Photo: Sandy Kim
Two big-deal dudes on the underground art scene in Brooklyn are opening a gallery in Williamsburg this week. And it’s name is MuddGuts.
Mark Cross is a tattoo artist at Greenpoint Tattoo Co. and an accomplished photographer who has been compiling the MuddGuts photo blog for a few years now. His partner-in-weird is Lele Saveri, a moustachioed and heavily tattooed Italian photographer who formerly served as VICE Italy’s photo editor and this summer has been charming folks into buying limited-edition zines at The Newsstand, in the Lorimer/Metropolitan station.
Lele Saveri at The Newsstand (Photo courtesy of All Day Every Day)
According to Saveri, the “project” (“I don’t like using the word gallery — it’s too limiting,” he said in an e-mail) has been on Cross’s mind for a long time. But the highly sought-after tattoo artist (he has over 17,000 Instagram followers and a booked client list) didn’t know whether he could undertake the whole thing himself. “He just asked me if I’d do it one night,” said Saveri. “I thought it’d be perfect for me at this time in my life.”
Cross preferred to not do a formal interview, but while tattooing a playful looking reaper head on the wrist of a client (the writer of this piece) he expressed excitement over the space at at 41 Montrose Avenue and hoped it would be something long-term.
(Photo: Sandy Kim)
Given the participants, you can expect to see some of the sicko photography MuddGuts is known for, as well as some classic tattoo imagery — plus representation of some of the wonderful things happening in Brooklyn’s underground art scene right now. “Mark and I are so blessed to be surrounded by so many artists,” said Saveri. “That was the starting point of this project, anything worth showing to the world, we’ll show.”
If you like your photography nice and disturbing, get excited for opening night Friday, when photographer Sandy Kim shows her new book and kicks off her first solo exhibit in New York. Kim’s work picks up where the late Dash Snow’s left off, bringing a cutesie sensibility to bloodied, skinny and naked people in compromising acts.