Final artists announced for Aberdeen street art festival
Nuart Aberdeen have announced the final artists for this year’s socially distanced event. The Aberdeen street art festival made its long-awaited return the city last week. Local talent Katie Guthrie, aka KMG making a welcome return to her hometown to create the first two murals of the 2021 run.
Henrik Uldalen and duo SNIK are the final artists for Nuart Aberdeen 2021. Organisers have added them to the group of already announced, Helen Burr, KMG and the pioneer of ‘balloon graff’ Fanakapan.
Henrik Uldalen
Henrik is a self-taught artist whose creative production revolves around classic figurative painting, presented in a contemporary manner. He explores the dark sides of life, nihilism, existentialism, longing and loneliness, juxtaposed with fragile beauty. Though he’s a figurative painter, his focus has always been the emotional content rather than narratives. Henrik often presents his work with a dream or limbo-like atmosphere. Using elements of surrealism and expressionism.
Internationally acclaimed artists SNIK took part in the 2018 festival. They then created one of the cities most loved murals. ‘Hold Fast Hope’ faces out to the harbour from a wall on Virginia Street. Both are delighted to be returning to Aberdeen. The city hold fond memories for them. They told us, “This is our second visit to Aberdeen and our fourth wall for Nuart. We couldn’t be happier to be painting again this year. We can’t wait to be involved again, up a lift and painting a wall for such a great city.”
SNIK
SNIK combine the creation of hand cut, multilayered stencils with haunting, ethereal portraiture, born from a male/female dual perspective. The duo’s work has been commissioned on walls the world over. Their post-industrial scenes loom large over passers-by in locations as diverse as Miami and Hong Kong.
Away from city streets, the pair have become revered by urban contemporary art collectors in recent years. This is thanks to rare releases of editions that can take up to a year to produce. The smaller scale and intricacy of layered stencil work requires incredibly precise cuts and careful compositional thought. This work has captured the attention of critics, art lovers and collectors alike.
Commenting on the announcement Adrian Watson, Chief Executive of Aberdeen inspired said “The focus this year has been on bringing UK based artists to the city over a period of time which helps to ensure that that we can deliver the productions as safely as possible.
“Henrik Uldalen and SNIK are talented artists who will bring interesting work to the walls of our city. It’s particularly rewarding when artists want to return to our city as this shows the warmth of the welcome they received first time round.
Nuart Aberdeen is curated and produced by the Stavanger based arts organisation Nuart, spearheaded by Curator and Director Martyn Reed, one of the worlds most respected and critically acknowledged authorities on the culture, he added “Nuart Aberdeen captures the imagination of people in a special way and we leave it to Henrik and SNK to create their art and the hope you the viewer will see something positive in what we’re trying to do.”
A covid safe event
Nuart Aberdeen 2021 has returned as a COVID secure series of individual street art productions which will take shape on the city’s walls throughout June and July. Artists will produce work supported by a local production team during the extended festival period.
With the first two productions complete Aberdeen Inspired are confident the plans for the event ensure the safety of artists, the production team, volunteers, and the public. As a result of covid, elements which would attract large scale gatherings, like the guided tours and public launch will not take place. This is to keep the public safe. Nuart will, however, provide resources and information to allow members of the public to conduct their own self-guided tours. The public can enjoy their tour at a time that suits them. In addition, it will be in accordance with the latest COVID-19 restrictions and regulations.
