$Looby, the only project with a dev that has done a TED Talk!

Check out the full TED Talk here:

https://youtu.be/Vb__xBcC0i8?feature=shared

Main site:

https://www.looby.love

Summary of Stephen Bliss’ TEDx Talk: “The Power of the Palimpsest”

Stephen Bliss’ talk explores the concept of the palimpsest, which refers to a multi-layered record—originally a manuscript that has been erased and written over, but in his context, layers of urban decay, graffiti, and street art that build up over time.

Personal Journey and Artistic Inspiration

Bliss shares that his discovery of palimpsests was accidental and tied to a personal crisis—his “midlife zombie apocalypse.” Seeking a creative outlet, he began taking long walks across New York, photographing torn posters, graffiti, and street textures. He was particularly fascinated by the way layers of old posters, advertisements, and street markings unintentionally created abstract compositions.

Urban Decay as Art

He describes how the city’s walls, covered in peeling posters and graffiti, offer unexpected juxtapositions—crucifixes next to sad figures, old advertisements blending with new ones, and letters from anonymous people pasted on walls. For Bliss, these accidental compositions hold artistic and historical significance. He also highlights how subway billboards, sanded down by workers, leave behind ghostly, abstract images that he considers art.

Historical Perspective on Graffiti and Mark-Making

Bliss connects this contemporary phenomenon to ancient traditions of graffiti and mark-making, such as Roman inscriptions, Pompeii’s walls, and prehistoric cave paintings. He sees the urge to leave a mark as a fundamental human expression, despite the rise of digital communication.

Turning Found Chaos into Art

Inspired by his findings, Bliss began collecting and reworking these elements in his studio—layering torn posters, spraying them with silver, and adding ink to create large-scale compositions. He likens the torn edges of posters to expressive brushstrokes and draws parallels to artists from the 1950s and 60s, such as Mimmo Rotella, who also worked with street posters.

Reclaiming Public Space from Advertising

He critiques advertising’s influence, noting how damaged posters, with fragmented words and floating body parts, symbolically resist consumerism. He sees his work as reclaiming public space from commercial messages.

The Transformative Power of Art

Bliss concludes that this process—seeing beauty in the discarded and repurposing urban chaos—helped him overcome his personal struggles. He encourages the audience to embrace a more observant mindset, appreciate overlooked details, and recognise the ongoing human tradition of visual storytelling.

His final message: even if people forget everything else from his talk, they should at least remember the word palimpsest.