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Alberto Vejarano, known as CHANOIR, is a Franco-Colombian artist born in 1976 in Bogotá. Internationally renowned, he is famous for the energy and optimism of his graffiti. CHANOIR works with a universal visual language, based on the belief that art and artists are agents of positive change.
In the mid-1990s, under the influence of pioneering artists like Keith Haring, or the Parisian André, he decided to use the spray can as a means of expression. The work of CHANOIR, which is born in the fusion of Pop Art and Free Figuration, calls on the knowledge of the history of art and feeds on popular humor, childhood memories and sense of aesthetics. contemporary. He develops a graphic style marked by resolute colors, flat planes and figures with simplified and immediate shapes, characteristic of both logos and tags.
Cat lovers, CHANOIR chose its name in reference to Steinlen's poster: "the cabaret of the black cat". His “CHA” cat logotypes, drawn spontaneously, constantly change shapes. Naive and always expressive, they communicate their emotions to passers-by, according to the feelings of the artist. A relationship is established with the public. His father, Gustavo Vejarano, Colombian and esoteric artist, transmitted to him his beliefs on the subtle planes. Thus, art is for CHANOIR a transmission of energy from mind to mind, with the aim of entertaining and playing with the spectator by creating an art for all.
Since his beginnings, he has constantly questioned the graphic boundaries between graffiti, street art, logotypes and tags. It integrates into the post-graffiti universe, over the years, the Kawaii and cartoon aesthetic, like current emojis. If the vitality of Latin and South American cultures animates him, it is in the streets of the 19th arrondissement of Paris that CHANOIR began his artistic career, where he created his first CHA. And it is the street that still attracts him. For its freedom, its independence, its power of expression and for the people who populate it. It's the street that constantly disguises and transforms itself like Alberto's CHA. Over the years, CHANOIR has extended its energy towards performance, installation, photography, design, collections and video art.
In 1997, he entered the Beaux-Arts in Paris and graduated from Jean-Michel Alberola. He then rubbed shoulders with the painters of free figuration, François Boisrond and the Di Rosa brothers, with whom he shared a taste for spontaneous and libertarian expression. He then joined the modest art movement by participating in the documentary “A modest world” directed by Stéphane Sinde. Jean-Michel Basquiat is a major source of inspiration for CHANOIR, but also icons such as Snoopy, Barbapapa, Monsieur Madame, Hello Kitty, the Shadoks, the Smurfs or more recently Gumball. He is also passionate about parietal art, his totemic paintings thus evoke the mystical power of primitive arts.
Nomadic artist, CHANOIR mixes, for 25 years, work on canvas in studio and spray paint in the streets of Paris, Barcelona, Bogota or Winwood Miami, where the artists El Xupet Negre and El Pez regularly accompany him. He became particularly active on the walls of Barcelona in the early 2000s and made the documentary "Murs Libres" around the best years of Barcelona Street Art. There he founded the collective 1980 with, among others, Jean-Philippe Illanes, Alexandre Sirvin, Hugo Garcia, and Ernest Añaños Montoto. In 2003, he invested the Colombian art scene by participating in numerous exhibitions, such as the personal exhibition "Mi complejo de Peter Pan" at the La Cometa gallery, and at the Museum of Modern Art in Bogotá. It was during these years that he met the artist Nadín Ospina, who still influences his work today. He then began an international career from Miami to Los Angeles, from Beijing to Costa Rica via Rome, Oslo, London or Brussels.
In 2009, he definitively established his studio in Paris, and presented with the collective 1980 a poetic installation of interactive graffiti "tag the moon" as well as several frescoes for the exhibition "Né dans la rue - Graffiti" at the Cartier Foundation. His paintings are presented in galleries and at auctions organized by the most prestigious auction houses (Artcurial, Drouot). He was then called upon to work with major brands, such as Samsung, Emanuel Ungaro, Cacharel, Ubisoft for Just Dance, and Disney. In 2019, he was named Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres by the Minister of Culture Franck Riester.
Link to his website: https://www.chanoir1980.com/
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