I love street art. The democracy of it. The freedom. From simple tagging to large-scale commissioned murals, street art has become a familiar fixture in our modern world. Learning a little more about the techniques, iconography, and motivations of the artists themselves can help give you an understanding of the public art you come across in your own city and on your travels abroad.
Street art is, first of all, the only worldwide movement. I place my artwork in front of you, whether you like it or not, it’s there. You can look at it, it’s free and it’s for everybody.”
And if those travels find you in Paris, I can highly recommend taking one of the Underground Paris walking tours with Street Art Paris. Different tours are offered each focusing on art in specific parts of the city. Lasting about two hours – where you will be walking, talking, looking, and discussing. And if you’ve been listening and engaging, you should come away with a language for reading street art. A street art literacy per se. For Paris. And around the world. As it turns out, this language is fairly universal.
Post updated: May 2018
Large-scale stencil Rue des Cinq Diamants | Buttes-aux-Cailles | Paris
We believe no matter who you are, where you’re from, who you love or who you worship – we all belong. The world is more beautiful the more you accept.”
– #weaccept, Airbnb
The above Airbnb advertisement aired this past Sunday on the largest screen available in the United States. It was played during the National Football League’s coverage of the Superbowl championship. And whether or not you are a fan of American football has nothing to do with the message that Airbnb continues to passionately endorse – that the world is a better place when we accept that our differences are part of what make us beautiful.
I concur.
Let’s share beautiful.
FAVORITES WEEK #16
There were so many beautiful posts linked up by our Faraway Files community last week. Missed them? Don’t worry – click here to catch up over on cohost Clare’s Suitcases and Sandcastles blog.
My personal favorites brought both beauty and a smile. I loved this post from Keri at Ladies What Travel about the fun street art in the George Town neighborhood of Penang, Malaysia. I adore how real objects are incorporated into the murals and create a true sense of joie de vivre for the area and its visitors. Hold on tight – it’s going to be a bumpy ride!
Jonny from The Adventures of Daisy the Bus shared his family’s outing to the Open Air Museum near Amsterdam in The Netherlands. I adore the pure wonder on his daughter’s face as she learned to knit under the watchful attention of this volunteer Dutch gramma. In Denmark – we call that hygge.
Jumping across the channel, we welcomed another Faraway Files newcomer – Jo from Where Jo Goes. I loved her post about lovely little Lacock in Wiltshire, England. Listen to me – like I know where Wiltshire is! Guaranteed – I looked it up posthaste after reading of its charm. A classic English village – put on a cuppa and take a look.
And if you prefer your cup with something a little stronger – check out Curious Pixie’s things to do in Vegas to rock your trip. And while Sima can show you where to get a cocktail and how to maneuver a casino – she goes beyond and offers a balanced approach to Sin City with suggestions to see the Grand Canyon as well as the classic neon museum. I’m in love.
Where will you take us this week? Me? I can’t believe that it took me writing a post about why to take your kids to the Caribbean for it to finally snow in Copenhagen! The differences are both beautiful. #Weaccept.
FARAWAY FILES TRAVEL BLOG COMMUNITY LINKUP #14
WANT TO JOIN IN?
We’d love you to join us in building this supportive and growing community who will inspire and share each other’s posts. All three hosts will try to read and comment on every post and we’ll share them on social media too. Each week we’ll choose our favorites and highlight them on our blogs and social media channels using #FarawayFiles.
HOW IT WORKS:
Link up one travel-related post and add the Faraway Files badge onto the post or your blog (code below) or link back to the hosts.
The link up will go live every Thursday at 8 am UK time (9 am, CET) until midnight on Friday. It will alternate between Untold Morsels, Suitcases and Sandcastles, and Oregon Girl around the World.
Link ups work best if everyone shares so please comment on all three of the hosts’ posts and at least two others.
I’M HOSTING THIS WEEK | OREGON GIRL AROUND THE WORLD
Show us. Tell us. Share with us. With others. We don’t know. Maybe you do. We want to see your far-flung corners. Your faraway files. For some reason the lyrics to the Estelle song, American Boy always lilt around my head every Thursday. Let’s go somewhere.
