An Interview with Chicago's very own Steff Skills | Chicago Reader

Interview by Brianna Wellen/Chicago Reader
Photos by John Sturdy and Kevin Kujawa

From an early age, Skills has had a love of handwriting and hip-hop. She eventually combined the two passions, making flyers for shows and becoming a pioneer for women in Chicago’s graffiti scene beginning in the early 90s. Still an active bomber—she was among those featured in the Cultural Center’s recent survey “Paint Paste Sticker: Chicago Street Art”—the 42-year-old single mom teaches Chicago Park District art classes as she plans for the day she’ll travel the world as a full-time artist.

I felt comfortable in the street art scene because I was around a bunch of guys, and I was more or less one of the guys. As long as I was with them, I didn’t feel alone. It was later on in life when I became a mother and the crew split up that I felt like a weirdo. After I became a mom, I realized that guys don’t have this deep experience of being a mother, and I started to cherish my friendships with women. That’s when I realized that I wasn’t going to major in being someone’s wife.

I have two boys, a 16-year-old and a 21-year-old. I always make jokes that I’m getting so old I’m going to run into my kid at the club. As a young mom, I would take my son with me everywhere. I would take him to walls, I would take him to recording studios, I would take him to college with me. There was a rumor that I was putting him in my backpack and [painting] rooftops. I wasn’t, but that was my parenting style. My second child I had when I was 26, and I was much more chilled out and ready. My first child I had when I was 21, so you feel like you can still do everything. I just wanted to keep things going as much as I could. And it worked for a little while—at least I thought it did.



I’m a “cool parent.” Knowing what I know now I would have gone back and invested more in my little one because now I teach little ones, and I see parents taking their kids to classes. I didn’t know anything about that; we were just about pajamas and cartoons until kindergarten.

A lot of women whose careers I admire don’t have children. But I certainly don’t regret my children. My children add to my experience, my pushing a feminine aesthetic in my work that I didn’t feel was important before. I’m starting to feel my freedom now that my kids are older. Once my little one graduates high school, I’m ready to attempt to make it on artwork solely, my own hustle. Or if I can’t, maybe be an airline stewardess, something where I can travel, my own little midlife career change.

Both of my kids have drawn from an early age. Because I am an artist and also teach art full-time, I didn’t want to push it on them. As for being into graffiti and all that, they kind of see my world as another knitting circle that they’re just not interested in. Maybe if I was their dad and their male role model they’d be more interested. My kids will appreciate me once they get away—“Oh, cool, that’s a poster my mom did.”

My mom is extremely creative, but she’s more of a seamstress, she knits. She can go to the store and look at something she likes and go home and make it. She was trying to pass that on to me. I remember she bought me a Holly Hobbie sewing machine when I was six. I was terrified of the needle. My mom, coming from Costa Rica in the 40s—I feel I kind of broke a tradition of textile crafts, but ironically some of my paintings look like embroidery. That aesthetic is still there, it just comes out in a different way.

I really loved handwriting. I felt it was powerful. I really took pride in handwriting because my dad was in the navy and we moved a lot, and handwriting was an easy way to impress my teacher, fit in. Anytime anyone had to write anything, they’d ask me to go to the board. That was the beginning of a graphic background and made me pay attention to fonts and letters. As a kid, I would visit my godparents in New York, so I did see trains and graffiti around the city. I soaked in the aesthetic, and it just made sense: I always wanted to use letters in my art.

My mom married right out of high school. She was kind of a renegade in that she did divorce her husband back in those times with three kids. That was another seed that was planted: independence. My mom would always say, “It doesn’t matter who you’re with or how long you’ve been with them, they could always walk out the door.” So I was like, Wow, why even bother? My parents are still together. They’ve had rocky times where each one would call me and say, “I don’t think we’ll make it, I think we’re getting divorced.” Even as a child, independence was more of an influence than trying to be part of a team, and that’s been hard. I think I’ve subconsciously picked people that make you independent regardless. Now I have a boyfriend who is a really good guy. But it’s not my first love; my first love is graffiti and street art.

