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C U R A T E D B Y P A U L H O W A R D , K O N G O U R I O T I S , M A R I A M I T A R

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I T ’ S O U R T H I N G : M O R E H I S T O R Y O N A U S T R A L I A N H I P - H O PP A U L H O W A R D A N D K O N G O U R I O T I S

CHRISTOPHER HIBBERT’S REMARK about graffiti during the great Indian uprising of 1857 suggests graffiti is always obscure: is this true about graffiti even today? And is it true even of contemporary writers and visual artists? Is there an imperative for creative people to make their statements and styles more accessible? It’s Our Thing: More History on Australian Hip-Hop, is an exhibition and performance program in two parts that raises this issue.

It’s Our Thing grew from two unlikely sources. Within Blacktown City Council’s Graffiti Management Plan 2012-2017, is an external review that argues for consideration of the full range of graffiti management practices in the Local Government Area. One recommendation is for the Council to investigate ways that aerosol art forms can contribute to a reconceptualising of the City as a

‘creative place,’ including exhibitions of aerosol art at Blacktown Arts Centre and street art projects. The key issue of graffiti could then partly be handled by the Council legitimatising and celebrating street art (including graffiti styled art), when undertaken with the permission of property owners, and in consultation with the local community. In 2006, an exhibition entitled Keep It Street, held at Blacktown Arts Centre, showcased the work of eminent graffiti artists. It’s Our Thing, is another foray into the subculture that encompasses graffiti, Hip-Hop, breakdance, the MC and the DJ.

In the 1990s, this subculture was alive and kicking in Blacktown. An artist run initiative, called Street Level, operated on 41 First Avenue, close to the Blacktown railway line. There graffiti artists worked with the new wave of Australian-accented words, styles

and pieces. Influences ranged from New York graffiti to contemporary art from USA and Europe, but what was significant was the signature and tone of a distinct local voice. Crews such as IBS and BRP provided the positive collaborative space. Working collaboratively helped to develop and individual’s and the crew’s style. Each crew would challenge the other, through this competitive environment the knowledge grew in all areas of Hip-Hop including the MCs, the graffiti writers and break dancers. The now famous band, Def Wish Cast, shot the first Australian internationally recognised Hip-Hop video (Mad as a Hatter) at Street Level in 1992. The time and place was a flashpoint of subcultural creativity and a critical meeting place - a place for exchange, for a new inter culture and social collaboration that inspired interdisciplinary practice.

One of the those arcane statements, beloved by the wall defacer,whose meaning is usually known only to the cognoscenti.1

Opposite: Unique at Street Level, Blacktown, c.1992, photograph and collection of Kon Gouriotis.

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1Hibbert, C, The Great Mutiny, India 1857, published Penguin 1978, London. 2Blacktown City Council’s Graffiti Management Plan 2012-2017, pp. 4-5.3Marcus, G., Lipstick Traces: A Secret History of the Twentieth Century, published Secker & Warburg 1989, London.4Eco, U., On Beauty: A History of a Western Idea, page 409, published Secker & Warburg 2004, London.

It’s Our Thing sets out to examine two disparate sources: graffiti management and the origins of Australian Hip-Hop in Blacktown, by presenting the Street Level archive, new and old artworks, and the archives of Minky Rawat and Khaled Sabsabi, artists who were active at the time. To bridge the gap, and set the work in the context of the period, artists who influenced both Rawat and Sabsabi including Joseph Beuys, Pablo Picasso and Andy Warhol have been included in the exhibition.

Today a new Hip-Hop generation, operating on the immaterial world of the digital era exists in Blacktown, and indeed, Australia. A curatorium was formed to create awareness of the diverse activities centred on Hip-Hop, and specifically on the high quality of objects, and people involved in the presentation of those objects. This was a way of connecting to the digital generation and the mostly Hip-Hop analogue generation around Street Level, and to the academic research involved in Blacktown Council’s Graffiti Management Plan.

