ch-ch-ch-ch-check it

When WeWereHere dropped a month or so ago, there was a lot of bloody, personal shit hitting the fans here at B&R, so we didnt really give the proper time nor effort to talk about what was really a pretty massive project for us.

So lets now then, shall we?

Ok so background. Sometime last year I had an idea to get a large group of people together(most of whom were SR chaps) and circulate sketchbooks to one another, adding to them as they come and sending them along. After figuring all the details, we realized that it wouldve been very complicated and expensive(though id still like to set up a mutated version at some point) to send 50+ sketchbooks all over the world in a circle, even after detailing a continental hub system and all that, it was just too much.

While we were right in the midst of looking at our options, SR died. Out of nowhere, hacked to bits and disappeared. This severed the only connection most of us had to one another, and since the entire project was being handled there, we lost everything. No real names, no emails, no web sites, no trails, nothing, just memories. My magical friend Bloo let me know about a small street art site that many of the SR refugees were landing at called Concrete-Canvas. This was the age of the ridiculous online streetart site war things.

Jesus thats another story, but such a mentally handicapped one that if you werent there youll never hear about it from any reliable source.

Anyway, a fair bit of us eventually concentrated at CC, and Lament(who was then a growing part of my life, and another story) and I decided that the next best thing to the sketchbook roundabout would be to collect work from everyone and compile it into book format and everyone could just order one for much cheaper than shipping a sketchbook around the world would have been, by far, and way easier than 50+ of them at once.

So a few months and way too many prototypes(including a discontinued hard cover version, of which like 4 exist) later, Concrete Canvas: The Sketchbook was born. It was crazy and fun and amazing and it was so cool to get the response we got and to include so many really great artists and meet so many neat new people and it was just really a time for celebration, for we had actually done it.


preview

So once we saw the support people were giving to the book, we decided to do another, with all new people. There was talk of doing one every 2 or 3 months like a bimonthly artbookmagthing, but it just didnt happen at the time(although Inkflow 3 seems like a pleasant idea now). Most of the handling was done on the revamped SR forum, so a name change was in order(plus the fact that we got sick of hearing "Hell yeah! Concrete-Canvas is awesome for putting together that book!!!!1!11one!" You bastards.) So another few months of tedious work and Inkflow vol. 2(CC: The Sketchbook vol. 2) was born a bloody, vaginal birth; sleeker and more finely tuned than the last; we knew what we were doing.


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Splendid words and support were still at our backs, it was wonderful to be a part of. It was then that the idea for a street book came up. We have to get as many creative people together that we can and compile all of the works into a sort of end of 2009 street art bible party time snapshot, featuring all the CC and Inkflow alumni as well as as much additional currently active streetheads as we can fit, dont we?

Why yes. Yes we do. A book to prove we were here.

As it turned out, after the announcement, we had collected so much work from so many people so quickly, that we had to change the size format from 7"x7", 80 pages to 8"x10", 120 pages, all mashed with an eclectic mix of streetart disciplines by hundreds of artists from all over the world. Old kids and new kids, people you know and know of, and people you dont. We got a few cool kids(Indigo, Seventenths, Shez and Bustart) to interview one another about themselves and the world, top it off with a wonderfully detailed custom-crafted cover by Lament, and youve got a giant printed collection of current and future Street Artists' works in 2009.

Bam, and now its all printed up and available to jam straight into your eyes, and any other orifice you wish.


preview

This is a year of street art in the world, and WeWereHere.

All of us, together.


-h