Tavar Zawacki

Tavar Zawacki (born 1981, California) is an American abstract artist based in Berlin, Germany. Known for a practice spanning public space and studio painting, Zawacki has spent more than two decades developing a visual language through repeated forms, systematic processes, and a disciplined, process-driven engagement with color and geometry. The arrow functioned as a visual extension of the ABOVE name, becoming a recurring device within a wider body of murals and public works realized across more than 45 countries, and reflecting themes of rising above fear, challenge, and limitation in pursuit of personal growth and aspiration.

Since transitioning to studio practice and exhibiting under his birth name, Zawacki has presented more than ten international solo exhibitions and developed a body of work centered on process-driven abstraction, employing geometric forms, color relationships, and transparency through layered and overlapping hues.

In 2000, he shifted from lettering to an arrow symbol pointing upwards, which became his primary visual identifier. According to Zawacki, the change was prompted by an incident where a freight train he had painted with the word "ABOVE" became unreadable as the train moved, leading him to adopt a simpler, more immediate symbol.

In 2000, at the age of 19, he relocated from California to Paris, France, where the street art scene included artists such as Zevs, Invader, Stak, and André. During this time he began painting his arrow logo throughout the city. Many of these works incorporated wordplay, with different words painted on each side of the arrows to create a rotating dialogue as they spun in the wind.

In 2005, Zawacki returned to Europe and began installing larger wooden arrows affixed to buildings at elevated heights. Over the course of a four-month tour he visited 15 countries and installed approximately 500 works.

In 2006 he organized the "Sign Language Tour," a six-month project across 26 European countries that emphasized wordplay in his arrow mobiles. Each piece featured words painted on both sides in different languages, creating a visual dialogue when rotated by the wind. Examples included French ("J'ai"/"faim"), Spanish ("Hace"/"sol"), German ("über"/"alle"), and Italian ("ciao"/"ciao"). thumb An illegal 'word play' mural painted during Zawacki’s 2007 South & Central America Tour, painted in Guatemala City. 'BY THE TIME YOU READ THIS I'LL ALREADY BE GONE'

He financed the project by working in Alaska for four months prior to departure. The tour lasted six months, beginning in October 2007 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and concluding in May 2008 in Mexico City, Mexico. Over the course of the project, Zawacki produced works in 18 cities across 13 countries.

Stencil period (2008–2010) In 2008, while still working under the pseudonym ABOVE, Zawacki shifted his practice from the arrow icon toward site-specific figurative stencil works that addressed social and political themes. In October 2008, following the collapse of the Washington Mutual bank during the Great Recession, he created a stencil of a downward-sloping NYSE bar graph on the building's exterior.

In January 2010, shortly after the 2010 Haiti earthquake, he produced the stencil "Help Thy Neighbor" in Havana, Cuba, depicting a boy with a raft, medical kit, and Haitian flag.

In May 2010 Zawacki exhibited with Blek le Rat, a pioneer of stencil graffiti, at White Walls Gallery in San Francisco. Press coverage described the exhibition as a "passing of the torch" between generations of stencil artists.

Mainstream media and political works (2011–2012) In October 2011, during the global Occupy Wall Street protests, Zawacki created a 120-foot mural in Miami reading "Give A Wall St. Banker Enough Rope And He Will Hang Himself," accompanied by a hanging effigy of a banker. The work was reported on by NBC News. Miami installation from 2011 responding to the Occupy Wall Street movement, where Zawacki paired a 120-foot mural with a suspended banker effigy to complete the statement: “GIVE A WALL ST. BANKER ENOUGH ROPE AND HE WILL HANG HIMSELF.”

In February 2012 he produced a mural in Johannesburg, South Africa, addressing the blood diamond trade. The text read "Diamonds are a woman's best friend and a man's worst enemy," painted across an exterior wall of Jewel City, one of the world's largest diamond exporters. According to media reports, he obtained permission from building owners by initially presenting a less controversial phrase.

