Os Gêmeos - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Os Gêmeos are graffiti

Graffiti

Graffiti is the name for images or lettering scratched, scrawled, painted or marked in any manner on property....

Artist

An artist is a person engaged in one or more of any of a broad spectrum of activities related to creating art, practicing the arts and/or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse is a practitioner in the visual arts only...

identical twin brothers (born 1974) from São Paulo

São Paulo

São Paulo is the largest city in Brazil, the largest city in the southern hemisphere and South America, and the world's seventh largest city by population. The metropolis is anchor to the São Paulo metropolitan area, ranked as the second-most populous metropolitan area in the Americas and among...

, Brazil

Brazil

Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...

, whose real names are Otavio and Gustavo Pandolfo. They started painting graffiti in 1987 and gradually became a main influence in the local scene, helping to define Brazil's own style. Their work often features yellow-skinned characters - taken from the yellow tinge both of the twins have in their dreams - but is otherwise diverse and ranges from tags to complicated mural

Mural

A mural is any piece of artwork painted or applied directly on a wall, ceiling or other large permanent surface. A particularly distinguishing characteristic of mural painting is that the architectural elements of the given space are harmoniously incorporated into the picture.-History:Murals of...

s. Subjects range from family portraits to commentary on São Paulo's social and political circumstances, as well as Brazilian folklore. Their graffiti style was influenced by both traditional hip hop style and the Brazilian pixação

Pixação

Pixação or Pichação is a unique form of graffiti native to São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It consists of tagging done in a distinctive, cryptic style, mainly on walls and vacant buildings. Many pixação artists compete to paint in high and inaccessible places, using such techniques as free...

movement.

From early influences to present

Hip hop culture reached Brazil in the late eighties and appealed to a lot of the country's teenagers at the time. The twins started out as breakdancers, and got involved with the graffiti aspect later on. Of course, their first steps into the graffiti world were attempts to emulate American hip hop pieces, in early New York style. It was not until some years later that they started to consciously put Brazilian cultural elements and influences into their graffiti.

Their first significant artistic influence outside their immediate environment, and their limited access to American hip hop (Style Wars

Style Wars

Style Wars is a 1983 documentary on hip hop culture, directed by Tony Silver and produced by Tony Silver and Henry Chalfant. The film has an emphasis on graffiti, although bboying and rapping are covered to a lesser extent...

, Subway Art

Subway Art

Subway Art is a collaborative book by Martha Cooper and Henry Chalfant, which documents the early history of the New York graffiti movement...

, Beat Street

Beat Street

Beat Street is a 1984 drama film, following Wild Style in featuring New York City hip hop culture of the early 1980s; breakdancing, DJing, and graffiti.-Plot:...

), stemmed from a chance encounter with Barry McGee

Barry McGee

Barry McGee is a painter and graffiti artist. He is also known by monikers such as Ray Fong, Lydia Fong, Bernon Vernon, P.Kin, Ray Virgil, Twist and further variations of Twist, such as Twister, Twisty, Twisto and others.-Life and career:McGee graduated from El Camino High School in South...

(also known as Twist

Twist

Twist may refer to:* Twist , a decorative piece of citrus zest* Twist , a comic by John Cook* Twist in screw theory in applied mathematics and physics* Twist , an American teen magazine...

), who happened to be in Brazil for several months on a study program through the San Francisco Art Institute

San Francisco Art Institute

San Francisco Art Institute is a school of higher education in contemporary art with the main campus in the Russian Hill district of San Francisco, California. Its graduate center is in the Dogpatch neighborhood. The private, non-profit institution is accredited by WASC and is a member of the...

in 1993. Technique and experience were shared, and McGee provided them with a lot of photographic examples from the American graffiti scene. Through Barry McGee, Os Gemeos met Allen Benedikt (founder of 12oz Prophet Magazine and also part Brazilian), who together with Caleb Neelon (also known as Sonik) became the first to interview them after a trip to Brazil in 1997 (12oz Prophet Magazine Issue 6; 1998), which became Os Gemeos' introduction to audiences outside of South America.

Recent work

Their latest work is a wall in Miami, Florida painted for Art Basel Miami Beach. Before that was a painting of 16 at 10 meters in the centre of Heerlen, the Netherlands. This painting determines part of cultural festival Cultura Nova. It was the inspiration source of the large opening act where the head character came to life in association with the French group La Plasticiens Volant. The show “L’Etranger” went in premiere on 29 August and was one-off seen on Cultura Nova. The wall painting continues to be preserved and is shown on the Schelmerhofje in Heerlen, the Netherlands. Click here for a photograph.

Legal work

Because Subway systems and train

Train

A train is a connected series of vehicles for rail transport that move along a track to transport cargo or passengers from one place to another place. The track usually consists of two rails, but might also be a monorail or maglev guideway.Propulsion for the train is provided by a separate...

s are often an object of pride in Brazilian cities, and therefore especially well guarded, they were never on top of the list of graffiti canvases (in sharp contrast with graffiti in other countries). But as of the early 2000s a couple of high profile graffiti artists, Os Gêmeos being one of them, were invited to paint the trains legally. Other large scaled public commissioned work, such as huge murals (for example the Avenida Paulista mural) followed afterwards. The most current mural is in 21st between 8th and 9th avenues on NYC's Chelsea district which is about 50% complete as of 08/09/2010. The latest mural is 6 stories on height and is painted on an elementary school.

Their first solo exhibition in the United States was at The Luggage Store in San Francisco, California in 2003.

As part of the Dreamland Artist Club 2005 project, they painted a 60 foot mural in Coney Island

Coney Island

Coney Island is a peninsula and beach on the Atlantic Ocean in southern Brooklyn, New York, United States. The site was formerly an outer barrier island, but became partially connected to the mainland by landfill....

on Stillwell Ave.

Comments on Os Gêmeos' work

"With rage, bliss and the power of their simultaneity, Os Gemeos have come to signify Brazilian graffiti itself to many viewers."

"Renowned for spray-painting with a kind of intuitive understanding, they have also gained recognition for their fantastic characters..."

External links

VIDEO

Interview with Os Gemeos, Jeffrey Deitch and Martha Cooper at Deitch Projects, 2008 by ScribeMedia.Org