A key ingredient in understanding the subculture is the differences in practices between artists. The practice known as ‘fine art’, derived from a formal art education and training, is distinct from the practice of ‘street art.’ ‘Street art’ can include a mix of media across fashion, style, site-specificities and genres. Similar artistic strategies were adopted in the USA by Andy Warhol, who successfully acted as a social and creative chameleon. Meanwhile in Europe in the1960s, Joseph Beuys was spearheading the notion of social sculpture to which current practices of socially-engaged, interdisciplinary and participatory artwork owe a great deal. Pablo Picasso’s art had a constant autobiographical nature, an inventiveness, such as his part in Cubism, which changed the course of Western art. He developed new methods of observing and understanding the human figure. Rawat and Sabsabi want to effect environmental and social change, and to understand their own existence, through their projects.

In Paris in 1953, the Situationist Movement, led by the artist, Guy Debord, began scrawling graffiti which disavowed the status quo, with inscriptions such as “Ne Travaillez Jamais” (“Never Work”). The movement became the Situationist International whose strategies led towards the students and workers protests of May 1968. Whilst the political and social consciousness of this form of graffiti is unquestionable, and of course is ubiquitous nowadays across the world, it nonetheless lacks a visual language and a beauty that captures a broader audience and response. In the images by Warhol and Beuys or Rawat and Sabsabi we still see a sort of mocking polemic against the industrialised world all around us, showing the archaeological finds of a contemporary world. But crucially, their works also teach us to love the objects and images of our environment, those elements Umberto Eco calls ‘certain forms that can convey an aesthetic emotion’.

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Khaled Sabsabi, God Complex I, 2016, Lexon resin, enamel (Dy-mark), H 70 x L 100 cm.

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Minky Rawat, Katalyst (medallion), 2010, stainless steel, H 9 x L 3.3 cm.

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Joseph Beuys, Yellow Yell, 1984, Silkscreen (ink) on paper, H 21 x L 29.5 cm. Edition: 100, signed and numbered. Publisher: Edition Staeck, Heidelberg. Courtesy of the Ian George collection.

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Mentor, ME, (drawing), c.1980s, ink on cotton, H 28 x L 31 cm. Khaled Sabsabi collection.

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The Sauce, (booklet), c.1980s, toner (photocopier) on 80 gsm paper, H 21 x L 15 cm. Khaled Sabsabi collection.

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Minky Rawat, Stage Axe 11, (poster), c.1992, ink (silkscreen) on paper, H 52.2 x L 39 cm. Khaled Sabsabi collection.

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K H A L E D S A B S A B I ( P E A C E F E N D E R )

Khaled Sabsabi works across borders, cultures and disciplines to challenge extreme principles and actions. Born in 1965 in Lebanon, Sabsabi with his family moved to Australia in 1977 and settled in Granville, NSW. Growing up he was active in the Hip-Hop scene, a part of the Granville Hip-Hop group COD (Count on Damage) to express the social and political issues of the time, also performing with US Hip-Hop legends Public Enemy. Experimentation with sound and poetry in Hip-Hop set a foundation for his practice. Today Sabsabi lives and works in Bonnyrigg, NSW, reaching an international audience with a practice that ranges across multimedia and site-specific installation.

For It’s Our Thing, Sabsabi will pres-ent a new series that continues his exploration of the Infinite, contem-plating Islamic Sufism; stripping back, constructing and deconstructing.

In 12 A – F series Sabsabi cut out stencils of his own silhouette into a postcard – 3 above and 3 below – each mirroring its other. Although each one is cut and painted differently, a sense of equilibrium is created. The use of negative and

positive space multiplies the figures further, all of which fold into the middle creating a sense of the Infinite.

Continuing this cyclical process in God Complex, Sabsabi repetitively spray-painted stencilled quotes onto resin light boxes. Reverting from the contemporary digital to an analogue process, the artist privileges an exper-imental experience, finite, and not a perfect replication. The witty interplay of phrases such as “Spelt backwards is Dog”, draws from Sabsabi’s early experimentation in Hip-Hop. The legi-bility of the repeated quotes fluctuate, with some layered into obscurity.

Hung beside Sabsabi’s work are key influences on his practice, including examples of Picasso’s socio-political commentary, and Joseph Beuys’ social sculpture.

Untitled 1 and Untitled 2 are dedicated to the influence of the musical genius, Prince. Sabsabi was midway through creating the work when Prince died, and it was finished as a personal homage.

