Dithers

Description

FIFTY24SF in collaboration with Upper Playground is proud to announce Dithers, an extraordinary showcase DVD featuring exclusive art and interviews with some of today¹s most influential fine, graffiti and street artists, designers and photographers. Dithers represents the first time many of the graffiti and street artists have been captured on film creating their art.

The 30 innovative artists featured on Dithers have produced inspiring work and contributions to today's cultural vocabulary and history. On the DVDs, they are featured in real-world situations discussing their influences, the environment in which they create art and the current art climate.

Dithers includes a bonus DVD under the direction of famous street photographer Ricky Powell that includes interviews and studio visits with eight artists: Team, Jest, Kostas, Dalek, Dr. Revolt, SSUR, Seen and Quick; as well as never-been-seen-before bonus footage. The footage is shot in a style Powell characterizes as, "unorthodox, avant-garde with a bohemian twist," similar to the relaxed format of his cult-classic New York public access cable TV show Rappin' with the Rickster. Ricky Powell has photographed some of the best known rap and hip hop artists of all time including The Beastie Boys, Public Enemy, Run DMC, Cypress Hill, LL Cool J, Easy E, Slick Rick and Method Man. His first book, Oh Snap! was published in 1998 and he released his second, The Rickford Files: Classic New York Photos, in 2000. He currently writes a column for Mass Appeal magazine, is compiling a third book and produces a clothing line, The Ricky Powell Collection under the Upper Playground label in San Francisco.

Customer Reviews:

Expected a lot more.......2006-01-15

They profile something like 25 really great and inspiring artists on this triple dvd. However, each only gets a max of like 10 mins, which is fine, but that 10 mins is a very unfocused period. The first 2 discs are done by someone who basically interviews every Westcoast graphic designer/'street' artist, most of whom have since been commissioned by skate companies etc., and talk a bunch about their collabos with major companies. the interviews are lacking. Then, on the 3rd disc, Ricky Powell handles the interviews, and while he gets to interview GODS in the original NYC grafitti scene like Seen, Kwik, Jest, Dalek, Kostas etc., Ricky is such a mind-wandering burnout that they're more like a wasted idiot with a camera fixed on a giggling, confused artist more than they are actual interviews. I love Ricky powell's humor and his place in nyc is certainly well deserved as a lippy luminary, but bottom line is he's done way too much dust to be asking anybody questions about anything. The 'extras', which by their titles seem really dope, are a waste of time, save for the Revolt one, which at least lasts a bit. In the video of Ssur's studio (who is my personal hero in that scene, and from whom I expected a full interview), SSur says like mayyybe 2 words. Literally. Because nothing like this has really been done before, with this type of collective of artists at least, or this long a roster, I have to give it some props, but it is definitely not well put together, cohesive in any way, and oh yeah the music backdrops to each interview are all from Ubiquity (wack) and some other fake instrumental hiphop labels that obviously didn't charge much or anything for music licensing.
All in all, I was decently satisfied, but by the 3rd disc, I was really hoping for so much more. Considering how much lots of these guys (and a couple gals) have contributed to modern design and culture in metro city society, there could have been a much more professional and/or in-depth approach to the whole DVD set.
Worth checking out, but I'll probably sell mine on ebay.

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