In 1990 I was supposed to go to the Art Institute, but my financial aid didn’t work out. I was pretty bummed, but I went to Truman College and studied astronomy, which really influenced my art. I lived on Honore and North Avenue, when Wicker Park was still a bohemian neighborhood. I had a two bedroom, and my rent was $260 a month. I had a roommate and she had a bigger bedroom, so my rent was $100 a month. I fell in love with the freedom, the bohemian community, the artists. I had never lived in a Latino community, and Wicker Park, Humboldt Park, and Logan Square were thriving Latino communities. I learned Spanish and learned how to cook the food. I knew a few dishes from my mom, but I immersed myself in a culture that I was a stranger to and that was a part of me.

I would love to move to Costa Rica. I have gone and painted out there. There’s definitely a thriving street art scene there. Their style is more influenced by Brazil and South America than New York. I’d be some old-school relic novelty out there. As soon as I get the gumption and time to travel, I can go to probably any country in the world and there would be someone in the graf community that would let me stay with them. Graffiti is a global community. It’s a really good feeling to be a part of a community like that.

Cap Matches Color | Sat 8/9

Under The Bridge Art Studio Presents "Cap Matches Color"

When: Saturday August 9, 2014 (4pm-10pm)
Where: 10052 S. Ewing Ave, Chicago IL

Support and Enjoy the Culture Chicago! Not to be missed.

9th Annual We Are Hip Hop Festival | Sat 8/9

ElevArte Community Studio's We Are Hip Hop Festival Approaches for 2014.

Join us for our 9th year of exploring the true essence of Hip-Hop and promoting a proactive culture.

Bring your family and friends to the fun-filled festival, to support our youth's talents and passions.



Lineup

1:02 - 1:17 pm House DJ Jay Emm
1:20 - 1:35 pm Sunniē Storm
1:35 - 1:50 pm Jeronimo Speaks ft. Lyric
1:52 - 2:07 pm DJ Moppy ft. Ebonee Cutz
2:07 - 2:22 pm Kuumba Lynx
2:22 - 2:37 pm Roman Flowrs
2:40 - 2:55 pm Hex Hectic
4:08 - 4:23 pm JAM1PHOTO.com
4:23 - 4:38 pm FM SUPREME
4:38 - 4:53 pm Nick Astro
5:00 - 5:20 pm Calez
5:20 - 5:50 pm Legitimate

2:00 - 4:00 pm Graffiti Battle
3:00 - 4:00 pm Breakdancing Battle

Saturday August 9th
Dvorak Park Cermak and May-
Chicago, IL 60608

Free for all ages.

Frankie Knuckles | Logan Square Mural Tribute

This graffiti mural honors Chicago music legend Frankie Knuckles. The Rooftop wall at Fullerton and California Ave. in Logan Square Chicago can be seen easily seen from the Blue Line, midway between the California and Logan Square stops.

Frankie Knuckles 2014 - ABC Project from BboyB ABC on Vimeo.

From the moment he heard that iconic DJ Frankie Knuckles had died, the local DJ and graffiti artist known as Mike Tupak began planning a mural to honor the musical legend.

Public art seemed the best way to honor Knuckles while educating those that may not have known what the man meant to many here.

“I didn’t personally know Frankie, but a lot of my friends did and they were hurting,” Tupak said. “I just knew (a mural) had to be done. I reached out to other artists and said, ‘We gotta do it.’ ”

Growing up in Chicago in the 1980s, house music unified young people from all over the city and got them grooving to the same beat, said graffiti artist known as BboyB. He was referred to as the “godfather of house.”

When Knuckles, 59, died of complications from diabetes in April, it was like losing a close friend for many fans.

For weeks, a group of seven graffiti artists scouted locations, collaborated on a design and coordinated a time to create a mural. They wanted a space that would get a lot of eyes, but also had enough room to create a big display.

