South African artist Freddy Sam spent a few days on the Azores islands where he was invited by the good lads from the Walk&Talk Street Art Festival.
Freddy Sam created this beautiful piece which is entitled “The Road Of Solidarity”. The mural depicts two young brothers Rodrigo and Johny and their friend Claudio walking into the ocean, into the life of a fisherman.The abstract golden line joins them and represents the community of Lagoa and symbolizes solidarity.
My intention with this and all my murals is to create an artwork that has meaning to the community who will live with the mural.In lead up to the festival during a skype meeting The curators of the Walk&Talk festival suggested the fishing community of Lagoa as the place for my mural and that one of the curators Monte Sarrado has been working on a documentary about the fisherman for quite some time already and could help me with the introductions. She told me how the fisherman worked in teams split between men out at sea and men on land and she shared how they were full with interesting tattoos.My mind immediately was filled with ideas of how I could narrate a story of fisherman and their relationship to the ocean. My imagination wondered about the stories of myth and legend that had been passed down to them from generations of fisherman. I had assumed they would tell me romantic stories about life at sea. After arriving on the island and spending a day with the fisherman and learning about life in Lagoa I found out that in fact there was very little romanticism like I had imagined.Far from it, I was so wrong, fishing was a harsh life, it was simply a way to earn for their families nothing more to it and asking if they had any meaning or relationship with the ocean left the fisherman with no answer’s for me as this is something they had never really thought of.Their tattoo filled arms had no meaning, and when asked about the beauty of the nature they encounter on their long fishing expeditions they replied that they did enjoy seeing the dolphins and the whales but there was nothing deeper to it then that.
I was now stuck and didn’t really know what to paint and shared my concerns with Monte during lunch. She told me not to worry and that we should go to visit the wall.The wall (I believe by fait) was on a street named “Rua da solidaridade” / “The road of solidarity ” –Freddy Sam
Hit the jump for a bunch of extra images and check back with us throughout the week for the latest updates from the streets.
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