The New Yorker has made a virtual art show to take place within the smash-hit game – and a real-life one at London’s Serpentine with a touch of augmented reality. Can it get young gamers into galleries?
For Brian Donnelly – known as Kaws since his graffiti beginnings in 1990s New York – art has always been a communication tool. From street art to vast public commissions, he says, “it’s a chance to create a dialogue”. His desire to bring art to the masses is partly why his work spans collectable toys and streetwear collaborations, as well as paintings and sculptures that sell for millions. His new exhibition will allow him to connect with a large number of eyeballs in, he says, “a new and massive way”. The show, New Fiction, is at London’s Serpentine Gallery, and simultaneously on two free online platforms: the gaming behemoth Fortnite and the augmented-reality (AR) app Acute Art.
With more than 400m player accounts, Fortnite is massive, especially when compared with the estimated footfall of an average Serpentine show (around 35,000). While the uninitiated might dismiss Fortnite as just another shooting extravaganza, players are increasingly spending time in its more peaceful zones, such as creative mode, where they can mooch about the Fortnite metaverse without fear of elimination. “You can hang out with your friends and explore new features,” says Fortnite’s partnerships director, Kevin Durkin. This could mean honing your dance moves but also watching a film or an Ariana Grande concert (as players did in August 2021), or, as of today, visiting an art gallery.
There have been lots of exciting crossovers between the art and virtual/augmented reality (VR/AR) industries, from the Street Art Museum Amsterdam (SAMA) trying to preserve local artworks to British rap artist, Giggs, using AR art to promote his album in London, UK. Further diversifying the space, next week the Thomas Crown Gallery will open in Birmingham, UK, as a specialist in AR and street art.
Thomas Crown Art is the brainchild of Birmingham-born international art dealer, Stephen Howes, looking to merge the worlds of art-tech and blockchain as an innovative solution for artists and art collectors. “It houses some of the country’s most original and lauded graffiti and street artists who have been inspired by revolutions and by ideas that disrupt convention, such as blockchain, cryptocurrencies and activist groups,” says Howes in a statement.
Like many others such as Psychic VR Lab with its AR art app Styly, Howe sees the potential in AR technology as a new means of expression, allowing artists to bring their creations to life, jumping off the canvas.
“Mobile technology is now part of our everyday, with more and more of our smartphones offering augmented reality experiences. Art is set to become one of the biggest beneficiaries of this digital revolution,” Howes continues. “AR allows artists to add considerably more layers and depth to their works, aside from just simply replacing one section in a painting with another still image, animation, effects and even technical details can be applied relatively easily with several purpose-built apps. It doesn’t end there – 3D visualisations can also be used to make the works even more intricate.”
Styly’s AR Art Wall
Another side of this technical revolution is the way each piece of artwork is embedded with blockchain technology to provide Thomas Crown Art customers with authentic artwork. “All our works of art are logged on the Ethereum’s blockchain with a unique ‘smART’ contract. This means that all the artwork is authenticated, and all providence issues are solved. This is a major step forward in the art world where forgery is a growing and expensive problem,” notes the gallery’s tech expert and business analyst Ian Mcleod.
“In the AR world, you can explore and interact with art like never before in history,” Howes adds. “Tech is democratising art. The gallery, which is a statement against the elite, symbolises this like nowhere else in the UK.”
Thomas Crown Art will officially open to the public this Monday, 3rd February, located in Stirchley, Birmingham, UK. For all the latest AR/VR news relating to art, keep reading VRFocus.
The power of graffiti and street art has been used by generations of young people in order to make a name for themselves or make a powerful statement on the state of society. But isn’t paint on a wall a bit old hat? Exactly, we need some modern technology to spruce things up, and that’s way augmented reality (AR) is being used in the latest street art pieces and murals to bring attention to a global issue that threatens us all; climate change.
Now, a new mural is going up near the City of Miami Cemetary which can be viewed through your smartphone in order to see the possible side effects of climate change. Curbed Miami reports that the mural was painted live in front of a small audience of gatherers and passers-by.
