Up next, it's an art form
that's been around since the Roman era
now being used to create one of a kind outdoor art exhibits.
- Using just flour, water, and sugar,
you'd think we were in a cooking class,
but no, local art group, The Big Picture,
pastes giant striking photographs all over Denver.
- They're using wheat paste to inspire the community
and encourage everyone to enjoy art.
Alexis Kikoen brings us this story.
(gentle electronic music)
- To me, there's an important story here
that is stepping outside of the white box gallery, museum,
and it's bringing art into the public domain
to where people who wouldn't necessarily go
to bourgeois art openings.
Here, they're just free to come across it and look at it
and it's a whole different concept
being out in an open space, and architecturally,
than being enclosed in the white institution,
that has been a great joy.
Good action shot here.
Wheat paste flyin' by the master himself.
Oh, oh.
My name is Mark Sink,
the director of The Big Picture Denver.
We're here today at The Temple Artist Haven
that has asked us to do this wall
with our Big Picture Project.
I'm marking so you know where your wheat paste goes.
The Big Picture Project
is a international street art exchange
of artists from over 50 cities around the world.
We bring in work from those cities
and we send our work to be wheat pasted
in the streets of those cities.
That's part of the whole philosophy
of bringing the world closer together through photography.
If you make it too thick,
it does not absorb into the paper.
If you make it too thin,
it just slides and drips off the walls.
Wheat pasting is a form of glue that is flour, water, sugar.
They've been using it since the Roman times.
- Well, it's like when I was a kid way back in the year 1
and you slap it on the wall
with rollers and brushes and stuff
and then paste the picture.
- [Mark] Today we're gonna keep adding to this collaging.
We'll start rolling out and making a selection
to see what pieces talk to each other.
- What catches my eye the most is portraits.
Whenever I'm wheat pasting I just love big portraits
that are really close up.
- You try to hang something
that's really eye catching on the end
because people would come down there
and then suddenly they see this picture and they do stop
and come on in and look at the rest of them.
- Oh my goodness, these are great.
- The more an image tells you a story or talks to you,
I find the more I'm interested in including it.
There's a lot of different families in street art
and wall art and graffiti.
The wheat paste street art, it's a very separate family.
It's a very ephemeral,
it doesn't destroy anything,
you can take it off just with a pressure washer.
It's always changing.
Some of the beauty is when the older
starts to crack and curl
and there's age and colorization in it.
- I feel a big sense of accomplishment at the end of a day
when we see just a finished wall,
or even just coming back to an old wall and touching it up.
It's like, this looks great.
- It's what the whole wall art and street art phenomenon is,
you get such great satisfaction
when you're in a deteriorating alley
and you spend a morning
making it into a beautiful art gallery.
I like flying that Colorado flag high,
that we have an incredible creative community here.
My keyword is community, community, community,
and that's what we're doing,
we're outreaching with the community.
- This concept of taking art
outdoors into public view is amazing
and these photos look so great in an urban setting.
- They really do.
And the way the photos kind of wear and tear over time
almost seems to take on the flavor of the city.
- It does, and our city has flavor.
And to find out where you can see
one of these amazing giant photos,
check out @thebigpicture on Instagram.