BboyB, Tupak and other mural artists such as Skol, Mugs, Statik, Des and Flash came together because they all were fans of Knuckles, BboyB said.

Because the men are artists in what is still considered a controversial art form, they all go by pseudonyms.

The idea for the wall came from Tupak. BboyB found the space to paint it and Flash organized the work. The men first covered the wall blue, then they painted together to get the colorful mural finished.

They unveiled their wall in Logan Square earlier this week. It is located on the rooftop of X-It European Clothing Co. in the 2900 block of West Fullerton Avenue, facing the CTA Blue Line tracks.

“People ride that train line everyday,” Tupak said. “They come into O’Hare and they take the Blue Line downtown. Now the first thing they will see is Frankie Knuckles. It will hit them that we care.”

The mural shows an image of Knuckles with a glowing vinyl record behind him as a halo. The paint on the mural is bright and colorful, a nod to Knuckles’ happy and uplifting disposition, BboyB said. In the portrait, Knuckles is smiling because in life he always wore a grin.

“We didn’t want it to be a ‘Rest In Peace’ wall,” he said. “Those seem more gang-related or like someone shot you. We wanted it to show him as loved by Chicago. The only thing that shows he is deceased is we put the year he was born and the year he died.”

The artists used nearly 100 cans of spray paint on the mural and paid for the project themselves. They finished the piece after working on it for about three days. They don’t know how long it will stay up.

“A lot of young people have stopped by to take pictures,” said Erik Melos, the owner of the clothing store where the mural is located. “I see the viewers from the train checking out the work. The art is positive and very tastefully done.”

lbowean@tribune.com
Twitter: @lollybowean
Copyright © 2014 Chicago Tribune Company, LLC

Hebru Brantley Is Chicago’s Hip-Hop Art Star

BY ELLY FISHMAN/CHICAGO MAG

Hebru Brantley

He was a former street artist born in Bronzeville—and now the 33-year-old’s work fetches thousands from blue bloods and rappers alike.



An hour with the graffiti-artist-turned-painter Hebru Brantley in his Pilsen studio—a large warehouse loft full of cluttered tables piled with spray paint cans, bags of Skittles, and half-finished canvases—feels like a minor lesson in multitasking. In a matter of minutes, the six-foot-eight artist checks the sales numbers on his online store (hebrubrandstore.com), fields phone calls from a Hong Kong collector, and puts the final touches on one of his comic-book-style pop-art paintings. He will later hop on a plane to London, where he has a solo show at the gallery Mead Carney. “It’s a little crazy right now,” says Brantley with a sly smile.

At 33, Brantley is one of Chicago’s fastest-rising artists, with some of his works commanding upward of $100,000 and a rapidly growing collector base that includes entrepreneur Matthew Pritzker and rap impresario Jay Z (who spent $20,000 on a Brantley painting in 2012). In the last year alone, Brantley has had work in 10 gallery shows and was the featured artist for both Chicago Artists Month and Chicago Ideas Week. Now, on June 14, he will premiere nearly 40 new works in Parade Day Rain, a solo show at the Chicago Cultural Center. “It’s a big moment,” he says. “This is my chance to put you in my world.”

Brantley’s Instagram feed depicts a world right out of a Kanye West music video. There are photos of him skateboarding with Lil Wayne, smoking cigars with Carmelo Anthony, and hanging with Lenny Kravitz. In an era when most street artists find fame from the shadows, Brantley has built a brand by broadcasting his ties with America’s glitterati.

Growing up in Bronzeville, he spent most weekends cruising the South Side looking for walls to tag and train cars to mark. “We’d scratch-bomb on trains, tag freight cars—you know, do throw-ups across the city,” Brantley says of the ’90s graffiti scene. “It was all about getting your name up wherever you could.”

He didn’t discover high art until he was 16 and his mother, Pamela Glover, an assistant at Johnson Publishing Company, gave him a book on Jean-Michel Basquiat. “I was entranced by him. It was like looking at the guy who did it first,” says Brantley. “He was a rock star.”

