ABOVE Tavar Zawacki Detroit

ABOVE

BERLIN / Germany

Growing up in a free-spirited family in Northern California in the early ’80s, Berlin-based artist Tavar Zawacki, formerly known under his pseudonym ABOVE, is an American abstract artist and former street artist mostly known for his ABOVE arrow artworks. Zawacki’s artistic scale ranges from large scale mural works, as well as fine indoor arts and is characterized by the use of hard-edge painting, geometric abstraction and forced perspective illusions. As ABOVE, he was part of URBAN NATION’S ‘CUT IT OUT!’ project, which was dedicated to stencil art. […]

Biography / ABOVE

Growing up in a free-spirited family in Northern California in the early ’80s, Berlin-based artist Tavar Zawacki, formerly known under his pseudonym ABOVE, is an American abstract artist and former street artist mostly known for his ABOVE arrow artworks. Zawacki’s artistic scale ranges from large scale mural works, as well as fine indoor arts and is characterized by the use of hard-edge painting, geometric abstraction and forced perspective illusions. As ABOVE, he was part of URBAN NATION’S ‘CUT IT OUT!’ project, which was dedicated to stencil art.

During his earlier years, Zawacki, who started his street-art career in Paris, focused on text-based murals and his iconic ABOVE arrow, shedding light on political and social problems, trying to instil a ‘rise above all fears, challenges and anything holding you back from your goals’ mind-set into people. Leaving his pseudonym behind in 2017 and working under his birth name, the self-taught artist who was heavily influenced by the skateboard culture oft he early nineties, shifted his focus onto indoor arts and canvases, keeping the formerly used bright colours but adding metamorphosing geometric shapes.

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