Street Art in Sin City at the Life Is Beautiful Festival 2015

What it was like at Las Vegas' premier art fair.

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Complex Original

Image via Complex Original

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For the past three years, JUSTKIDS has teamed up with the Life is Beautiful Music and Art Festival to bring artists from around the world to the desert to breathe new life into Old Las Vegas. Working downtown within the 15-block footprint of the festival, the squad of artists paint, build, paste and cover walls, containers, and electrical boxes with art ahead of the epic concerts that rocked the city late last month, and for the second year in a row (2014 recap here), we were invited along for the ride.

A week removed from the Unexpected Festival in Fort Smith, Arkansas, curator Charlotte Dutoit of JUSTKIDS, Rom Levy of StreetArtNews, and artists D*Face and Ana Maria made the trip to a very warm Nevada (around 100 degrees the morning we arrived) and were joined by Ruben Sanchez, Sbagliato, Bikismo (with a little help from The Fat Jew), Bordalo II, Filthy Luker and Pedro Estrellas, 1010, Pixel Pancho, Stephane Malka, Jason Woodside, and Trevor Wheatley and Cosmo Dean. The artists endured the sun to add to the growing outdoor art gallery, which now has over 30 permanent murals and installations. From Bordalo’s Meerkat installation made entirely of wood and materials found in a salvage yard in Vegas, to D*Face’s giant Zombie Hello Kitty and Zombie Snoopy inflatables, the art was a big hit again this year and gave the hoards of music fans a lot to appreciate in between performances by Stevie Wonder, Kendrick Lamar, Run the Jewels, Imagine Dragons, The Killers, and many more.

Other highlights of Life Is Beautiful 2015 include the Grills & Guitars launch party at the SLS Las Vegas with live music by Spoon and amazing food by world-class chefs and restaurants, and the “Learning Series” talks with actors, entrepreneurs, and other famous people like Bill Nye and Rosario Dawson. Other works of art that framed the colorful events of the festival included tons of paintings and sculptures at the Art Motel by APEX and dozens of others, and a very popular installation of Banksy’s All City truck from his 2013 “Better Out Than In” New York City residency. Scroll through these photos from the festival, and peep the #JustKidsOfficial and #LifeIsBeautiful hashtags on social media for more.

 

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