In September 2012, during the Eurozone financial crisis, Zawacki painted a 120-foot stencil mural in Zaragoza, Spain, depicting a queue of silhouettes with the phrase "24% Desempleados" ("24% unemployed"). The work referenced Spain's unemployment rate of 24.6 percent at the time, then the highest in the European Union.

Later that month he produced the short film #Socialmedia in Copenhagen, Denmark. The project involved painting a series of text-based statements on a wall, repeatedly covering and repainting them over two days, recorded as a time-lapse film. The messages addressed the role of platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram in contemporary culture.

Timing Is Everything (2013) Street stencil Timing Is Everything (2013) in London. At night, the fixed shadow of the street sign aligns with the painted figure, completing the site-specific illusion.

In August 2013, Zawacki produced the stencil work Timing Is Everything in London, England. The piece depicted a breakdancer painted upside down with an arm extended downward. At night the stencil aligned with the shadow of a nearby streetlight pole, creating the illusion of the figure balancing on top of the shadow.

Coverage in the Huffington Post described the piece as a work in which "timing and lighting" were integral to the visual effect, noting its dependence on interaction with the urban environment. Similarly, Mashable reported on the project, emphasizing its use of context and shifting daylight conditions rather than social or political themes.

Abstract Arrow period (2014–2016) “Incognito” mural painted by Tavar Zawacki in Johannesburg, South Africa in 2015, created during the City of Gold Festival. The 33-meter-tall work layers overlapping arrow forms, generating secondary shapes where the colors intersect. In June 2014 Zawacki participated in the Artscape mural festival in Malmö, Sweden, where he painted an eight-story mural titled Metamorphosis using a color scheme based on the CMYK color model.

Later that year he held a three-month residency in Detroit, Michigan, in preparation for his solo exhibition Remix at Inner State Gallery. The exhibition featured laser-cut wood panels reconfigured into new compositions, described as an exploration of the balance between curved and linear forms.

In October 2015 Zawacki painted a 33-meter-tall by 17-meter-wide mural titled Incognito in Johannesburg, South Africa, as part of the City of Gold Festival. The work, completed over ten days, layered overlapping arrow forms in varied colors, producing secondary shapes at their intersections.

In March 2016 he presented 12 Months at Galerie SOON in Zürich, Switzerland. The exhibition consisted of works reflecting Zawacki's associations with each month of the year, integrating his arrow motif into varied abstract patterns and color combinations.

That summer Zawacki was artist-in-residence for the Quin Arts program at the Quin Hotel in New York City. Curated by DK Johnston, the exhibition presented 36 mixed-media works in acrylic and resin on wood, marking his first solo show in New York.

Metamorphosis (2017) Installation view of Tavar Zawacki’s 2017 exhibition Metamorphosis in Berlin. The show featured large-scale Op art and hard-edge works and was the first time Zawacki exhibited publicly under his real name following two decades working anonymously as ABOVE.

In January 2017 Zawacki ended his anonymity and began creating and signing works under his birth name. The exhibition included large-format canvases incorporating Op art, Trompe-l'œil, CMYK, and Hard-edge painting approaches. It marked the first time in his career that he publicly exhibited works signed with his real name.

That same month, his second monograph, also titled Metamorphosis, was published by Urban Spree Books. The 168-page volume surveys his work from the 2014 Remix exhibition in Detroit through the 2017 Berlin show, including outdoor murals and indoor works produced during that period.

Shapeshifting (2018) In November 2018 Zawacki presented the solo exhibition Shapeshifting at Wunderkammern gallery in Milan, Italy. The exhibition explored ideas of transformation through varied shapes, color gradients, and trompe-l'œil effects.

Artist Shepard Fairey wrote the exhibition introduction, noting Zawacki's transition from his anonymous ABOVE identity to broader formal experimentation, and described the works as "visually dynamic" and engaged in a "2D/3D dialogue" through layered gradients and trompe-l'œil techniques. The mural, covering the side of a multi-story building, became the largest public artwork in Buffalo and Western New York.

