B-Toy

Andrea Michaelsson, also known as BTOY, is a Spanish artist born in 1977. For many years, she has been using stencils on her favorite surfaces: “found walls” with uneven textures, where pollution traces and bits of advertising posters gather. Worn-out walls, boarded-up doors, and windows of deserted buildings serve as the natural settings for her artistic creations. BTOY paints still characters whose gazes and expressions engage us, making us ponder the passage of time. Inspired by old black and white photographs, her portraits depict images of a bygone era, characterized by vibrant colors and vigorous brushstrokes. Delving into intertextuality, the artist embeds the principles of postmodernism in her works.

Her portraits of female figures prompt us to reflect on the portrayal of women and explore how the concept of femininity has evolved over time. Her imagination is drawn to Hollywood of the first half of the twentieth century, spanning from the silent films of the 1920s to the musical comedies of the 1950s, from Louise Brooks to Judy Garland. Recently, she has turned her attention to social conflicts in history and the roles of men and women in such contexts. She is moving towards increasingly textured pictorial compositions marked by splashes and streaks of color, akin to reinterpretations of Pixaçao. Practicing stencil art since 2001, Andrea Michaelsson has established herself in the international art scene. She was invited by Banksy to the Cans Festival in 2008, alongside fifty of the world’s top stencil artists. Her work has also been showcased in France, notably at the temporary exhibition of the Tour Paris.