We stepped into the vibrant studio of Germán Bel, famously known as Fasim, a true Pioneer In Spanish urban art. Located near Valencia, Spain, his creative space is a testament to decades of artistic exploration. Fasim, a seminal figure in the Spanish street art scene, graciously agreed to an interview, offering insights into his journey, inspirations, and perspectives on the evolution of urban art.
Interview with Fasim: Tracing the Roots of a Spanish Urban Art Pioneer
Hello Fasim, it’s a pleasure to speak with you. Could you share how your artistic journey began?
Hello to the Art Shortlist community! The pleasure is all mine.
My connection with painting is deeply rooted in my childhood. It’s almost as if painting preceded language for me. I was a very quiet child, often lost in my own world. My family would sometimes worry about my silence, only to find me engrossed in drawing, a look of pure joy on my face. One of my earliest memories is creating a crucifixion scene on an old sheet when I was around six, likely influenced by the strong religious atmosphere at my maternal grandparents’ house where I lived.
School was a challenge. I was constantly drawing, filling my notebooks with sketches to the point where the actual lessons disappeared under layers of art. Teachers struggled to get my attention as I was always mentally sketching. I wasn’t trying to be difficult, but painting was my sole focus. My schoolbooks became canvases, overflowing with drawings. Growing up in La Trinidad, a neighborhood in Barcelona with its share of challenges, I spent most of my time indoors, immersed in drawing, comics, and books. My grandmother, a skilled embroiderer, also influenced me with her intricate floral designs.
Even the floor tiles in our house sparked my imagination. I would find shapes and figures in their patterns, tracing them with pencil, creating my own secret world. It was a game, a kind of pareidolia exercise before I knew the term, and it became quite serious for me, despite the occasional reprimand. These tile games, in a way, were my first urban interventions. This early fascination with finding art in the everyday became the foundation of my later work, though I didn’t realize it was “art” then – it was just vital to me. When hip-hop culture arrived in Barcelona, I was already primed for a rebellious, unconventional art form that resonated with my desire to challenge the status quo and express my creativity freely.
Fasim is a unique name. Can you tell us about its meaning and origin?
“Fasim” evolved from my early days in graffiti. It’s a name born from the streets, from the act of writing itself. When hip-hop exploded in Spain in the mid-80s, it was a cultural earthquake. I started tagging anywhere and everywhere – crayons, carnival hairspray, discarded brushes, industrial sprays, even schoolbooks and walls.
Movies like ‘Beat Street’ introduced us to breakdancing and graffiti culture, but Henry Chalfant and Tony Silver’s film, Style Wars (1983), was the real revelation. It was our Rosetta Stone to the New York graffiti scene, a world away yet incredibly inspiring for young Spanish rebels like myself.
Germán Bel aka Fasim in his studio
Initially, I wrote “Fase1,” which became my recognized name in the scene. Over time, I modified it, arriving at “Fasim” because I liked the letter combination. Interestingly, Fasim is also a proper name in India, a coincidence without any intended connection.
Years later, I had the incredible opportunity to meet Henry Chalfant during his exhibition setup, “Graffiti, art or vandalism?”. I peppered him with questions about Subway Art and slides he showed, finally understanding the slang and nuances of the early New York scene.
What inspires your art, and which artists have been particularly influential?
My inspiration is diverse, drawn from artists, musicians, writers, and artisans globally. Art is a universal language, connecting people across borders. Despite political and social divisions, art fosters unity and shared vision. The internet has amplified this connection, allowing artists worldwide to inspire each other.
When I started with urban art, my knowledge of art history was limited. Street painting was about youthful energy and rebellion. However, a trip to Paris around 1989/90 changed everything. I was invited to JonOne’s studio at the Hôpital éphémère in Saint-Denis. Witnessing the burgeoning canvas movement in Europe, which JonOne spearheaded, was transformative. Artists like Rammellzee and A-One, pioneers of urban art as an artistic discipline, heavily influenced them, as did neo-expressionist giant Jean-Michel Basquiat.
JonOne’s studio was filled with works by Lady Pink, Lee Quiñones, Rammellzee, Daze, and Crash. He also showed me books on Basquiat and Miquel Barceló. It was my first real exposure to these artists, sparking a profound shift in my artistic thinking. This Paris trip was my initiation, unleashing a torrent of creativity. Back in Barcelona, I explored avant-garde galleries and museums, discovering Joan Miró, Antoni Clavé, Georges Braque, Picasso, and Antoni Tàpies.
Before Paris, Futura 2000’s Barcelona exhibition at Arcs & Cracs gallery had already shown me graffiti and urban art elevated to fine art, as Henry Chalfant had articulated.
How would you describe your current artistic style? Has it evolved from your graffiti roots?
My current work is a culmination of transformations, leaning towards a poetic and pictorial expression rather than just representing objects or abstract forms. It’s rooted in a visual game I played since childhood. Being solitary, my room was my universe, filled with drawing, painting, adventure books, and comics. I lived in a world between imagination and reality. My tile game, finding shapes in patterns, was an early form of art creation – painting with my eyes for pure mental delight.
