Sheffield street artist Bubba 2000 discusses the Steel City's incredible outsider art scene and the struggle of breaking into it while maintaining credibility as an artist.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00If you do too much of something, you dilute what makes it special.
00:04If someone is, if their heart is in the right place and they're going out and they're doing it and they're being earnest about it
00:10and they're doing it for the right reasons, they're not just doing it for money, I will support them to the hill.
00:15Like, there's a lot of people who do stuff I don't particularly like, but in the same way, not everyone likes what I do.
00:22It kind of creates a troublesome pipeline for artists then.
00:26I mean, they will look for opportunities where they can be paid for legally, given the opportunity to spray a wall.
00:33There are plenty of places in Sheffield where people go out and spray just political messages, for example.
00:37One of the main issues now is, I mean, when COVID happened, a lot of people for the first time were given a lot of free time.
00:44So they decided to indulge in that free time and their creativity, which I fully endorse and support.
00:50Whereas in the old days, street art was the last pure democratic way to get your stuff out there.
00:56Now it's about paid advertising. It's about how many likes you get, how many hits, the algorithm.
01:03Those that have got more money and more connections, they're being given the opportunities.
01:08But I mean, you're seeing that in music, you're seeing it in acting.
01:11People from this kind of lower middle class, working class, you ain't getting the look in.
01:17You know, there's people out there and they're throwing their money around left, right and centre without doing what I call the time in the trenches.
01:24Do you understand? And that's what's frustrating.
01:27That because people haven't got money or they're not getting the exposure, which is why I wanted to do, you know, get artists that wouldn't necessarily be getting the attention.
01:37We'll say, here's a canvas, this is the person we'd like you to do, knock yourself out.
01:42But instead, you can end up with the same people time and time and time again.
01:45I mean, I could be going out, I could be doing something on everyone, but people get sick and tired of it.
01:51You know, you want it to be special, you want it to be an event.
01:54You don't want it to be something that you're just commodifying.
01:58And it's just, as I said, it's just ends up commercial art at the end of the day.
02:02To be able to do what you enjoy and get paid for it is incredible.
02:06You know what I mean?
02:07And I think the minute you stop being grateful, it's work hard, stay humble.
02:11Keep your head down, do the work, you know, because you're only as good as your last job.
02:16Ooh, profound.