After digging round in the attic at our family home I came across a box containing some items that belonged to our long lost Uncle Lou. Apparently he was something of a womaniser and a card-sharp and would ever be in search of the next loose woman and dodgy card table. He mysteriously disappeared on a trip to the local butchers one day and all they ever found of him was his rusty sheriff’s badge (which he always wore). He left behind a box of mementos and this is a little something from one of his jaunts around Europe in the late 60’s and looks to be an annotated map of his adventures. It appears it involved lots of women, drink and skiing…
I’ve never actually been to Switzerland myself but I have plenty of friends who have and they all seem to really enjoy the place. I’m pretty sure I would enjoy the skiing and cheese aspect of a visit there but it’s been many years since I wore a timepiece and I’m not a massive fan of chocolate so they couldn’t really impress me on that front. Anyhow I’d still give it a go as apparently ‘It’s more fun in Switzerland!’ and I’d be willing to see if it lives up to the claim.
Working on maps is really rather enjoyable and this piece has been lovingly created on a large vintage motoring map of the region. She features at least 12+ different screen print levels (including our id-iom seal of approval), hand-done red hand-stitching around the Swiss border, many stencils and a load of hand annotation in paint pen (not done by me as my writing isn’t neat enough!) If that wasn’t enough it also features the Transformer Soundwave about to steal a load of ‘energon’ from the Large Hadron Collider on the Swiss border. Naughty Transformer!
For further information about us and what we get up to you can visit our flickr page and we’re also on twitter (@thisisidiom).
The hunter gatherer team that is id-iom has always had strong wombling instincts – often bringing home stray bits of wood, street furniture, signs and the like. You just never know when you might need it for another project!
Anyway, there I was quietly minding my own business when I come across an abandoned painting still in its little gold frame. After taking it home and having a closer look it appeared to be homemade and sadly a little neglected. As it wasn’t really to my taste I thought my best option was to give it a little makeover – hopefully breathing a bit of new life into it on the way – and get it back out on the streets.
Anticipating its new role on the street as ambassador for upcycling I thought I’d give it something of an upbeat message to go along with its new look. I can only wish him the best of luck in finding a new home.
If you like this kind of thing you can find more online at Creative Crap.
As a memento to our now demolished studio a good friend of id-iom came down to document our work at the ‘House of Pain(t)’ before it was razed to the ground. Here’s a new video he put together in the final days of the house. After watching this I’ve come to realise quite what a place we had. We just need another now…
You can also see the video that Spraying Bricks put together below:
For individual shots of the pieces you can see them on our flickr page here.
This is the second instalment of our ‘Back to the Future’ mixtape project which sees us combine our two of our loves – music and street art. Basically our initial plan was to get some new mixes together, burn them on CD and then put them out on the street with some exclusive slate cover art. This is the second id-iom mix called ‘Futility’ and will soon be followed by mixes from a (hopefully) eclectic range of other Djs.
There’s some contact details on the back and we’re hoping that we’ll get a reply/critique/abuse via email from whoever found it and then hopefully they’ll upload it to the web and share it around for further praise/ridicule. So, if you see one of these suckers on the street feel free to take it home and then lambast us via email on our shoddy skills and poor tune selection.
It’s the size of a standard roofing slate and has the CD securely taped to the back so she should last a reasonable amount of time out in the open. It has been completed using the magic of paint pens, spraypaint and stencils. They are signed on reverse with our trademark id-iom stencil and logo.
We are also now open to submissions – so if you dj at all and fancy taking part just get in touch and if we like your mix then you’re in! You can find more information on our facebook page here:
So once again we went east to paint up the wall that we have done before for Global Street Arts’s ‘The walls project’ because you guessed it, it got tagged up again. Although this time it was a little more tasteful than the word ‘Anus’ and we also didn’t have to fight with any film crews for the space this time either.
The letter box bandit comes from a newspaper article i read, about someone who was going around stealing post out of peoples letter boxes. You have to wonder though why you would do such a thing because i know most of the letters i receive are bills or some such rubbish and hardly ever anything interesting and it seems just a complete waste of time. Supposedly this thief was quite determined though carrying his campaign of thievery on for years. He must of had a list of birthdays because why else would you do it?
