Kirk Gallery is proud to share the two latest additions to their ‘Out in the Open’ 2019 collection, by French artist Seth Globepainter (Julien Malland). Bringing his work to Denmark had been on their wish-list for a long time, intrigued by how he approaches the world through such an endearing, childlike gaze.
Born in Paris in 1972, Seth began to express himself on walls in the mid-90s. In 2003, he embarked on a trip around the world to explore street art from different cultures, and in doing so, opened himself up to new ways of living and painting in urban areas. Since then, he has made his name by creating childhood-inspired interventions around Paris, and indeed the globe.
In Seth’s two new works, Aalborg has the opportunity to glance at the world with the same openness, not least in one new piece ‘Jack in the Box’, featuring a small boy sitting squeezed into a small box with a pencil in his hand, having drawn a little window on the wall for himself.
Seth explained to the Danish press, “I almost always use children in my work, since through the child I can talk to everybody who will all understand. My work is about talking to the inner child inside each and every one of us. Sweetness and innocence from childhood regularly contrasts with the chaotic environments I choose to put them in. We are all able to relate to children, and travelling around the world there are always children playing”.
Although Seth had only planned a single mural for Kirk: a flash of inspiration for a second one struck him on driving past an old building in Aalborg, just a little further up the street from the site of his original mural. The Kirk Gallery team moved mountains to turn around necessary licensing, and within an unprecedented 24 hours, the permits were in place for Seth to bring this new vision to life.
He painted over bricked-out windows to create a trompe l’oeil of a transparent building, complemented perfectly by a little tower sitting at the top. When the sky surrounding the building echoes the clouds in the painting, the effect is magical, with just a little girl sitting at the edge of one of the windows with a bird hovering beside her. Seth named this majestic piece ‘The Phoenix’, and since its transformation, Aalborg residents have marveled at this enchanting building they had never payed a second glance to before.
He explained, “The motive never is nearly as important as the place where it is situated. It is the surroundings and the effect of the piece on the urban landscape that really matters. All of a sudden the citizens see the building in a new way. This is why I like to paint in the streets.”
After intensively travelling to over fifty countries during the last two decades, Seth is very much aware of the way globalization and modernization are influencing local traditions. This experience culminated his book ‘Globe Painter’ published in 2007, followed by the documentary series ‘Les Nouveaux Explorateurs’, where Seth proposed to discover a country through the prism of its urban art.
Seth GlobePainter: web | facebook | instagram
KIRK Gallery: website | facebook | instagram
