Research Paper On Blek Le Rat

1656 Words4 Pages

Claire(Huixin) Pang
Heather Dunn
DNY 1000C
10/25/2017

Research of Blek

Blek le Rat, a French graffiti artist who has a well-known name as the “Father of stencil graffiti”. Blek expresses his artwork by using stencils instead of stylized lettering for graffiti. Hundreds of artists all over the world was inspired by his artworks with his stenciled style. The British artist Banksy even said, "every time I think I've painted something slightly original, I find out that Blek has done it as well, only twenty years earlier."
As one of the earliest graffiti artists in Paris, he was originally known for stenciling the giant rat image all over Paris. For him, the rat images symbolize freedom and the distribution of art around the city just like if …show more content…

His pseudonym, Blek le Rat, originates from a childhood cartoon “Blek le Roc”, using “rat” as an anagram for “art” because, the rats symbolized both freedom and the spread of art throughout the city as an invasion for him. In the early 80s, American artist Richard Hambleton brought his artwork to Paris over from the US. During that period, Blek was already started making rats, but when he saw Hambleton’s large shadow human figures, he got the idea of making bigger pieces, so he soon began doing larger works, as well as self-portraits. Today, Blek is credited as the first to transform stencil from basic lettering into imagery, and the one to invent the life-sized stencils. He creates most of his stencils by hand, crafting each to perfection to allow for the best detail possible upon application, and works mainly in black and white.Ten years after he made his first piece, Blek was eventually discovered and caught by the French authorities. He was charged and fined for stenciling his own version of Caravaggio’s Madonna and Child onto a wall in Paris. This image is Blek’s oldest remaining …show more content…

Many of his pieces are pictorials of solitary individuals in opposition to larger, oppressive groups. In 2006, he began his series of images representing the homeless, which depict them standing, sitting, or lying on sidewalks, in attempts to bring attention to what he views as a global

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