derelict sites to urban art. |
| Description | Maser’s artwork took a drab, run-down inner-city petrol station, and re-invigorated the building, forecourt, shutters, petrol pumps and vehicles with vivid colours and pop-art patterns. The urban art project took five 14-hour days, and almost 300 litres of paint to complete, as everything had to be given a coat of white paint and two coats of colour. The finished artwork, which is lit at night, can only be viewed from the pavement, as viewers are not permitted to enter the forecourt. Maser entitled the installation ‘No.27, A nod to Ed Ruscha’ after an artist who published a collection of photographs entitled ‘Twenty-six Gasoline Stations’ in 1963. The transformation is intended to surprise people, “to lead them to question their relationships with familiar objects" and to consider how "people are disassociated from the space around them”. Maser stated “I’m using paint as a tool to express what’s going on in my head, but I’m also aware there is an audience. I want to encourage that audience, especially the young and the disheartened." |
| Mediation | Alan Owens ‘Limerick urban art project a ‘gift to the city’ that aims to inspire’, Limerick Leader, 20th December 2013 Alan Jaques ‘ A Blast of Colour for City of Culture’, Limerick Post, January 16th 2014 http://www.limerickpost.ie/2014/01/16/a-blast-of-colour-for-city-of-culture/ Kaitlyn Schaeffer ‘Maser Converts a Derelict Ireland Petrol Station Into an Homage to Ed Ruscha’, Complex (New York) Jan 11, 2014 http://www.complex.com/art-design/2014/01/maser-ireland-gas-station ‘Maser "No.27 - A Nod To Ed Ruscha" New Street Installation - Limerick City, Ireland’ Monday, January 06, 2014 http://www.streetartnews.net/2014/01/maser-no27-nod-to-ed-ruscha-new-street.html |
| Biographies | Maser is a Dublin-based graffiti artist who has been painting for over ten years in the Irish/international graffiti scene, in such places as New York, Copenhagen, London, Holland, Belgium, Spain and Sweden. He began studying fine art and continued on to graduate with distinction in a BA in Design Communication (graphic design). He was later awarded membership of the International Society of Typographic Designers, MISTD. Within the last 2 years Maser has focused more on his painting/street art and has high ambitions to promote the positive aspects of the graffiti culture to the Irish society. Maser is a member of the TDA Klann and FOES Crew. The TDA Klann is Ireland's premier graffiti crew, widely known for their unique and innovative style of writing. They have been running Ireland's only outdoor graffiti festival since 1993 and fronting a movement of emerging talent. Maser’s collaboration with singer Damien Dempsey is outlined here: |
| Commission Type | Local Authority,Regeneration Agency |
| Commissioner Name | Limerick City Council |
| Commissioning process | Invitation |
| Artform | Visual Arts |
| Funded By | Limerick City Council |
| Location | Disused Petrol station, Parnell Street |
| County | Limeri |
| Town | Limerick |
| Website | limerickcityofculture.ie/content/draw-out-urban-exhibitionists |
| Content contributor(s) | Web Editor |
| Associated professionals / Specialists involved | Catherine O’Halloran, senior youth worker, the Northside family resource centre, Ballynanty. Paul Foley, Senior Executive Officer Environment Department, Limerick City Council |