“Look. If you had one shot or one opportunity. Would you capture it or just let it slip?”
In 2002, Slim Shady aka Eminem’s alter-ego, violently shared his angst which moved a chord in each and every one of us, rap aficionado or not. To one Barcelonian, that song was a life changer. Overheard over the ringtone of his cousin’s mobile when he was just 11 years old, Nil Safont felt a strong connection with that music and a strong urge to question social conventions. A year later, Slim Safont captured that one shot.
He started running his first tags at the age of 12 under Slim Shady, and pretty soon he was better known as Slim. Everyone called me that, even my mother, and no matter how much I wanted to change my name, I couldn’t – I had already written it all over the place and people had seen it too much. I met Nil/Slim virtually, and prior to that, I connected with his work. Across the Mediterranean Sea that connects Barcelona to Beirut, that connects his world to mine, he opened up on his alter-ego, he opened up on Slim.
A Fine Arts graduate from the University of Barcelona, Slim shares that although the years spent there as a student between 2013 and 2017 gave him a wealth of knowledge in art history and criticism, he discovered painting beyond the walls of the educational establishment. My apprenticeship as a painter has been entirely self-taught. I come from painting in the street. My relationship with painting comes from graffiti first and muralism second, he proudly asserts. Street painting that connected him with the art of painting and that led him into the world of the classics like Sorolla, Casas or Pla Y Rubio, and not the other way around.
My first references were urban artists, graffiti artists or muralists… It is only afterwards that I dissociated myself from the street to build myself a studio and start investigating the history of painting, the masters, the techniques… Autodidactic and self-educated, Slim learned everything by doing, by experience, with a passionate and open heart to figuratively and realistically express a connection, a feeling, all in one shot, figuratively and factually, for indeed, photography is part of Slim’s method of work.
Photography has always played a crucial role in my creation [process] because it is the base from which I start a painting. Sometimes however, it can be the other way. Sometimes I imagine a painting and to create it I need a photograph. Other times I take a photograph and imagine on it a new pictorial interpretation. And sometimes I start painting a photograph and during the process, many things happen that I stop looking at the photograph and the result ends up being something totally different.
Irrespective of his creative process, Slim’s dynamic relation between photography and painting is based on his keen interest in representing reality the way he sees it, the way he captures it. He is fascinated by the human figure and relationships between people, and admits to how challenging it can be to disassociate himself from the image he wishes to communicate. A painting can speak for itself as a material, separate from the image itself, but this has been difficult for me to learn… so I always work towards applying this so I may separate myself from the image by making a clear representation, with the help of the material itself, the texture, the colors, …
A dynamic dance between photography and painting. A self-taught approach that speaks from his own heart to the heart of the viewer. I am attracted to everything that makes me feel something. I am attracted to that person, to that situation, to that urban landscape or place or scene, and for which I feel a special connection. It is that particular connection that Slim feels which translates into a mural that in return, speaks to the viewer. The connection is mutual for the emotions are simple and raw, easily understood by viewers all over the world, from Barcelona to other European cities and all the way to the United States. Beyond the beauty of the work, Slim seeks the connection, especially when it comes to street art. Painting freely in a studio is not the same as painting in a neighborhood with problems in the suburbs of the city. Sometimes I get carried away by the attractiveness of the image and I know I would enjoy painting it in a studio freely. But if I am going to do in the street, then I feel that I have a bigger responsibility as I must find something more to share and tell than just my own personal enjoyment.
More than an artist, Slim is a story-teller. A witness to our daily lives. I like to meet the people I paint. When I portray someone I know, I am saying something about that person, I find my reflection in that person, I identify with that person. A mirror to our lives. A mirror to our human behavior. I am interested in representing something that people tell me or that I see in them. A portrait of someone sometimes represents an entire community, some values or ideas shared by many people. Street art gifts Slim with that opportunity to connect with others, something he truly appreciates and values. Street art is human, immediate, realistic; it translates human communication. Canvas painting on the other hand, is something that Slim enjoys but on a different remote level. When I paint on a canvas, I like to work on images or scenes that I captured from afar. It reflects ambiguous ideas or images that can have many interpretations or readings.
Transitioning between murals and cavasses, Slim finds it hard to choose which of the two mediums he prefers to communicate his art. Although murals connect him with the community and the people he represents, canvasses allow him to be on his own with his imagination, pushing him into a world of different creative possibilities, ironically throwing him out of his comfort zone. It is ironic indeed, because while he has found his own creative method with murals making the entire process a comfortable one, physical strain in completing murals on the other hand greatly limit his creativity process. Rain, noise, cranes that break down or poles that do not arrive, railings that you have to cover, cars that you may stain, temperatures that range between 0 and 40 degrees, gossip… Murals do mean a lot of wear and tear, physical and psychological pressure. Yet he quickly shrugs off the idea. It doesn’t matter. I miss it when I haven’t painted a mural in a month. I am addicted!
Much to our pleasure, I should add, for Slim remains an activist, though he would not admit it. I would say a romantic activist, as one needs to slowly dive into his paintings to understand the subtle representation, represented with soft and soothing colors. His work is neither provocative nor brutal. It is on the contrary very comforting, and perhaps the strongest messages are be better understood under softer tones. Sometimes I manage to be more evident with my messages and other times I prefer to be more poetic. But I always start with questioning social conventions. From an educational system operating from oppression to conformist roles and behaviors in our contemporary society, I try to inspire small changes in human behavior and our relationship with the power figures that influence it. It is evident that things in our world are not going well and they must change. An idealist? Yes. A dreamer? No. A realist? Yes. He neither considers himself a political activist nor a plain activist. He admits that he is just a painter and realizes that a painting is not going to change the world. Maybe. But soft and poetic messages to communicate strong messages sometimes may have a greater effect over time on the communal conscience. I try to find my own pictorial language, he shares. A language that is clearly his, defined by his own experiences and understanding of poetic justice. A language that is today understood and shared by many, as Slim has taken part in a wealth of festivals and international projects over the course of the last decade.
A language that is shifting from the streets and moving into art galleries. While it may be a generational trend, it is however undeniable that the street or urban art movement has considerably grown in the past years, and galleries have expressed plenty of interest. This has opened a new market for urban artists like Slim, allowing them to produce work that can be exhibited and sold. And while Slim’s entrance to the world of galleries has been relatively shy so far, he plans on giving the prospect of showcasing his work in confined spaces more of his time in the near future.
In his murals, I couldn’t help but notice that most of the people do not face the viewer. As a matter of fact, Slim seems to always paint them in action or from behind. Technically, he explains, it is difficult for the eyes to remain in perfect symmetry in large murals. He continues however to explain that the action is of more importance than the face. When a gaze captures our attention, we stop seeing everything else, we stop seeing the action of the characters or what is happening there.
I looked back at his murals and understood what he meant. Slow action in soft colors. Slow movements to describe a strong message. Small steps in the direction of an intended change in human behavior. Small changes over the course of time. Subtle. An artistic urban language defined by Slim.
He owns it. He better never let it go.
I’m blown away by the story behind the artist as well as his exquisite murals and raw talent. I am a public art curator and l want to work with him some day.