A screenprinter by trade Joe Vegas is a supremely talented yet rarely organised art-making machine. He is known to often dwell in the streets of Melbourne Town. 10 years ago whilst living in a caravan on the NSW coast he would scribble away furiously by himself during the gaps left by skateboarding, acting more out of compulsion than any grand design. It took the encouragement of a friend for him to realise art is a worthwhile focus/ Obsession/ way of life and much more than just a gap filler. Since then there has been a brief interlude in art school, a few changes in scenery and a shit load of debris such as stencils, illustrations, murals, Screenprints, Tattoos, Sculpture, Photography and Band Posters.

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Check out Joe’s work in the Sweet Streets Award show: 1000 pound Bend until the 24 october

Boo is a stencil artist and facilitator from Melbourne city. In spite of her honours degree in fine art she has been making street art for many years. The reclamation of public space being central to her work, she prefers the street to the gallery but exists wholly between the two. Boo is obsessed with the point at which the aesthetic and the political collide the creation of a subtle friction and that slight sense of uneasiness. Her motivation is to create engaging work that leads the viewer to question immediate visual gratification and look for more, a disjuncture, a grift, or another way of seeing. She is currently hard at work with the sweet streets committee, after having won the emerging artists award at last years Melbourne stencil festival and spending every waking hour in her studio to deliver some aerosol delights for this years festival. All this and more glad wrapped in a pleasing 1940′s aesthetic.

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CHeck out Boo’s work in the Sweet Streets Award show: 1000 Pound Bend until th 24 October 2010

Melbourne street artist Phoenix has created a work ‘EPHEMERAL’ to coincide with Sweet Streets 2010. This work – which he has installed on the wall of the carpark opposite Thousand Pound Bend – is an exploration of the way street art evolves with the passage of time.

The top letters are sturdily built – made of plywood coated with PVA and paper; the bottom letters are made of unsealed corrugated cardboard – open along their top edges to the rain and sun. One part is designed to last; the other part is designed to degrade.
Phoenix installed this piece on the day before the Sweet Streets opening – with the hope that the piece might start to show signs of its inevitable self-destruction over the course of the Festival.
With the extraordinary weather we have been experiencing in this middle part of the Festival, his hope may just be fulfilled. A photo taken last Thursday night – before yesterday’s wild weather, and tomorrow’s even wilder forecast – showed the ‘MORE EPHEMERAL’ letters dampened and beginning to swell:

Because street art is so often impermanent and ephemeral, it is often suggested that that is how it should be – yet surely this is open to question. Many street artists feel a sense of satisfaction at their works lasting over time.
People attending Thousand Pound Bend for the various events in the second week of Sweet Street will have the opportunity to watch what happens to this piece over the days remaining in the Festival – and perhaps beyond. ‘EPHEMERAL’ may be at the effect of natural  or human elements – whatever happens, it will continue to spell out something interesting about the ephemerality of street art.
We will update any significant changes to this piece on the Sweet Streets website.