Rone - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Rone is a notable street artist

Street artist

A street artist is someone who creates and/or sells their art or craft in public for the pleasure of passers-by.Some people use the term 'street artist' more broadly and also refer to people involved in busking, such as musicians who sing and/or play instruments, acrobats, jugglers, living statues,...

living in Melbourne

Melbourne

Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...

, Australia.

History

Born in 1980, Rone grew up in the city of Geelong, Victoria before making the move to Melbourne. In 2002, Rone started out decorating skateboard

Skateboard

A skateboard is typically a specially designed plywood board combined with a polyurethane coating used for making smoother slides and stronger durability, used primarily for the activity of skateboarding. The first skateboards to reach public notice came out of the surfing craze of the early 1960s,...

s and skate parks. Since then, his work has spread to the streets and inner-city laneways of Melbourne and into some galleries and exhibitions. Rone lives in a small flat so he uses Stencil Art as a creative outlet; in 2003 police caught Civilian

Civilian (street artist)

Civilian is a street artist operating out of Melbourne, Australia, who has been profiled as a 'leading player' of "the city's vibrant stencil art scene"...

and Rone at the Canterbury

Canterbury, Victoria

Canterbury is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 10 km east from Melbourne's central business district. Its Local Government Area is the City of Boroondara...

“Empty Show” (illegal exhibitions held in derelict buildings) although no criminal charges were ever laid. Rone loves skateboarding and works as a graphic designer from the Everfresh studios in Collingwood. On graffiti, Rone says:

"I always had a respect for graffiti. There was something about it that appealed to me, I think it was the risk of putting something up that will be judged by so many, the risk that someone will hate it and paint over it, or it will be praised by someone you’ll never meet."

Mediums

On the streets, Rone's preferred places to stencil are high traffic areas. Rone often paints in broad daylight.
Rone's larger images require much more time to put up, so he uses wheat pasting to do quick paste-ups in busy locationshttp://www.november.com.au/w06/media/video/rone.mov.
He likes that paste-ups can be used irrespective of the wall background and the way that aging and deteriorating of the paste-up can lead to striking and unique effects. Rone's main form of stencils are large images of women's faces mostly cropped which tower and look upon people that walk by.
Rone's art by rule, does not contain any political messages. He says:

"If you think about it too much, it becomes a problem. I paint because want to bring the streets alive."

He also says:

"I paint because I love it, and it adds character to any inanimate object. Whether it is a wall or a footpath. It brings the streets to life."

Influence

While Ha-Ha

Ha-Ha (street artist)

- Work :Ha-Ha is a stencil artist based in Melbourne, originally from Hamilton, New Zealand. Despite his occupation, Ha-Ha has never been to art school. He was inspired by a street artist known as "Psalm" at the start of his stenciling career, as well as "Rone" and "Phibs". Ha-Ha engages in...

, who is considered to be Melbourne's most famous street artist because of the massive number of stencil tags he puts up, has slowed in production of late, Rone is gaining a reputation as the city's most prolific street artist. A quote from Jake Smallman, co-author of Stencil Graffiti Capital: Melbourne, on the question "Who is Melbourne's most prolific stenciler and how did they become so renowned?"

"When I started working on the book it was without doubt Ha-Ha - the guy was simply everywhere. Not only would he paint in a lot of areas, but repeat his images over and over again on the same wall. He got to that position by having a regimented plan to go out regularly with two cans of paint and not come home until he'd used them up. He's been a bit quiet of late, so in terms of consistently getting up over the last 3 years, I'd have to say Rone. His stencils have gotten larger and larger and the placements more and more bold over time."

Rone is building influence in the streets. He mainly stencils around:

Carlton
Carlton, Victoria
Carlton is an inner city suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 2 km north from Melbourne's central business district. Its Local Government Area is the City of Melbourne...
Fitzroy
Fitzroy, Victoria
Fitzroy is an inner city suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 2 km north-east from Melbourne's central business district. Its Local Government Area is the City of Yarra. Its borders are Alexandra Parade , Victoria Parade , Smith Street and Nicholson Street. Fitzroy is Melbourne's...
Chapel Street
Chapel Street, Melbourne
Chapel Street is a shopping, dining and entertainment precinct in Melbourne, Australia. It has a myriad shops ranging from exclusive upmarket fashion designers at the South Yarra end to old fashion pawnbrokers towards Windsor.-Geography:...
The Melbourne CBD

Influences

Rone's art demonstrates influence by a great many people (mainly street artists) and sources. He has stated the these include:

The 1980s and '90s
Skateboarding
Skateboarding
Skateboarding is an action sport which involves riding and performing tricks using a skateboard.Skateboarding can be a recreational activity, an art form, a job, or a method of transportation. Skateboarding has been shaped and influenced by many skateboarders throughout the years. A 2002 report...
Video games
Shepard Fairey
Shepard Fairey
Frank Shepard Fairey is an American contemporary graphic designer, and illustrator who emerged from the skateboarding scene. He first became known for his "André the Giant Has a Posse" sticker campaign, in which he appropriated images from the comedic supermarket tabloid Weekly World News. His...
Banksy
Banksy
Banksy is a pseudonymous England-based graffiti artist, political activist, film director, and painter.His satirical street art and subversive epigrams combine irreverent dark humour with graffiti done in a distinctive stencilling technique...
Fashion
Fashion
Fashion, a general term for a currently popular style or practice, especially in clothing, foot wear, or accessories. Fashion references to anything that is the current trend in look and dress up of a person...

Among others. His favorite cartoon character is Frosty the Snowman

Frosty the Snowman

"Frosty the Snowman" is a popular song written by Walter "Jack" Rollins and Steve Nelson, and first recorded by Gene Autry and the Cass County Boys in 1950. It was written after the success of Autry's recording of "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" the previous year; Rollins and Nelson shipped the...

.

Rone's re-contextualising of fashion images has had interesting repercussions. A model who ended up as the face in Rone's "Jane Doe" series ended up searching out the artist. This was reported as a human interest and arts story in Australian newspaper The Age
The Age
The Age is a daily broadsheet newspaper, which has been published in Melbourne, Australia since 1854. Owned and published by Fairfax Media, The Age primarily serves Victoria, but is also available for purchase in Tasmania, the Australian Capital Territory and border regions of South Australia and...

.

External links

Other sources featuring this artist

Official site

Citylights Gallery, Melbourne, 2004. (featured artist)