Take me on a trip, I’d like to go some day.”
– Estelle | American Boy
FARAWAY FILES #9 FAVORITES
What a diversity of discoveries we delved into last time. We drank gluhwein in Nuremberg Germany, sampled gouda cheese in Gouda Netherlands and sampled mint tea in Tangiers Morrocco. We danced through Seville and roadtripped in Ireland and California. But, these are my favorite posts from last week’s travel blog community linkup. If you missed them – don’t you fret – you can read here.
Newcomer to Faraway Files community is Ruth at Tanama Tales. Last week she shared the creative and fun street mural project that is helping re-energize a historic area and community in Dallas, Texas. This is a colorful and impactful post. Thanks for sharing Ruth!
When we visited Croatia in October for our fall break, we did not make it to nearby Montenegro. Tracy at Tracy’s Travels in Time takes us to Kotor, Montenegro for a day trip from Dubrovnik, Croatia. The pictures and adventure are stunning and driving my wish to revisit the region. Check it out!
From sparkling to blue Adriatic to the freezing and beautiful Misty Fjords in Alaska. Nesting Nomads share their flightseeing adventure in a cozy seaplane through epic Alaskan wilds. I have flown in a seaplane once – for my 10th wedding anniversary weekend – from Seattle, WA to the San Juan Islands. I would adore to it again in Alaska. Thank you for the inspiration!
Seaplane Sightseeing in the Misty Fjords, Alaska | Nesting Nomads
WANT TO JOIN IN?
We’d love you to join us in building a supportive community who will inspire and share each other’s posts. All three hosts will try to read and comment on every post and we’ll share them on social media too. Each week we’ll choose our favourites and highlight them on our blogs and social media channels using #FarawayFiles.
We’d love you to join us in building a supportive community who will inspire and share each other’s posts. All three hosts will try to read and comment on every post and we’ll share them on social media too. Each week we’ll choose our favourites and highlight them on our blogs and social media channels using #FarawayFiles.
This week I want to tell you a little bit about the Danish Christmas feast – so much tradition and love put into this end of year celebration.
How it works:
Link up one travel-related post and add the Faraway Files badge onto the post or your blog (code below) or link back to the hosts.
The link up will go live every Thursday at 8am, UK time (9am, CET) until midnight on Friday. It will alternate between Untold Morsels, Suitcases and Sandcastles and Oregon Girl around the World. This week – Katy at Untold Morsels is hosting – so head over there and give her some love. She needs it this week, her laptop and camera were stolen!
Link ups work best if everyone shares so please comment on all three of the hosts’ posts and at least two others.
On the surface, life is normal here. We are still our same American family of five. Here in this different place. Here in Denmark. On the surface, it looks nice. It seems that we can see things and do things that we haven’t seen or done before and share them here with you. On the surface, it looks like sunshine and roses. Sometimes it is. Sometimes below the surface, we’re just sleepwalking. Moving through the motions of a day from sun up to sun down whilst the world works and does and becomes. Sometimes I feel like I have to scratch off the surface to reveal the winning code, the lottery winner. Maybe we didn’t buy the ticket today though. What did we do? I sometimes wonder at the end of the day. But you can’t win if you don’t buy the ticket.
Yesterday – I bought the ticket. And I definitely won. My personal lottery that is. Those who know me know that art, especially public art, is something very important to me. Public art in the form of outdoor sculpture galleries, murals, architecture, street art and even well executed colorful graffiti. The earth without ART is just… eh. Yesterday, I attended the closing afternoon of Danish photographer Søren Solkær‘s excellent exhibition Surface. An enormous, in scale and presentation, portrait series pointed at street artists all over the world and in every iteration – from street “taggers” to muralists to installation artists to graffiti kings. Yesterday Søren himself led a public tour through the Oksnehallen culture center‘s display of his works. Hearing how and where and why and who from the artist himself made the images come to life and engendered a respect for the work required to undertake such a project.