Aaron Ott, Curator of Public Art at the Albright-Knox, described the project as an expansion of Zawacki's studio practice into a public setting, noting that it conveyed "the kind of energy that you get from the streets but that you can share throughout the world in museum settings, galleries, and here, with public art."

Lockdown paintings (2020–2021) In February 2020 Zawacki travelled to Bali, Indonesia, for a planned six-week surf trip. Shortly after his arrival the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic led to global travel restrictions, preventing his return to Berlin. What was intended as a short visit extended into an eighteen-month stay. During this period he decided to let go of his remaining belongings in Berlin and later relocate to Lisbon, Portugal.

While Bali was under lockdown measures, Zawacki established a temporary studio and began working on the Lockdown series between March 2020 and April 2021. He described his routine during that period as painting “an average of 9–10 hours a day alone in my Bali studio,” adding that the works reflected his personal responses to the early months of the pandemic.

Papel (2022–2023)

After producing the Lockdown paintings in Bali, Zawacki relocated to Lisbon, Portugal. During this time Zawacki continued working without a permanent studio before reestablishing one in Berlin in 2025. He has described this period as one of disconnection from both himself and the people around him, during which he stopped drinking alcohol, adopted daily meditation and breathwork practices, and sought to rebuild stability in his life. The works are large-scale abstract paintings characterized by sweeping arcs of translucent color layered across the canvas. The overlapping veils generate secondary and tertiary tones, embodying Zawacki’s principle of "1 + 1 = 3," where the meeting of two elements produces a third outcome.

The series engages with themes of connection and disconnection in contemporary society, referencing both community and the human need for collaboration. Zawacki has described the project as a visual exploration of how relationships between forms—and between people—create something greater than the sum of their parts. 2021: LOCKDOWN, Virtual Reality Gallery – Bali, Indonesia He was born and raised in northern California and has been skateboarding since he was 13 years old.

Above: Passport documents Zawacki's artworks and travels in over 60 countries from 2004 to 2010. The introduction was written by artist Shepard Fairey, who described Above as "extraordinarily driven" and praised his ambition and creativity on the streets of Paris.

Books featuring interview/works from Tavar Zawacki In English: Søren Solkær, "Surface", Gingko Press, 2015, Nicholas Ganz, "Street Messages", Dokument Press, 2015, Anna Waclawek, Graffiti And Street Art, Thames and Hudson, 2011, Christian Hundertmark, The Art of Rebellion 1, Publikat Verlag, 2003, Christian Hundertmark, The Art of Rebellion 2, Publikat Verlag, 2006, Christian Hundertmark, The Art of Rebellion 3, Publikat Verlag, 2010, Without Reason, Ilovewr, Without Reason, 2006, Markus Mai, Writing: Urban Calligraphy And Beyond, Die Gestalten Verlag, 2003, Gary Shove, Untitled, I, Carpet Bombing Publishing 2009 Gary Shove, Untitled, II, Carpet Bombing Publishing 2010 Gary Shove, Untitled, III, Carpet Bombing Publishing, 2011, Maxime Courtin, Colors Zoo, Colorzoo publishing, 2004, Nicholas Ganz, Graffiti World, Thames & Hudson, 2004 Tristan Manco, Street Logos, Thames & Hudson, 2004, Louis Bou, Street Art: The Spray Files, HarperCollins, 2005 Louis Bou, NYC BCN: Street Art Revolution, Collins Design, 2006, Izastickup, Bo130, Microbo, TheDon, Drago, 2005, Claudia Walde, Sticker City, Thames & Hudson, 2007, R. Klanten, M. Huebner, Urban Interventions, Die Gestalten, 2010

In French: Kriss Montfort, Hip art the french touch, éditions Kitchen 93, 2004, (see p. 81) Collectif, Une Nuit, éditions Kitchen 93, 2007, (see p. 72) Fabienne Grevy, Paris Graffiti, Editions de la Martiniere, 2008,

In Italian: Duccio Dogheria, Street Art (Storia e Controstoria Techniche e Protagonisti), Giunti, 2015,