Until mid-September, the facades of two houses in Norilsk will be painted with 3D drawings. The artists use a unique technique within the framework of the ARcTica street arts festival.
The festival was first held in Norilsk a year ago. The artists Yegor Koshelev, Alexey Mikheev, Alexey Sokolov, Denis Shevchuk and Silva Ligama created several monumental drawings on the city houses.
This year, the Norilsk Development Agency, which is conducting the festival with the support of Nornickel and the Norilsk and Taimyr administrations, has invited the SPEKTR team artists, a group of authors from different cities, widely known for the annual international street art festival STENOGRAFFIA. During ten years of their career, the artists’ works appeared in 15 cities of the country, including the northern regions – Khanty-Mansiysk and Yamalo-Nenets autonomous territories.
In Norilsk, the SPEKTR artists – Alexey Tarakin, Vitaly Safronov, Alexey Mikheev, Denis Shevchuk, Sergey Erofeev and Sergey Shevelev – began painting the facades of the houses at 4 Moskovskaya street and 33a Komsomolskaya street.
All the drawings are united by one concept, says Karina Andreeva, head of socio-cultural and educational projects of the NDA.
“The Norilsk people fly a lot: all the townspeople, even the smallest ones, are used to flying. And this is always a pleasant association for us – holidays, pleasure. We want to prolong this romantic mood, and the idea was born to invite the townspeople on a dreamy flight – to draw an airship on the house near the Norilsk youth center and balloons – near the Dolgoye Lake park. All the images will have a 3D effect”, Karina Andreeva explained.
In addition, the ARcTica festival participants will decorate one of the central squares of Dudinka in summer: the NDA, together with the administration of Taimyr, is implementing the Taimyr’s Attraction project to create a modern public space in ethnic style.
Nowadays, the work is in full swing. The drawings will have several points of the image “animation”: the authors of the project expect that the balloons on Komsomolskaya 33a will seem to float out of the building, as well as the airship on the facade of Moskovskaya 4.
It was no coincidence that those addresses were chosen: the house on Komsomolskaya street was included in the Dolgoye Lake recreation park space being modernized today. The house on Moskovskaya street is part of the youth center courtyard, this is an interesting place, and it should be decorated accordingly, the NDA specialists explained.
The artists themselves say that the townspeople are interested in their work; but the constant Norilsk wind blowing away the spray paint is a hindrance to the painting. A feature of working in the Far North in summer is the inability to use a projector that gives the drawing to the facade. That is why the craftsmen have to cover the facade with special signs to help them.
In total, about 2.5 tons of professional paint will be spent on Norilsk and Dudinka buildings.
Text: Maria Sokolova, Photo: Irina Yarinskaya