Two abstract compositions by Fasim
Later, I realized this was similar to shamanistic and Paleolithic cave painters’ vision, perceiving bison shapes in rock contours before painting them. It’s pareidolia – a cognitive perception shared by humans and other mammals, more pronounced in sensitive individuals.
Paleolithic painters believed a membrane separated the real world from the spirit world, where images appeared in trances. Egyptians also revered pareidolia, evident in Gebel Barkal mountain in Sudan/Egypt, where a cobra-like rock formation became a sacred mountain dedicated to Amun.
What are your thoughts on the new generation of urban artists in Europe?
Urban art is more prevalent than ever, inheriting from and influenced by American pioneers. Europe has seen immense growth since the 80s. The initial decades were explosive with rebellion, which continues today.
However, urban art has, in many ways, deviated from its original rebellious intent. It’s been absorbed by the market. I see two paths: commercial and the one that retains its rebellious, often illegal, spirit.
The commercial side often exhibits a diluted aesthetic, where concepts seem intentionally blurred. Like contemporary art, it risks becoming an “aesthetic of merchandise,” losing itself in hyper-aestheticization and ego. Commodity theory debates in Central European contemporary art highlight this risk for urban art – sinking into meaninglessness.
Where is your studio now, and how is it organized?
About a decade ago, I moved from Barcelona to Valencia with Merche, to an old farmhouse in a small village near Valencia city. It’s large and old, perfect for a house-studio. It’s laid out with a long central corridor and side rooms – historically used for carts and animals heading to the fields. My studio is in the former stable’s upper level. Sometimes, I feel like Rimbaud writing “A Season in Hell” in his family’s stable.
When we arrived, it was like stepping back in time, filled with early 20th-century objects, disorganized yet fascinating, like Howard Carter discovering Tutankhamun’s tomb. Cleaning and dismantling the mangers revealed the space, though the troughs remain.
My studio is divided into three areas: side walls for large canvases, a central table for paper works, and mobile supports for medium-sized pieces. It’s not huge, but efficient for my needs.
Did the Covid-19 crisis affect your artistic practice?
Yes, significantly. It profoundly transformed my worldview, which in turn shaped my art. My work reflects my thoughts and experiences; it’s not mechanical. What I paint is deeply connected to my perceptions of the world, a poetic act.
The climate crisis, in my view, is the deepest crisis. Coupled with the 2007 economic crisis and the 2019-20 health crisis, it’s been challenging to maintain normalcy. However, I’ve been fortunate to continue creating, which is a privilege for an artist.
Do you have an artistic experience you’d like to share?
I remember as a teenager spending many nights in Antoni Gaudí’s Park Güell in Barcelona, back when it was open at night and frequented mostly by locals. It was a mystical experience. The park, on ‘the bare mountain’ (Monte Carmelo), is a living creation, a brilliant blend of nature and Catalan modernism, though initially considered eccentric and unsuccessful.
At night, Park Güell felt magical, like walking inside a giant, enchanting dragon. It was aesthetically and spiritually uplifting, deeply inspiring.
What are your projects for the latter half of 2021?
This summer, I’ve been working on postponed prints and a new painting series. I’m also starting two books. One is an experimental project in the style of Tristan Tzara, Brion Gysin, Julio Cortázar, and William Burroughs’ cut-ups. It’s a mix of poetry, literature, and fantastical imagery, blending noir, poetry, and surreal storytelling. It delves into jungles, snake men, and talking tigers – a dreamlike, subversive, hallucinatory style, seemingly illogical yet with deep symbolic layers, much like dreams. It’s my first venture into literature, and I’m enjoying the subversive, hallucinatory style.
A mural painted by Germán Bel in Spain
The other book is about the origins of graffiti in Barcelona, a long-gestating idea, but it’s still in early stages. I’m also participating in a group exhibition in Tenerife, Canary Islands, at the Boreal Festival, alongside 50 urban and contemporary artists.
What is a favorite artwork of yours?
Choosing one is impossible, so I’ll mention a few that come to mind. Goya’s Black Paintings from ‘la quinta del sordo’ are incredibly intense. Miraculously preserved in the Prado Museum after being transferred from the walls using the ‘strappo’ technique before his house collapsed.
A pair of old shoes, Vincent van Gogh, 1887
Vincent van Gogh’s A Pair of Old Shoes (1887) and Chaïm Soutine’s Landscape of Cagnes (1924) are also favorites. From antiquity, the sculpture of goddess Sekhmet and Euphronios’ painted kraters are stunning. In contemporary art, Miquel Barceló’s The Dance of the Flesh (1994) and Anselm Kiefer’s For Paul Celan: Flower of Ash (2006) are deeply impactful.
To conclude, is there a quote that inspires you?
“Beauty is the blending of the finite and the infinite in the right proportions.” – Plato
Discover the works of Germán Bel (Fasim)
