Bridging Brooklyn

This Friday sees the opening of an exhibition of new work from street artist EMA, celebrating a decade of work created on the streets of Brooklyn, New York.

The Glasgow show, entitled Breuckelen (Brooklyn’s original moniker), demonstrates the breadth of EMA’s work, which has been exhibited in the galleries of New York’s Chelsea art district, as well as on the streets, often in the form of enormous murals in Manhattan, Queens and the Bronx.

Originally from Montpellier, France, EMA (also known as Florence Blanchard), moved back to France in 2010 after a decade long stint in Brooklyn. She started out as a graphic designer in the early 1990s, and her career has since encompassed street art, murals and now painting.

This show will see the inside and outside of Glasgow’s Recoat Gallery festooned with her work, and will feature a series of intricate ink paintings. According to the gallery, the art deco-inspired backgrounds and detailed line work are influenced by typography, 90s hip-hop, and 70s science fiction.

Perhaps her most recognisable icon is Dropman – the face of a tear-shaped moustachioed gent, who has been wheat-pasted all over New York and Paris.

With a PhD in biology, EMA claims the odd visages originate from her interest in physics experiments on particle collision. Focussing on people’s (rather understandable) fear of ‘black holes’, the artist took the idea of synchotronic waves and used them as the scenery from which her Dropmen fall. Phew.

Breuckelen runs from 9 September – 9 October at Recoat Gallery, 323 North Woodside Road, Glasgow G20