Own an original Filipino street art!

Artist Basic Lee was born and raised in the Bay Area.

On October 2nd, two filmmakers will be launching a unique crowdfunding campaign, bringing seldom seen artworks from the streets of Manila to an international audience.

The Filipino Street Art Project Kickstarter campaign will be the first opportunity for art enthusiasts worldwide to own original works from over 30 participating Filipino street artists, including stickers, art prints, and canvases.

Kimberly Dryden and Austin Smith, co-directors of the Filipino Street Art Project (FSAP), spent six months documenting the lives of street artists in Manila with a team of Filipino cinematographers and production assistants. The anchor of the project is a feature-length documentary film exploring life in modern Manila through the diverse and intimate stories of four street artists.

“There’s so much depth and vitality to the Philippine street art scene. It is growing hand-in-hand with the Philippines as an economic player, giving these artists the opportunity to comment on the incredible social change happening in their communities. We hope by sharing their stories that we spark dialogue around both Filipino issues and the power of public art as a medium,” said Smith, whose mother was born in Pangasinan.

Dryden is a documentary film producer and a transmedia storyteller with an MFA from Wake Forest University. She has shot, directed, and produced numerous films at home and abroad. In addition to documentary film-making, Dryden also creates transmedia projects that use first-person narratives across multiple platforms to allow participants to engage with sometimes unfamiliar, difficult issues like drug policy reform and political corruption. She has taught Documentary Producing, owns a video production house, and consults on several media projects.

Austin Smith is a cinematographer originally from the San Francisco Bay Area. As a Filipino American, Smith has strong ties to the Filipino communities on the West Coast and within the Philippines itself and so acts as the project’s primary producer. Smith holds degrees from Wake Forest University in Political Science and English with a focus on Southeast Asia, and has worked as a reporter, social media manager, and event planner. He is the co-owner and creative director of Locavore Media and is also serving as outreach and engagement consultant on two documentary projects.

Funds raised through this campaign will be used to finish post-production of the film with a target release of Spring 2015. Each donation reward will be accompanied by an interview, photo gallery, and short video of the artist the backer chooses to support.

Beyond the film, the FSAP has created a set of interactive ebooks, hosted live art events at universities, contributed exhibits to Google’s Street Art Project, and had images featured in TIME and Esquire.

Check out their Kickstarter campaign.