70,000 Veils is a testament to Sabsabi’s ongoing experimentation

with sound and image from his Hip-Hop beginnings, and his later work making soundtracks for feature films. The large multi-channel video work combines photographic collages and stripped back sound into an autobiographical 3D media landscape, made up of 70,000 seconds of sound and animated images.

Visually the human scale and 3D format of 70,000 Veils alludes to the influence of graffiti, in particular a “piece” – a complex and labour intensive painting. 70,000 Veils parallels the 3D effects of graffiti arrows and many colour transitions. Without the 3D glasses each monitor resembles a sketch for either a block or a calligraphy/graffiti throw-up. The throw-ups’ characteristic outlines and minimal fill-colours look like 70,000 Veils’ nominal colour palette.

All Sabsabi’s works are autobiographical – deconstructed media collected from the artist’s day-to-day experiences of local and international places. Constantly negotiating and renegotiating multimedia to draw attention to socio-political issues, he asks the viewer to consider the Infinite.

L U C Y S T R A N G E R

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Khaled Sabsabi, Untitled I, (Prince), 2016, (detail), Kodak xtralife II paper 360gsm, enamel (Dy-mark), H 12.2 x L 15.2 cm, 4 of 21 parts.

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Khaled Sabsabi, Untitled 1, (Prince), 2016, Lexon resin, enamel (Dy-mark), H 70 x L 100 cm.

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Khaled Sabsabi, 70,000 Veils, 2014, (detail), digital 1080 Progressive Scan PAL HD Video, MP4 Format, each channel 700 seconds, 100 parts, H 400 x L 1320 x W 100 cm.

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Khaled Sabsabi, God Complex, 2016, detail, Kodak xtralife II paper 360gsm, acrylic, H 12.2 x L 15.2 cm each, 2 of 20 parts.

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Khaled Sabsabi, God Complex 2, 2016, Lexon resin, enamel (Dy-mark) lightbox, H 70 x L 100 cm.

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Just Us at Central Station Records Melbourne office on signing the first Hip-Hop record contract in Australia to release the Voice of the Hunted LP, c.1988. From the left is Peacefender (Khaled Sabsabi), Mentor and Case. Fuji colour paper (photograph), H 9.9 x 15.1 cm. Khaled Sabsabi collection.

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Khaled Sabsabi, 12 A, 2016, 12 parts, Kodak xtralife II paper 360gsm, acrylic, H 12.2 x L 15.2 cm.

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M I N K Y R A W A T ( A T O M E )K O N G O U R I O T I S

For more than 25 years, the word ATOME has been redrawn and repainted by Minky Rawat. This devotion to experimenting with a single message has produced an extraordinary series of evolving combinations on different surfaces, including paper, walls, wooden boards, fabrics, surf boards, skate boards and recently canvases.

Although Rawat has lived in Sydney since he migrated with his family from India in the 1970s, he has inscribed ATOME on walls in cities in Europe, North America, India and Australia. Since he first travelled to New York in 1991, his national and international reputation has grown steadily. His work has been critiqued in Thames & Hudson’s Graffiti World, and in various specialist publications including XTENSYBLE UNCOMMISSIONED ART: an A-Z of Australian Graffiti. KET Urban Art Legends published ATOME in an international roll call of graffiti writers, including Banksy, BLADE, Blek le Rat and Daze. In the mid-1990s Rawat established the first Hip-Hop clothing label, titled Caution, in Australia with Simon Bottle and

Bill Bovopoulos. His Western Sydney crew IBS included Hip-Hop music innovators, Def Wish Cast.

Rawat’s interest in graffiti came from reading remarks that defaced the seats of Sydney trains while he was travelling to school. Like many of his generation he was swept up by the New York Hip-Hop eruption in the early 1980s. NY films, videos, rap music, breakdancing, graffiti magazines and photographs all influenced his ATOME form. As his infatuation with graffiti deepened, his confidence grew and two distinct inclinations developed. The first was his embrace of the histories of modern art, especially Pop artist Andy Warhol and Op artist Bridget Riley. The second was his awaking consciousness of his Indian Hindu-Sikh cultural heritage: brilliantly bold colours as in religious images and cloths such as sari dresses, resonate within all the paintings in It’s Our Thing.

