TRANSFORMING CITY WALLS INTO ART SURFACES: REPRESENTATION OF HUMANITY IN HYURO'S WORKS

Abstract

The questioning of the activity of gathering people and gathering for the purpose forces people to see the formal surface and the interpretation of the art of wall painting produced. As a form of artistic expression, murals in cities are the means of street artists to reach people in daily life. In this article, the art works of the Argentinian artist Hyuro and the citizens’ living environments (city streets and interiors) are explored as the art surfaces of the city walls from the biological and social perspectives of the citizens. Looking at the way Hyuro criticizes the daily activities of people in his works, it is often reflected in human bodies as wild animals that operate in their natural environment. In Hyuro's works of art, surreal depictions of the individual to different concepts (such as freedom, cooperation, sharing, protesting) open up new ways for the citizen to cope with his own hidden, covered, undefined situations. From this point on, beyond the boundaries of museums, galleries or exhibitions, the city walls, where Hyuro's figures come together, become an artistic venue for audiences. In this study, the murals of Hyuro will be examined by using semiotic method considering the space, material, theme of the study, analysis of figures, design principles and elements. Roland Barthes's "Image Music Text" will be used especially in the analysis of images. Pierre Nora's work “Memory Spaces” will shed light on working as the main source in terms of the permanence of the images in the analysis of the murals and the images on the city walls. In the light of the findings, inspriring from Hyuro's works on making the daily activities of the urban individual remarkable and presenting it to the citizen, it will be focused on the use of urban space as an art space and the artist’s performing the artistic production on the street beyond the closed area such as workshops and galleries.