Street artist Jaune pays tribute to firefighters
A total of 16 small paintings are plastered on park benches, electricity boxes and walls in Estarreja's city centre.
What?
In the wake of the wildfires in northern Portugal, the Belgian artist, Jaune, has filled the streets of Estarreja with small figures of firefighters to pay them a tribute.
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Why?
He came to Portugal last week to participate in Estau – Urban Art Festival that this year took place between September 14-22.
When he arrived, he found a country shrouded in clouds of smoke and quickly realised that the artistic intervention he had planned would have to be revised.
Overall, he made 16 small paintings spread through park benches, electricity boxes and walls in Estarreja’s city centre.
The figures of firefighters skateboarding over a base of flames, enjoying a moment of pleasant conversation or enjoying a moment of pure relaxation - the artist says he likes to paint workers ‘in strange situations’ - are intended to honour those who were on the front line fighting the fire.
“Because those people are heros, protecting people and nature against the flames. Plus : most of them are volunteers!,” he wrote on his instagram profile.
Where?
The works can be seen on Avenida de Visconde Salreu, Praça Francisco Barbosa and Parque Municipal do Antuã, alongside other artistic interventions, many of them large-scale, signed by names such as Bordalo II, Halfstudio and Vhils, among others.
The itinerary for the festival, which began in 2016, is available on the municipality’s website and already includes more than four dozen stops.
Who?
Residing in Brussels, Belgium, former sanitation worker turned street artist Jaune first stepped into the spotlight in 2011, when his mostly small, multi-layered stencil works of miniature garbage men popped up all over the city.
With most of his work done in stencil, the self-taught artist manages to attain a high level of detail.
His lively and dynamic artworks, often showing more than a dozen of his ‘Mini Dudes’, are so rich in detail, that viewers rarely grasp the whole scene in one look.
Having worked as a sanitation worker himself, his fluorescently dressed miniatures of himself portrait the paradox between the visible and invisible, concealed from the public eye despite their flashy outfits, and often act in contrary to what the public opinion would expect e.g. playing golf with bags filled with trash, instead of picking them up. Jaune takes part in the exhibition “Love Letters in the City”, 2024-2027.