NYState of Mind: See No Beauty

BNS bridges street and fine art by integrating his public interventions into his studio practice. His street art and graffiti, often ephemeral, are placed in key city locations, blending into their surroundings while being exposed to weather, tags, and uncontrolled interactions. He documents these interventions through photography, later transferring them onto silkscreens and incorporating these scenes in his gallery works.

For nearly 20 years, he has refined a self-taught approach to silkscreening. Viewing it as an individual art form, he employs an unconventional technique that does not use registration. Each screen is burned and hand-pulled with controlled pressure to achieve distinct variations where all screens are applied to the canvas only once, ensuring that every piece is unique. This approach contrasts with the traditional perception of silkscreen as a repetitive process.

His work is built through layering, combining aerosol paint, acrylics, silkscreen, inks, collage, and photography to create depth and texture. Compositions often exceed 30 layers, exploring the interplay between urban landscapes and organic elements, juxtaposing architectural structures like bricks, cables, and water towers with botanical imagery.

His works are primarily on canvas or wood panels, sometimes incorporating a resin finish.

It juxtaposes the beauty found in cityscapes, nature and people. A series of figurative paintings where women’s elegance shines through layers of flowers and patterns fuelled by graffiti and the energetic aesthetics of cities like New York or London. 
The paintings include self-referential imagery such as buildings that have a history in the artist’s life, drawings by his kids and symbols of special importance. Every utility pole, every NYC bodega corner, every train, every single building featured in the paintings have had an impact on the artist’s life.
In some of his paintings for instance, buried beneath numerous layers of paint, one can spot among the silkscreened architectural scenes the artist’s studio building and homes where he has lived, as well as his grandparents’ house or art supply stores like the first graffiti shop still standing in NYC, “Scrap Yard” or iconic venues like CBGB and Andy Warhol’s studio and even the NYC City Hall where BNS got married.
Water towers, parking signs and brownstone buildings - elements that make up the cityscape - suddenly come under the spotlight, reflecting the artist’s perception of beauty. 
Nature is also a recurring topic in BNS’ work. Floral and botanical designs as well as the artist’s own pictures of plants, weeds and flowers appear in different layers throughout the series. Some grow in his garden and others remind him of his childhood, such as Yerba Mate leaves.
The photography sessions for the portraits usually take place in the artist’s studio where he gets to meet the models and learn about their life. Later on BNS tells each model’s story through symbols in his paintings.
Part of the series depicts subjects with graffiti painted over their eyes which adds a layer of anonymity to the portrait, while other works are portraits where different people’s faces, eyes, mouth and body are collaged to make up an entirely new subject.

This series was initially conceived as a street art project and began in New York City around 2009. Many of these portraits were wheat-pasted across various cities, including NYC, Miami, Moscow, Toronto, and Barcelona, among others.
BNS’s bespoke-suited Stormtroopers or tattooed Audrey Hepburns subvert familiar pop culture tropes, merging iconic characters and concepts with his explosive bursts of color and a touch of dry humor. These works invite viewers to re-examine their perspectives on some of the most recognizable figures of the past few decades. BNS’s style is original and instantly recognizable—seamlessly blending graffiti, tattoos, and his signature elements into each portrait.
Every element in these portraits is deliberately chosen to unify the subject and its story. The tattoos often reference the subject’s personal life—a nod to the city of their birth, a romantic story, or a pivotal date that shaped their career—while the titles serve as punchlines, adding an extra layer of meaning to the work.