Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Ivanevid. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

IVANEVID, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Can you talk to us about a project that’s meant a lot to you?

I have several, but there’s a special-one that I called “STREET FACES by IVANEVID” but let me tell you the story behind this amazing project.

I was born and raised in Mexico City, an incredible place, rich in culture and lots of energy from more than 22 million people. From a very young age I began to notice facial features in people I had contact with, such as my family, friends and people in the streets. In other hand I’m very familiar with the steel industry and heavy machinery since early age thanks to the family business, so I began to discover valuable details in metals and their different finishes such as shiny and opaque aspects and how these, although they are inanimate minerals, undergo transformations such as natural deformations and oxidation, so I began to relate this type of changes in people’s faces depending on their mood and personality and of course in the natural process of aging.

So around 15 years ago I started with my first professional face/portrait using this media, a gallery work painted on steel with a long oxidation process, achieving high contrasts between the rich textures and striking colors with a unique style.

As an artist with roots in graffiti culture, I managed to transition into a Street Art concept by avoiding invading people’s property, making collectible pieces of art people can find on the streets, take’em and give them a special place in their personal collection. These are the Street Faces, painted in mixed media on steel. The steel is treated, so it will gradually begin to rust and degrade which makes the work alive, changing its appearance over time.

The collection of “Street Faces by Ivanevid” officially started with the first piece placed in the city of Venice, Italy in 2022 and has now spread to more than 30 cities, in at least 13 countries such as UK, Sweden, Japan, Norway, Germany, The US, Mexico and many more.

My goal with this project is that in the future I’ll make an exhibition joining together all the claimed Street Faces I can, showing the way they turned out during the years.

As an artist, this project is very important to me because even if every material and effort I put on it is a big investment, this is my way to give back to the community everything it gives me, as inspiration, culture and tons of emotions and learning. Even if I don’t know who’s going to collect a piece, people contact me after they claim a Street Face and thats the beginning of new and strong connections and friendships because of art.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I started doing graffiti in late 90’s in the streets of Mexico City. The graffiti culture was so strong in that era that the guys at the school or even in the streets used to ask you: “what’s your tag?” instead of: “what’s your name?” Every single guy and some girls wanted to make graffiti and there were some blackbooks and sketchbooks rolling in different classrooms, or even hidden in the school library between science and art encyclopedias, so you can add a sketch or your new ideas for a piece or a throwie but, was super important that your style were different of the other guys so you won’t called a TOY! I really pushed myself to make everything to stand out with my own style.

Then, your mission was to go out and paint in the streets some of your sketches as big, good, visible and as many as you could to build some cred and become a real writer. So graffiti helped me a lot in the process of finding my own style, also I found on it a great way to represent my ideas fast, in big scale and the perfect scenario to experiment with different media and tools.

Later I went to the Faculty of Architecture, Design and Communication of México focused on graphics. I worked as a graphic and fashion designer for some clothing companies and I developed my own clothing and accessories brand.

I painted as a hobby for years, showing my art in multidisciplinary shows I organized with some other artists and painting at least one mural a year in many cities all around Mexico, and keeping doing graffiti from time to time. As a musician I played and toured with some music bands around North America and Asia as a sax player and percussionist.

Then I moved to North Texas in 2021 where I started to become a full time artist and muralist. Now my work is recognized as part of the DFW art scene with murals, art shows and gallery presence.

Something really interesting is that young people, from kids to teenagers feel so connected with my art, to the point that I have some young collectors that save money every year to buy some of my pieces.
Probably my youngest collector is a girl from around 8 years old now, she saved money to buy her favorite painting, now she has more than 3 of my pieces. There’s another boy and his sister that decided to save money for months and asked their parents to take them to my studio to buy art, I finally met them the other day at the gallery and that was a great experience that filled my heart with so much joy. All of that pushed me to keep going and make more art.

And that’s not all, I have more young collectors, all of them are super-sweet and that is something so meaningful to me that sometimes it make me think that probably I’m painting for the next generation.

My studio is located in LAST Art Gallery in the Historic Downtown of the city of McKinney, Texas, a beautiful place full of energy, culture and very talented people. The gallery is open 7 days a week, so if you plan to visit my studio please send me a DM by my Instagram page. I’ll be happy to meet you there guys!

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

Art is an abstract language that communicates emotions and deep messages. We as artists or creatives have the power to put strong messages out in the world, sometimes with no written words. In my case I usually make drawings and sketches talking about the source of every problem in the world and its solution, things that affect the society in general and some others just about dark places in my mind. But at the end, I paint something that avoids every social and controversial topic, I get lost in details in my paintings letting the shapes and colors express the energy of the moment. I prefer to make connections with the viewers through my art in a language that doesn’t have a word but is full of feelings, taking you to your inner space where no world’s problem is making noise and nothing else exists, just emotions.

If my art take you to that place at least just for a second, then my work has fulfilled its purpose, and that’s a real reward.

How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?

Support the local talent and buying art from living artists is something very important for the Artist community. Art is known as a hard living and nowadays with the fast communications of social media and all the attractiveness in the digital world it’s super easy to “fulfill” your art need “for free” with screens but just for a few seconds and no satisfaction. I’m not saying that is bad but will never be the same something rich in textures that changes with light variations as the real and tangible art and its meaning. Just as a beautiful sunset, that can be perfectly captured by a camera but it will never be the same to live it than just watch out for a few seconds.

That human feeling is imprinted in the tangible works that will never be replaced by digital stuff. And do not forget that Art is not only a unique expression, it is also a valuable investment that keeps great memories and becomes part of your environment.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.ivanevid.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ivanevid
• Other: Stay tuned for my upcoming music project called “105” you can find it as @105band in Instagram

Image Credits

Ivanevid and Silviangelik