Although there wasn’t a picture with the article i was thinking what kind of person would be a letter box bandit and i came to the conclusion he would look like some sort of primary school teacher who has nothing better to do with his time after he’s been let out of school at 3 in the afternoon. He’s got a few hours before his wife or friends finish their work and he doesn’t want to spend it in the pub as he’ll just be drunk before anyone gets home, so he decides to embark on a criminal crime wave and become the letter box bandit.
As long time patrons of our local pub we were more than happy to assist when they asked us to design a flyer for a spot of local promotion. After some initial inspiration all that was needed was a little tinkering on the computer and we had a nice little image worked up.
Like the flyer says ‘Music, sports, pool table, chat and good times’ – although not necessarily in that order. At least I know where I’ll be going for a few jars tonight…
For further information about us and what we get up to you can visit our flickr, twitter (@thisisidiom) and we can also be found on Facebook.
Here comes the sun… (Mixtape with slate cover art)
Here comes the sun… (Mixtape with slate cover art – front)
Here comes the sun… (Mixtape with slate cover art – back)
Back to the Future – Exclusive id-iom mix tape with original slate cover art! All for the grand price of nothing! You’ve just got to find it…
It’s 2013 and we’re going back to the future with our street art take on the classic mix tape. It’s a combination of that old school hop with that new school hip! Although we have had to move with the times so we’ve gone and burned it on CD.
Both members of id-iom have been djing for more years than we care to remember and rather than go the inevitable route of uploading our mixes to Soundcloud and have no-one listen to it we’ve gone all experimental and attempted to fuse our street art activities and proclivity for making mix tapes. We’ve completed the hour long mix and then done the slate cover art to compliment the tunes. From there it’s just a matter of putting it on the street and seeing what happens.
Only a very small number of copies exist and ideally we’re hoping that we’ll get a reply/critique/abuse via email from whoever found it and then hopefully they’ll upload it to the web and share it around for further praise/ridicule. Really we’re just too lazy to upload it ourselves and are hoping that someone else will do it for us. It looks better that way. So, if you see one of these suckers on the street feel free to take it home and then lambast us via email on our shoddy skills and poor tune selection.
It’s the size of a standard roofing slate and has the CD securely taped to the back so she should last a reasonable amount of time out in the open. It has been completed using the magic of paint pens, spraypaint and stencils. They are signed on reverse with our trademark id-iom stencil and logo.
We are also now open to submissions – so if you dj at all and fancy taking part just get in touch and we’ll see what we can do. You can find more information on our facebook page here.
Happy hunting!
‘Cross my heart and hope to die’ is an idiom that one would use to emphasise that something is true. This lady on the other hand is a tricky little customer and I have a hard time believing anything that comes out of her mouth. Even if she has crossed her heart. Maybe, just maybe, this time she is on the level…
She’s a compact A4 in size and is from a small edition of 5. Each has been completed using the magic of screen printing, paint pens, spraypaint and stencils. Signed on reverse.
This picture, or some version of it, has been hanging round on my computer for a good long while now. For some reason I can’t really explain I had set myself the mission of trying to convert my sometime earworm ‘Let’s face the music and dance’ into a picture that would reflect the spirit of the song.
After many false starts and incomplete attempts I finally had something I was happy with and so put paint to paper. I think my favourite touch is the bass clef in the ladies eyes which speaks of late nights clubbing and busy dancefloors. So, as Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers sang in Irving Berlin’s 1936 film ‘Follow the Fleet’:
“There may be trouble ahead
but while there’s music and moonlight
and love and romance
let’s face the music and dance”
She’s an eminently frameable A3 in size and has been completed using the magic of screen printing, paint pens, spraypaint and stencils. Signed on reverse.
For further information about us and what we get up to you can visit our blog (www.thisisidiom.wordpress.com) and twitter (@thisisidiom).
We all only have one life to live so you might as well live it to its fullest, take every day as your last and all that malarkey and this beauty is doing just that. Her parents always told her to put her clothes back on when she was a child but she just didn’t care she was going to do as she wished and even now as someone more advanced in age she’s still up to her old tricks. Admittedly this doesn’t always go down to well at parties but then again who cares, certainly not her that’s for sure.
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