Artwork Description
A P O P H E N I A Silkscreen Print by Add Fuel Hand-Pulled 6-Color on 320gsm Astropack Fine Art Paper Limited Edition Artwork.
2023 Signed & Numbered Limited Edition of 100 Artwork Size 19.69x27.56 Silkscreen Print
A P O P H E N I A Silkscreen Print by Add Fuel
A P O P H E N I A by Add Fuel is a masterwork of visual decoding, layering ornamental tradition with street-born semiotics to construct a compelling example of Street Pop Art & Graffiti Artwork. Released in 2023 as a hand-pulled silkscreen edition, this 6-color print on 320gsm Astropack fine art paper measures 19.69 by 27.56 inches and is signed and numbered in a limited run of 100. True to Add Fuel’s signature language, this piece fractures expectations by deconstructing tilework aesthetics and revealing subversive narratives beneath the surface.
Traditional Ornamentation Meets Urban Expression
Add Fuel, the Portuguese visual artist born Diogo Machado, is globally recognized for transforming azulejo tile motifs into contemporary compositions that pull from graffiti, comic illustration, and digital art. A P O P H E N I A lives up to its name by encouraging viewers to find meaningful patterns in layered chaos. Through strategic tears in the blue-and-white ceramic facade, Add Fuel reveals a multidimensional view of street culture. Each layer beneath the decorative mask reveals graffiti elements, cartoonish eyes, spray can fonts, and references to playful vandalism. These ruptures become metaphors for exposure—lifting the veil on how historical identities clash or coalesce with urban reinvention. This technique mirrors the visual tension at the core of pop art’s evolution: reverence and rebellion, past and present. The ornamental tile patterns themselves are sharply printed with impeccable silkscreen precision, emphasizing symmetry and repetition. But these are violently interrupted with jagged rips and embedded graffiti text—injecting defiance into formality.
Layering as Cultural Commentary
The print reads as a layered palimpsest of history, heritage, and rebellion. Add Fuel uses the azulejo not just as pattern, but as cultural symbol—a representation of colonial history, religious expression, and architectural identity in Portuguese-speaking regions. By inserting abstracted cartoon eyes, bubble-style graffiti lettering, and pink pop flourishes beneath the surface, he questions who writes cultural legacy and who redraws it. The pink upper right insert, mimicking a gallery-mounted screenprint overlaying a tile wall, points toward institutional framing, commerce, and the ongoing commodification of street aesthetics. Each section in A P O P H E N I A appears surgically exposed, intentionally disruptive, and graphically clean. The effect is an exploration of what happens when underground expression seeps through decorative veneer—when lived street experience insists on being seen within museum-ready surfaces.
Printmaking Precision Meets Urban Interruption
Printed with six meticulous layers, the craftsmanship of A P O P H E N I A elevates it far beyond a reproduction of street wall aesthetics. The 320gsm Astropack fine art paper absorbs color with depth and vibrancy while allowing the precise edges of the rip effects and tile seams to stand out. The silkscreen process allows each motif—from the tightly interlocked azulejo geometry to the looser graffiti splashes—to retain graphic clarity, simulating physical layering and dimensional depth. It’s not just visual illusion—it’s the handcraft of print technique made tangible. Add Fuel’s A P O P H E N I A is both homage and confrontation, tradition and disruption. It sits comfortably in the context of modern pop street art, not by borrowing aesthetics from graffiti but by merging tile and tag with equal care. It is a visual thesis on identity, culture, and the simultaneous erosion and persistence of public expression.
