Juliette

Wildplaskunstenaar

The art of peeing on walls

When a group of young friends are drinking on the streets, there inevitably comes a point where at least one of them needs to pee. For Theo Brandwijk the basic need originally inspired a friendly competition, and later an entire lifestyle.
What started as a joke many years ago is now a rather large collection of photographs. Self-proclaimed "wildplaskunstenaar"(outdoor pee-artist) Theo Brandwijk utilises urine as both an artistic material and a design subject.

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Theo Brandwijk - eagle - Theo Brandwijk, self named 'wild-pee-artist', pisses eagles on walls. Theo Brandwijk

It started as a friendly contest after a night of drinking with his friends. The one who could "paint" the best eagle with his pee would win. Though he's lost contact with the friends he competed with, Theo Brandwijk is still pissing eagles as he goes. Throughout the past 16 years the designer has been leaving his mark in very temporary street-art fashion by peeing on walls, continuously improving his technique.
As the collection of eagles have grown to 150 eagles on Instagram, Theo has also gained attention and praise from various media. In 2013 he was interviewed for the Dutch Vice. This is when the term "wildplaskunstenaar" was coined.

But why eagles? According to Theo Brandwijk he and his friends chose the eagle because it's a very strong symbol. Also, they're not that hard to make apparently, though he admits that he still has room to improve. He's getting better at making the eye, but the head continues to be the hardest part of the image: He has to stand on his toes to reach.

His interest in urine, however, is not exclusive to the eagles. Theo is also working on designing a modern, separating toilet. He is looking to create a toilet that can extract the nitrates and phosphate from urine - substances that are hard to remove from wastewater. Theo has named the design "Piet" and this upcoming May he's going to Chicago for a month to improve and further develop the project.