Chanoir
Title:
Rarity: Unique
Size: 60 x 40 cm
Materials: Acrylic on panel
Medium: Painting
Name: Alberto Vejarano
Nationality: Francaise
b. 1976
Alberto Vejarano, known as CHANOIR, is a French-Colombian artist born in 1976 in Bogotá. World-renowned, he is famous for the energy and optimism his graffiti conveys. CHANOIR creates in a universal visual language, rooted in the belief that art and artists are agents of positive change. A cat lover, CHANOIR chose his name in reference to Steinlen's poster: “Le Cabaret du Chat Noir”. His “CHA” cat logos, drawn on the fly, constantly change shape. Naïve and always expressive, they impart their emotions to passers-by, echoing the artist’s feelings in their flow. A relationship with the public comes about. His father, Gustavo Vejarano, a Colombian artist and esoteric, passed on to him his beliefs in subtle planes. As a result, for CHANOIR, art is a means of spreading energy, from spirit to spirit, with the aim of entertaining and playing with the spectator, while creating an art that is for everyone. Since the start, he has continually challenged the graphic boundaries between graffiti, street art, logotypes and tags. As the years went by, he began to integrate the “Kawaii” and “Cartoon” aesthetics into the post-graffiti universe, in a manner akin to today’s emojis. In 1997, he entered the Beaux-Arts de Paris and graduated under the tutelage of Jean-Michel Alberola. He then frequented free figuration painters François Boisrond and the Di Rosa brothers, with whom he shares a taste for spontaneous and libertarian expression. He then joined the modest art movement by participating in the documentary “Un monde modeste” directed by Stéphane Sinde. Jean-Michel Basquiat has been a major source of inspiration for CHANOIR, but also such icons as Snoopy, Barbapapa, Monsieur Madame, Hello Kitty, Les Shadoks, the Smurfs or more recently, Gumball. A nomadic artist, CHANOIR has been combining, for 30 years, work on canvas in his studio and spray-painting in the streets of Paris, Barcelona, Bogota or Winwood Miami, where he is regularly joined by artists El Xupet Negre and El Pez. The walls of Barcelona sparked a particularly active period in him, in the early 2000s, and inspired the documentary “Murs Libres”, about the heyday of Barcelona street art. There, he founded the 1980 collective with such artists as Jean-Philippe Illanes, Alexandre Sirvin, Hugo Garcia, and Ernest Ananos Montoto. In 2003, he took over the Colombian art scene participating in numerous exhibitions, such as the solo show “Mi complejo de Peter Pan” at La Cometa Gallery and at the Museum of Modern Art in Bogotá. It was in these years that he met the artist Nadin Ospina, who still influences his work today. He then began an international career from Miami to Los Angeles, from Beijing to Costa Rica, via Rome, Oslo, London and Brussels. In 2009, he set up his studio in Paris once and for all, and with the collective “1980”, presented a poetic installation of interactive graffiti, “Taguer la Lune”, as well as several frescoes for the exhibition “Né dans la rue - Graffiti” at the Fondation Cartier. His paintings are shown in galleries and at auctions organised by the most prestigious auction houses (Artcurial, Drouot). He was subsequently called upon to work with major brands such as Samsung, Emanuel Ungaro, Cacharel, Ubisoft for Just Dance, and Disney. In 2019, he was named Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres by the Minister of Culture Franck Riester. “Alberto is the only Western collector/artist to have preserved in his work the primordial vision of his messy room (after Ben).” J-M. Alberola.
DELIVERY
UK: £80.00
Europe: £120.00
Rest of world: £140.00
Collection is available from our carbon-neutral facility near Heathrow Airport. All artworks are packed by our team of experienced art handlers.
Delivery for this auction may take up to 30 days as these artworks are on display in either Tokyo or London.
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