Art in MKE: Jeremy Novy's urban koi fish and queer street art
Courtesy of Jeremy Novy MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- If you live in or around Milwaukee, you're probably familiar with the black, white, and orange koi fish painted throughout the city's sidewalks and alleyways.
Jeremy Novy, the artist behind the popular street art, places them with intent. To the untrained eye, they may not appear to be more than a whimsical juxtaposition of color among potholes and slabs of concrete, but if you ask Novy, you'll find each piece carries its own symbolism.
And while these fish are arguably his most well-known designs, Novy is also the talent behind a queer street art series that holds its own significant message. We caught up with him in between commission work to take a closer look at the meaning behind the artwork many of us walk by daily.
The Urban Koi Fish
Originating in Milwaukee, Novy's hallmark koi fish can now be found all around the world, from the streets of San Francisco to Amsterdam.
He began painting them after a college trip to China back in 2006. A student at UW-Milwaukee's Peck School of the Arts, he received a grant to study abroad, spending time in Beijing, among other places.
"When we came back, we had to do an art project that was about what we learned while we were there," Novy says. "And so, I was really fascinated with kind of like ancient art…they're taking ancient art and they're mixing it with contemporary art materials. And so, I came up with the idea of using the concrete, which is a very, very new medium, or a new material, and mixing that with the very soft, nature feel of a koi pond, and that feng shui-ness."
If you spot the fish around town, you'll notice they're rarely swimming solo. You'll often find between two-eight koi in a given area. Their appearance may seem random, but the number of fish at each location bares meaning, also connecting back to Novy's time abroad.
"In Chinese paintings, they've symbolized the number of koi that would be in a painting to represent different Chinese lucky numbers, to kind of like create different feng shui and positiveness. So, when I put them out into the world, I try to incorporate what that Chinese lucky number means, as well, placing them out there."
For instance, the number three represents the three stages of life - birth, marriage and death. "So, I usually do them in a circle in that, to kind of represent the circle of life in that aspect," Novy says.
Two represents double happiness. "And who doesn't want to be happy more than once, but maybe over and over and over again?"
Five symbolizes transformation. "It's the story of an emperor coming from peasantry and walking through five gates- the final gate being the forbidden city- before becoming emperor."
Seven is about community and relationships. "I really enjoy doing seven in public places, like parks and things like that, and really hoping that kind of the feng shui and symbolism is somehow carried over and can create strangers to talk and communicate with another in public places."
"Eight is good fortune, kind of for luck, business."
And one symbolizes perseverance and overcoming obstacles.
"I feel that there must be some truth, some universal-type thing to these lucky numbers, the same way that in Western culture we have religious symbols that have some bearing and some meaning behind them, and some universal energy. I'd really like to think that, you know, by putting these numbers out there, even just the koi in themselves, that I'm somehow creating some universal feng shui harmony for the space and community, and people that see them on a daily basis."
Queer Street Art
While his globetrotting koi fish could reasonably be considered his most famed work, Novy is also the talent behind a queer street art series equally worthy of attention. After growing up in Reedsburg, Wisconsin, Novy moved to Milwaukee at 18. He says that's when he had the opportunity to really open up about his identity.
His very first stencil in the series was created in Milwaukee around 2004 - an image of Lady Bunny, a legendary New York City drag queen.
"I really was researching street art, I found street art a really interesting thing... I saw that there was different artists, like female artists, starting to make art that was about representing females in street art and graffiti, because it's kind of a male-dominated world for a really long time. They were bringing diversity in by representing the female in street art, and I found that really interesting. And the more and more that I looked at it, I realized that there wasn't any queer representation in street art."
He says at the time, graffiti used a lot of homophobic slurs.
"And so, I really, really found it interesting that that there's this opportunity to create, what I call nowadays, queer visibility and a visual safe space for our queer community. We're constantly bombarded with heterosexual advertisements - bus stop ads, billboards… so I started to create these different queer images and putting them on the street to change the way that people think, and to put out an image that maybe makes someone feel safe and comfortable in their skin."
In 2011, Novy received a National Endowment for the Arts grant from the Queer Cultural Center in San Francisco. He began collecting queer street art from around the world. "I was trying to prove that what I am doing is a real art medium, that there are other artists like me in the world and it's not just me trying to make this." And in 2013, he was able to show that collection of art at Yale University in New Haven.
"Since, there has definitely been an increase of people creating stickers and different stuff to empower themselves- like all over the United States and beyond the United States- which is a really, really beautiful thing, that, you know, we could make art to heal ourselves, but also make art to heal others."
There's a reason Novy finds street art, in particular, so important.
"Art on the street reaches 100% of the demographics; it reaches people young, old, all different races, in a different way than art that's in a museum or gallery." He says art in those spaces will only reach the people who can afford to go there. If you're trying to make a statement, street art reaches a much wider audience.
"Early on, you know, the people would write gay slurs on my art pieces. Back in like 2008 still, some would," Novy says. But he says these days, people give his art more respect- something he attributes to the respect they have for the koi. "The koi have made me gain popularity in the graffiti community, so then the community, because they accept the koi, they also accept my queer street art." But he says the attention given to his talent is still often narrowly focused. "I'm in a lot of different books, and if it's like a picture book of street art, they'll only show my koi. They won't put any of my other stuff."
Stencil of 'Divine,' (Harris Glenn Milstead), actor and drag queen
He says while we have seen steps forward in terms of diversity and inclusion in public art -like the addition of rainbow-colored crosswalks to city streets- there's more progress to be made. "We need to be elevated off of the ground and onto walls, and have queer murals," Novy says. "To create an understanding to your neighbor, that maybe isn't queer, or for a straight person to understand their transgender neighbor, you know. By putting out these images, it's kind of created that."
He says there's proof that the images are, in fact, making a difference. He's received mail from people who've been impacted by his queer art. "About five months ago, from a mother who has a transgender child and was so happy to find me putting this art out into the world…and I wasn't ever expecting that. I was just trying to fight homophobia in the graffiti community and to bring in diversity that, you know, we all have a right to have stuff on the street."
And his koi fish seem to provide the same comfort to some, by association.
"I've gotten emails from people...and they're like, 'you know, I love seeing your koi around the city, I feel that anytime there's koi in front of a business or bar, that it's a safe place for queer people to go, like we're not gonna be bullied.' And I don't know…that's just kind of beautiful that it's kind of evolved into that."
The connection between the early days of contemporary graffiti, and the work he's doing now, doesn't elude him. "If you read up about it, it started from kids…and they really found graffiti as a way to empower themselves. They would write their name and then a number next to it that represented the city block in New York that they lived in...and they were really trying to give themselves a voice. And so very similar thing, you know, with street art- and especially like queer street art- it gives you the opportunity to empower yourselves and maybe change the mind of others."
So, what's he up to now? Novy currently calls California home, but when we caught up with him, he was painting the town with koi in New Orleans. He says he continues to push for queer murals and says he's added rainbow koi fish into the mix.
"Trying to get those books that published my koi to publish a koi that has a rainbow on it," he says. "To make people see the world as a more diverse place."
