Interview with PichiAvo

PichiAvo, the Spanish-based artist duo, are recognised worldwide for their ability to ignite relationships between art, sculpture, architecture, space and social contexts. Their work is distinct in its ability to combine a variety of styles, combining techniques to create a truly unique art form.

With their upcoming show opening 11th August 2017 at Unit London, we grabbed the opportunity to talk to them about their artwork, as well as their upcoming show.

How did you meet?

We met painting in the streets of Valencia over 10 years ago and have been working collaboratively since 2007.

What made you decide to work together?

We didn’t decide, it came naturally, we both have different graffiti backgrounds, but our artistic thoughts were similar and through painting, we realised that we could do even more together, forgetting the artist ego and instead focusing on the final painting.    

How do your styles compliment each other?

We can’t really say as our separate styles have developed into one over the years, but when we first started, yes our styles were different because of our artistic backgrounds but complimentary.

You’re known for painting mythological figures, what made you choose this as your focus?

We are known for our style, graffiti and classical art together to create a piece of art, most of the classical pieces are based in mythology as we found that we could tell and learn a lot from history.

What made you choose to paint these mythological figures as images of sculptures?

We started our style thinking we should bring everything we know about art together and adding graffiti to help bring classical art back to life.

The best way we could think of to do this was by working with classical sculpture, sculptures that today are white but people don’t realise they used to be covered in paint, so our painting the figures with the graffiti is our small tribute to the classical sculptures that have marked many historical recognised artists.

Can you explain the importance of combining the graffiti style art in your work?

We started there – although, through the years we have worked in different styles of graffiti, learning the various techniques but at one point we were losing the essence of graffiti, the letters, tags, colours, spontaneity… so after trying many different styles we were finally able to do very realistic things with spray paint.

We wanted to go back to our beginnings and add our other passion, classical art, to the mix. Now, we feel more comfortable with what we do and we have the freedom that we didn’t have years ago, painting real figures, but also reinterpreting them by using graffiti, creating something untouchable, helping us bring together the classical with graffiti so everyone can see and appreciate ART.

Tell us more about your upcoming show?

Our upcoming show at Unit London is an opportunity for us to be able to show people what we can do in a gallery space. We spent all of 2016 working on the collection of works based on the 12 gods and goddesses of Olympus and our personal representation of them. People will find each painting different in terms of their colours and treatment… but for us that means each god or goodness has a personality of their own that people can see in the work.

We are also exhibiting our new sculptures, mixing classical with graffiti, drawing attention to the contrast between the white of the sculpture with the colours of the graffiti  and more surprises both inside and outside of the gallery that we won’t share just yet, because we want people to come see the exhibition and discover our world.

What future plans / projects to you have?

We are always working and try to keep a balance between the time we spend painting in the street and the studio, but we have a full schedule this year with projects at international festivals like Pow Wow and Kaaboo (San Diego)… but we have a few other projects we are working on, big and small, that we would like to keep secret so they are still surprising.

Their show at Unit London will be on from 11 August – 24 September 2017. Don’t miss it!