Mexican artist Said Dokins is currently in France where he recently joined the French artist crew Monkey Bird composed of the Bordeaux-based street artists “Blow” the Bird and “Temor” the Monkey.
Titled “Le message secret” and organized by Pole Magnetic Street Art Bordeaux, this 300 m2 wall intends to create a relationship between geometry and text transmitting its message as poetic knowledge.
On the one hand, we have Monkey Bird’s beautifully crafted stencils, alluding to ancient ‘platonic solids’ and creating a series of apparently unfinished characters, like ‘guardians of knowledge’. On the other hand, we find Said Dokins’ characteristic calligraphic work, used, according to the artist, to express an idea of eternal return by inserting texts that refer to the possibilities and limitations of philosophy, and the importance of text as a legacy of consciousness through time.
The mural includes fragments of Walter Benjamin’s texts such as ¨Knowledge comes only in lightning flashes. The text is the long roll of thunder that follows¨ or ¨Like ultraviolet rays memory shows to each man in the book of life a script that invisibly and prophetically glosses the text¨. The references are many.
As pointed by the artists, the mural also makes reference to old antique prints like those of Wenzel Jamnitzer, Renaissance statuary and medieval calligraphy as well as old classic architecture, inviting the viewer to reflect about the importance of knowledge in our study of the human condition.
Images by Leo Luna
Author: Fran
Founder and editor of Urbanite. Street Art lover who after the finishing her MA thesis on the Mexican and Norwegian muralist movement in the 1920-50s, developed a fascination for street art and graffiti that eventually led to collaborations with different art blogs, including the creation of this one.
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