Film Screening
CIDADE CINZA (GREY CITY)
October 13, 2023, 7-9 pm
Cherry Tree Park
205 E 99th St,
New York, NY
As the closing for our OPEN HOUSE, join us for a screening of CIDADE CINZA (GREY CITY), curated by our 2023 ONE WALL MOVEMENT Muralist N. Carlos J. Following the screening will be a Q&A session with N. Carlos J. and 2022 ONE WALL MOVEMENT Muralist Mattaya Fitts. ONE WALL MOVEMENT is a public art initiative that commissions muralists, graffiti artists, writers, and street artists to create a large-scale mural.
Free & Open to all.
All levels welcome.
About CIDADE CINZA
On the streets of São Paulo, Brazil, a new form of graffiti was born. Like wildfire, the works of artists such as Os Gêmeos, Nunca, and Nina spread through the streets of the city and then to art galleries and museums around the world.
Nevertheless, City Hall implemented the Clean City Law in an effort to “combat visual pollution,” hiring a small team to paint over graffiti deemed aesthetically unpleasing. When a large-scale mural was painted over, the artists unleashed a graffiti war against the local government, giving birth to one of the most creative resistance movements in Latin American art. Together, the artists worked to recreate lost artwork in an act that embodied the tensions within the city over who decides which pieces are art and which pieces get painted over.
Grey City is not only a documentary about graffiti artists and their work but also a film about the city and streets of São Paulo, which are simultaneously a battlefield and a confluence point—with graffiti serving as the voice of the populace.
Featured Artists
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N. Carlos J. (he/him) is a painter, designer and muralist who employs painting, illustration and drawing elements within his works. With a degree in Fine Arts and a background in mural painting, his works range from smaller multiples to large scale murals in the public forum. He began his study in fine arts at the High School of Art and Design, and continued at the Fashion Institute of Technology where he received his BFA.
Carlos joined Hi-ARTS as the 2023 ONE WALL MOVEMENT Muralist and just completed A Flower Grows in Harlem, a large-scale mural located at Lucille C. Clark Apartments in Harlem.
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Mattaya Fitts (she/her) is a visual artist whose practice encompasses a multi-disciplinary approach within a studio and street art discipline. Using figurative elements of abstraction, Mattaya depicts aspects of the human condition in a multi-layered way, inviting the viewer to interpret the work through a lens informed by individual and collective/ cultural narratives, earth’s ecology, and divine femininity. Using vibrant color palettes, her often fantastical artworks appear as images in which fiction and reality merge and meanings shift to create new worlds and characters that continually evolve.
Based in Boston and New York City, her public artworks can be found throughout Massachusetts and New York, including a wide range of clients and partners, from the City of Boston to Spotify.
Mattaya joined Hi-ARTS as our inaugural 2023 ONE WALL MOVEMENT muralist and completed Musa, a large-scale mural located in Cherry Tree Park in Harlem, NY addresses self-care as an extension of community care.