For this exhibition Rawat has created a new triptych painting on canvas titled flows in form. Here, bold shapes and colours spread beyond the

perimeter of the canvas as unfamiliar formal elements – as in the drawings of Biro boogie and Led sketches – subjects are contained and float within the paper. A modular grid arrangement, is in most of Rawat’s ATOME works, has also been applied to flows in form, minimised to a traditional convention – the triptych.

In the piece, ‘A’ Series, there are 12 parts set in a portrait orientation and gridded vertically and horizontally, as in the works Biro boogie and Led sketches, while in the piece 1000’s they are arranged horizontally.

While in Rawat’s outdoor works on public walls, the grid disappears. Here he is often guided by context and environment and by the prepared drawing. These and other small movements resemble a traditional Japanese ‘Noh’ performance, subtle yet with high skill level as in a codified culture.

Rawat’s flow from the street to the gallery marks a significate shift in his presentations. This is the next dimension of ATOME.

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Minky Rawat, ‘A’ series, 2014, 15 parts, enamel (aerosol paint) on canvas, H 60 x W 90 cm.

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Minky Rawat, Led sketches, 2008-2011, (detail), led pencil on 80gsm paper, H 21 x L 29.7 cm.

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Minky Rawat, 1000s, 2015, 1 of 11, colour markers on paper, H 30 x L 24 cm.

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Minky Rawat, ATOME, c.2002, pencil on paper, H 21 x 29.7 cm.

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Minky Rawat, Biro boogie, 2012 – 2015, 100 parts, biro and felt ink on paper, H 15 x L 19 cm.

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Minky Rawat in Street Level Gallery, Blacktown, c1992, Photography and collection of Kon Gouriotis.

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A N D Y W A R H O LF L O W E R S

Minky Rawat, ATOME, c1986, coloured pencil, paper and plastic, H 21 x L 29.7 cm. Minky Rawat collection.

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S T R E E T L E V E LK O N G O U R I O T I S

On a May weekend in 1995, John Cheeseman and I hired a truck and collected all of Street Level’s assets and drove them to Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre (Liverpool) where they have remained since. It marked the end of Street Level’s 1990 to 1995 period at 41 First Avenue Blacktown. It also initiated the third and final phase of Street Level as an Artist Run Initiative (ARI) in Western Sydney, a low infrastructure virtual project space. This final phase was led by members, Kathy Cleland and David Cranswick, curating exhibitions and events across sites in Parramatta and the new Casula Powerhouse, until 1998.

After the closing in 1983 of the Modern Art Gallery, Casula (run commercially by artist Alice Klaphake), there had been no contemporary art space between Annandale and Penrith. In 1981 Penrith Regional Gallery & The Lewers Bequest was the first local government gallery in Western Sydney. By 1988 the Campbelltown Bicentennial City Art Gallery came into operation, followed by the Casula Powerhouse in 1994. Six years earlier Street Level had been

incorporated as a not-for-profit ARI, the first in Western Sydney. A part of the (multi-campus) University of Western Sydney, it was established by about 30 former students of the Nepean College of the Arts. They were led by Katie Soady, Albertina Viegas, Diane Wallis and Atina Hrstic. With funding from members and the Australia Council for the Arts, the new ARI rented a shopfront at 213 High Street Penrith, launching its first program in 1988 - an Albertina Viegas installation of bamboo and domestic implements as weapons evoking resistance and resilience in face of the Indonesian invasion of East Timor.

From the outset, Street Level members wanted to connect the region to a network of ARIs nationally and internationally, to engage with art and ideas. They also felt it was necessary to take up social issues such as Aboriginal land rights, community television, environment, vivisection, gay and lesbian equality and East Timorese independence. They tried new ways to present art to the community and to provide

professional experience for artists and curators.

The second phase of Street Level history was the collective’s move to Blacktown. They leased a shopfront, a ‘bunker’ with space to establish six artists studios and a gallery. The collective immediately engaged with Blacktown’s and western Sydney’s Hip-Hop scene. They set up a legal wall for graffiti writers and an exhibition Thrill to Chill which commissioned new graffiti writers to paint the gallery walls. The constantly changing legal wall outside, and a moving exhibition/events program inside every two weeks, established a constant aesthetic dialogue on Australian Hip-Hop and visual arts.