Two years later, in 1999, Brantley headed to Clark Atlanta University to study film. But he quickly soured on the industry (long hours, little creative control), preferring to sneak into art classes at the Art Institute of Atlanta. “I started exploring different things beyond Basquiat. I was honing my own style,” he explains. “It was like a crash course in painting.”

For the next couple of years, Brantley made ends meet working at HMV Records while painting on the side. Then, in 2002, he made his first sale. “My friend [Philadelphia record producer] DJ Drama bought a painting for $800. It was a big confidence boost,” Brantley recalls. “After that, I started thinking about just doing art.”

Today, Brantley’s work, like Basquiat’s, nods to black American history and gritty urban life. But he also brings his own affinities—Marvel comics, hip-hop music—to the canvas. His 2012 piece Captain, O’ My Captain, for example, depicts a black Captain America taking a cigarette break. “The paintings don’t take themselves very seriously,” he says. “I’m a kid at heart. But they still have some of those darker undertones.”

Some of that darkness comes from Brantley’s own life. Five years ago, he lost both his mother and stepfather to cancer within a six-month period. “I wasn’t painting much at that time,” he says. “I had moved back to Chicago to take care of my parents, and I felt drained. But I started to carry a sketchbook. I figured at the very least I could journal what was happening.”

It was during those doctor visits and hospital stays that Brantley began sketching work for a solo show, Fade Resistant, at Three Peas Art Lounge, a now-defunct gallery in the South Loop. “My mom just really wanted to make it to the show, but on the day I was going to take her, she lost vision in one eye and didn’t have the strength to walk,” Brantley says. Though Glover never saw the show, Brantley recalls that she gave him a piece of advice that stuck: “Be shark-like. Always moving, never stopping.”

To hear Brantley tell it, his rapid rise is due as much to his role as a savvy salesman and networker as to his art. “It’s all about growth. I want to do films, heavy licensing deals. I want to run the whole gamut,” he says. “I want people to come out of the shower and step on a Hebru Brantley rug.”

***********************************************************************************************************

Hebru’s World

Brantley’s work ranges from pop-art paintings to life-size fiberglass figurines.


A Dedication (Spielbergian) (2013)


Contra (2013)


Untitled (2014)


The Watch (2013)

Where the Kompetition starts | Aerosol Supply | 2014

AEROSOL SUPPLY

Where the Kompetion Starts . Chicago . 2014 .

Music: "You're Welcome" / Alex Wiley / Closed Sessions

Open Blackbook Sessions | Flicks on Flash | 3/16

SiLO Art Space "Open Blackbook Sessions"

Featuring: Flicks on Flash / Samurai Sunday Picture Show

Sunday,March 16 (2-6pm)

Covert operators, Ninjas, Samurais of the art world, operating under the cover of night or in the barren wastelands of the streets. A shred of legality giving some the opportunity to shine with a rare few creations achieving longevity. We celebrate the untamed creative energy of these artists.

The man with over 2,000 flix takes you on a journey through his archives of Chicago Graffiti, complete with commentary.

Flash is a walking history book of the art since its inception here, and is continuously chronicling its evolution.

Many never before seen photos of elaborate works shot within the few moments of most of their existence that, if not documented would only be lost in time.



5110 W. Irving Park Road
Chicago, Illinois 60641
Phone (773) 710-9909
Email siloartspace@gmail.com
Website http://siloartspace.tumblr.com

About

The Silo Art Space:

Description

The SiLO Art Space is a storefront art gallery and artists service center presenting exhibitions and workshops in Chicago's Portage Park neighborhood.

The SiLO Art Space is dedicated to providing positive opportunities for artists and youth interested in contributing and participating in urban culture and street art. We strive to assist artists growth by offering not only a place to show their art, but a place to prepare their art at reasonable costs. We have fabrication services for art framing, stretcher bars and display cabinetry as well as art installations.

Hours of operation are during events and by appointment at this time.

Please contact @ siloartspace@gmail.com.