The company who put the mural in place, Before It’s Too Late, are using art, virtual reality (VR), simulations and science in order to make a statement about climate change. They’re a group founded by MIT graduate students who want to make people more aware of the dangers of climate change and what they can do to prevent it. You can learn more about them on their website.
This isn’t the first time we’ve seen street art and graffiti cross paths. In the AR app WallaMe you can leave AR art and messages on any wall space virtually, allowing other app users to view it when they visit the same space.
The AR graffiti app Gif-iti also altered real graffiti, by using special patterns which enable the phone to make the images pules and move like a real life gif.
Of course, if you want to get creative in the virtual world there are also options like Kingspray Graffiti, which can immerse you in a digital world that you can decorate and design at will.
It’s fascinating that street art has moved towards AR technology like this, but it makes sense. It’s natural though, as so many traditional art forms are moving further into the digital space. As more things like graffiti and street art make the jump to AR and VR, you’ll read about it on VRFocus.
The paint drips from the wall, bleeding the blue-green from the eyeballs into the pale, tan skin of Super Saiyan Goku. At least, that’s what I tell myself I’m spray painting on this brick wall, even though it looks more like a smiling potato with yellow grass on top of its head. I’m not much of an artist, but I can recognize the power of a piece of software when it’s there.
Kingspray Graffiti has been around for a while, originally as a Vive title, and now as a timed-exclusive on the Oculus Rift with Touch. What we have here is a full suite of features for painting graffiti art work on walls, multiplayer support, sharing options, and more it’s a fantastic tool that enables and promotes a very specific and striking form of art.
Before you clicked on this review, you probably already had a pretty good idea of whether or not this is for you. Kingspray Graffiti sets out to do one thing and one thing only: simulate the experience of spray painting stuff. You can pick different paint cans, nozzles, locations, and lighting to tag walls either on your own or with friends. Take pictures, share them, record 360-degree videos inside the game of your work, and listen to preset music stations, or your own tracks, while doing so.
Many people don’t realize that King Spray was actually an Xbox 360 indie game released around six years ago. This latest iteration, Kingspray Graffiti, takes the concept and expands on it in every way, as well as adding your hands into the experience. That’s the real game changer here.
Similar to other art-enabling VR apps like Tilt Brush, Medium, Quill, and others, there is no game in Kingspray. There aren’t missions, or objectives, or anything ‘to do’ in the traditional sense other than what you decide to do. Pick a location, decide what you want to make, and go make it.
In this way it’s a freeing experience that enables you to make and do whatever you’d like, but it’s also a bit overwhelming for people that enjoy having more precise instructions and directions. If you’re looking for something to hold your hand and tell you exactly what to do and how to do it, this isn’t the app for you.
For the intrepid street artist however, you have the power to make some truly incredible stuff. There are dozens of colors and shades to pick from with an intuitive interface. One of my favorite parts of the app is the clever in-game representation of a smartphone in your left hand. You can choose menu options, change the station on the jukebox, take photos of your creations, and more. Small touches like this are what really put experiences over the top in VR.
The social aspects of Kingspray are great as well, as you can co-exist in the same environment with up to four other other wall bombers in real-time. Collaborating on large wall art is exhilarating and the simple teleportation movement makes it easy to access far-reaching areas of a canvas, as opposed to physically trying to move around a building in real life.
Final Recommendation:Only For Fans of Street Art
Kingspray Graffiti takes a simple premise and expands it out to the point that it offers all of the features you’d ever want — and plenty that you probably didn’t know you wanted. It feels like the real thing, but it also lets you do so much more than what the typical artist could ever do in real life. It’s a creatively freeing, flexible, and engaging experience that’s equal parts artistic expression and social engagement. If you’re dying to try this, then you probably won’t be disappointed. But if you’re just passively curious about art’s applications in VR, then maybe spend time checking out Quill for drawing or Medium for sculpting first — they’re both free, whereas Kingspray is not.
You can download Kingspray Graffiti for Oculus Rift with Touch via the Oculus Home Store for $14.99.