Over time, Street Level has been run by voluntary curators and artists developing over 200 exhibitions and events. By various ingenious means they have all activated a collective awareness of arts culture in Western Sydney.

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Garage Graphix (poster), Signs of Survival, 1989, ink (silkscreen) on paper, H 61 x L 45.5 cm. Private collection.

L I S T O F W O R K S

// K H A L E D S A B S A B I

Khaled Sabsabi, 70,000 Veils, 2014, digital 1080 Progressive Scan PAL HD Video, MP4 Format, each channel 700 seconds, 100 parts, H 400 x L 1320 x W 100 cm.

Khaled Sabsabi, Untitled I, (Prince), 2016, Kodak xtralife II paper 360gsm, enamel (Dy-mark), H 12.2 x L 15.2 cm each of 21 parts.

Khaled Sabsabi, Untitled 2, (Prince), 2016, 21 parts, Kodak xtralife II paper 360gsm, enamel (Dy-mark), H 12.2 x L 15. 2 cm.

Khaled Sabsabi, Untitled 1, (Prince), 2016, Lexon resin, enamel (Dy-mark), (light box), H 70 x L 100 cm.

Khaled Sabsabi, Untitled 2, (Prince), 2016, Lexon resin, enamel (Dy-mark), (light box), H 70 x L 100 cm.

Khaled Sabsabi, God Complex I, 2016, Lexon resin, enamel (Dy-mark), (light box), H 70 x L 100 cm.

Khaled Sabsabi, God Complex 2, 2016, Lexon resin, enamel (Dy-mark), (light box), H 70 x L 100 cm.

Khaled Sabsabi, God Complex, 2016, Kodak xtralife II paper 360gsm, acrylic, lightbox H 12.2 x L 15.2 cm each of 20 parts.

Khaled Sabsabi, 12 A, 2016, 12 parts, Kodak xtralife II paper 360gsm, acrylic, H 12.2 x L 15.2 cm.

Khaled Sabsabi, 12 B, 2016, 12 parts, Kodak xtralife II paper 360gsm, acrylic, H 12.2 x L 15.2 cm.

Khaled Sabsabi, 12 C, 2016, 12 parts, Kodak xtralife II paper 360gsm, acrylic, H 12.2 x L 15.2 cm.

Khaled Sabsabi, 12 D, 2016, 12 parts, Kodak xtralife II paper 360gsm, acrylic, H 12.2 x L 15.2 cm.

Khaled Sabsabi, 12 E, 2016, 12 parts, Kodak xtralife II paper 360gsm, acrylic, H 12.2 x L 15.2 cm.

Khaled Sabsabi, 12 F, 2016, 12 parts, Kodak xtralife II paper 360gsm, acrylic, H 12.2 x L 15.2 cm.

Mentor, ME, (drawing), c.1980s, ink on cotton, H 28 x L 31 cm. Khaled Sabsabi collection.

The Sauce, (booklet), c.1980s, toner (photocopier) on 80 gsm paper, H 21 x L 15 cm. Khaled Sabsabi collection.

Just Us at Central Station Records Melbourne office on signing the first Hip-Hop record contract in Australia to release the Voice of the Hunted LP, c.1988. From the left of the image is Peacefender (Khaled Sabsabi), Mentor and Case. Fuji colour paper (photograph), H 9.9 x 15.1 cm. Khaled Sabsabi collection.

// M I N K Y R A W A T

Minky Rawat, ‘A’ series, 2014, 12 parts, enamel (aerosol paint) on canvas, H 60 x W 90 cm.

Minky Rawat, Led sketches, 2008-2011, 20 parts, led pencil on 80gsm paper, H 29.7 x L 21 cm.

Minky Rawat, Biro boogie, 2012 – 2015, 100 parts, biro and felt ink on paper, H 15 x L 19 cm.

Minky Rawat, 1000s, 2015, 11 parts, colour markers on paper, H 30 x L 24 cm.

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Street Level, Blacktown, c 1992, Photography and collection of Kon Gouriotis.