Awesome Stick Figure Art

Image via Complex Original

Keith Haring is one of the most iconic graffiti artists of the 1980s. This untitled 1983 work is typical of his stick figure-like characters that he drew using bright colors and bold lines. Such images quickly became a central part of New York street culture of the time. As Haring rose to fame, his work could be spotted in high-end galleries and subway stations alike. Through his stylized art, Haring was able to communicate these positive messages of unity and life. 

Antony Gormley is a British artist that has received praise for his sculptures, installations, and public artwork. His work explores the relationship between the human form and nature. His sculptures reflect the feeling of estrangement from the world and from others that humans beings are too familiar with. Gromley has shown in museums and galleries but he has also done installations on the streets of London, New York, and Brazil. This work was part of his Inside Australia project for the Perth International Arts Festival in 2002 where he installed 51 steel figures across the sparse landscape.

Harald Naegeli is a Swiss artist known as the "Sprayer of Zurich" for the work he did during the late 1970s. Although he is a classically trained artist, he is best known for his graffiti. In 1977 he began spray painting his stick figure on walls in Zurich, creating controversy on whether this was art or vandalism.  Since then, however, he only occasionally draws these slim dark figures and begun embracing the more traditional arts, receiving wide acclaim for his work. 

This geometric sculpture uses wood blocks to form a 3D stick figure. The piece sticks to the traditional stick figure form, giving it a very stiff feeling that contrasts the goofy and loose position that it was placed in—a blend of abstraction and representation.

Artist Ryan Sullivan takes old photos or movie stills and recreates the characters in stick figures. The stick figure shows up repeatedly in Sullivan's work, demonstrating a keen fascination with this bare representation of the human form. This work, titled Coming or Going is a 2009 print cut out from a book.

The first Stikman surfaced in 1992 in the East Village, and since then he has been sighted on countless occasions in various cities across the US.  The character is a constantly evolving street art project.  When asked about the meaning behind the figure in an interview with Street Art NYC the anonymous artist said, "I like my art to speak for itself. There is no hidden message or meaning in the traditional sense, but it is possible to analyze the work on many levels if one is so inclined.  I do hope that the viewers develop a keen sense of the visual environment that is all around them."

Hans Godo Frabel is a German glass artist who is credited as being one of the first to blow glass as an art form. Up until the mid 1990s the Frabel Studio worked exclusively in clear glass but has since then adopted the use of color in the artwork. These beautiful glass sculptures created by Frabel elegantly capture the stick figure form.

Groupe LAPS is a French team of six artists and designers who used their combined expertise to create this multimedia experience called Key Frames in 2011 for i Light Marina Bay, Asia's first and only sustainable light art festival hosted in Singapore. Using LED light tubes these artists give the traditional stick figure form an exciting twist. 

Although Michael Luceros is best known for his ceramics and focus on Native American symbolism, these sculptures, installed at the Chazan Museum of Art at the University of Wisconsin this summer, are reminiscent of his early period. These hauntingly beautiful representations of a vacant human form are composed of wire frames and thin handmade tiles. Perhaps their fragile structure is meant to remind us of our own delicate nature. 

The Silent People by Finnish artist and dancer Reijo Kela was installed in the Finish countryside in 1994.  A local youth workshop maintains the installation and clothes sculptures. These figures have become a part of the local landscape, bringing life to the vacant countryside. 

These stick figure murals are a beautiful example of the artistic value in stick figures in art. The thick black lines that are a bold way to strip down the human form into an abstract representation. The use of humans as a symbol carries emotional depth but also allows room for a viewer to project their own identity upon the canvas. 

Artist Sam Brown of Explodingdog brings his simplistic stick figure drawings to life with his whimsical humor and thought provoking phrases. All of the drawings are either hand drawn or made on Photoshop, and the titles are all taken from fan submissions. His takes on the phrases sent in to him are often surprisingly beautiful. The depth of emotion that comes from his simplistic characters is what makes Brown's art so compelling. 

Banksy is the British graffiti artist best know for using his art as a platform for his strong social criticism and fearless attacks on institutions. This piece was a response to the Rupert Murdoch phone hacking scandal in 2011. Not known for stick figures, Banksy uses the simplistic form in this piece to bring an element of playfulness into a serious topic. The artist recently came out with a new piece in LA, titled Better Out Than In, hinting at an upcoming show in October. Hopefully we will be hearing more from him soon. 

Tony Bones is a Texas-born street artist who goes by GOYA.  Although Bones dabbles in many forms of artistic expression, his street art stick figures have long captivated the streets of New York. The artistic form is reminiscent of childlike innocence while the content often reflects a darker layer to the artwork, looming somewhere beneath the surface. 

Alberto Giacometti, alive from 1901 to 1966, is best remembered as a surrealist artist who worked extensively in sculpture, drawing, painting, and print. Giacometti's striking sculptures are powerful reminders that there is room for stick figures in the fine arts. Although Giacometti's obsession with the human form is prominent in his art, he is quoted saying that he does not sculpt the human form but "the shadow that it casts." 

Andre Saraiva is a French street artist known for his signature cartoon figure, Monsieur A. Although art is his passion he is also well known in the Parisian club scene. His fun loving nature defines the playfulness of his character, Monsieur A, and enables him to bring life into any city he hits.  As he once said, “A city without graffiti is a dead city.”

STIK's figures have become iconic of this British street artist's work. The simple lines and shapes that he creates bring depth to the sense of loneliness and insecurity that he is projecting with his work. He is quoted saying, “Body language is really like a direct language. Transitioning that to lines on a page or on a wall strikes directly to your heart.”