Ukrainian duo Interesni Kazki were recently in Gainsville, Florida in order to take part of the second phase of the 352walls urban art project that started last year in October.
The duo, consisting of Aleksei Bordusov and Vladimir Manzhos, better known as AEC and Waone respectively, spent some time painting this new large-scale mural featuring the kind of surreal imagery that has made them become some of the most influential street artists today.
Like in the rest of Interesni Kazki’s work, the new mural is inspired by science, religion, mythology, folklore and history. Each piece has its own story. It is not possible to unite them by one expression or concept, but one thing is clear, they challenge our perception of the world and what is physically visible transporting the viewer into a world of symbolic and dreamlike compositions.
The wall is divided into two sections painted by each of the artists that explain its meaning as follows:
On the left side of the wall (see picture above) we find the work of WAONE: the first image was titled ‘Irretrievable time is flying’ where irretrievable time (the hourglass) is surrounded by the ring of Saturn, a wonderful representation of Saturn or Chronus, the God of time and karma. Next to it we find, ‘Star Cube of SAPIENTIAE’ (wisdom, knowledge, lat.), showing a square section housing a temple. On top of this cube we see the head of a monkey with an open book on top. The monkey learns and becomes ‘smarter’. This particular section has been dedicated to the University of Florida. But the black cube also refers to Saturn/Cronus in order to express the value of time when it comes to cultural achievements as well as the development of science and technology.
To the right we find the work of AEC which he choses to call ‘Intuition or Sixth sense of Pedro’ featuring the head and hands of a man emerging from the ground. The image, based on a drawing presented at their last exhibition at Jonathan LeVine gallery in NY (here), is intended to represent taste, hearing, sight, touch, smell as well as a 6th sense – intuition – as represented here by the meteorite-like flying eye that passes by.
As mentioned, the mural was done for 352walls, a Gainesville-based urban art project founded and curated by Iryna Kanishcheva, and in many ways a visionary multi-site project aiming to transform under-utilised building facades into imaginative works of public art. To learn more about both the participating artists and the project visit www.352walls.org or follow them on social media like Facebook, Instagram or twitter.
Author: Fran
Founder and editor of Urbanite. Street Art lover who after the finishing her MA thesis on the Mexican and Norwegian muralist movement in the 1920-50s, developed a fascination for street art and graffiti that eventually led to collaborations with different art blogs, including the creation of this one.
