Carlsbad Art and Culture

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The warm air greeted my bearded face and shaggy hair as I drove the empty early morning streets in route to the Wynwood Art District of Miami. The opening days of Art Basel, the nation’s biggest contemporary art fair, and the additional satellite fairs, were only days away, but an animated buzz had already begun to grow within the community with local businesses enticing tourists with flashy deals. Visiting artists had already begun claiming untouched  wall space. In only a handful of days these streets were to be congested with art collectors in search of creations by the next break through artist. Gallery owners would be pampering deep pocketed A-listers and socialites would be seeking the biggest lens and brightest flash.

With hundreds of galleries prepping their designated indoor walls, I began scouting my own walls which would also later be used to showcase artwork, but these walls would be those of the natural urban environment where the attendees of my art presentations would be the unsuspecting urban passersby of the the Miami streets during my 2nd large scale ‘Urban Pop Up Gallery’ consisting of nearly 30 pieces of art created previously in my San Diego based studio and transported within my luggage.

I drove the streets surrounding the Art District as well as the side streets extending outward into the shady residential neighborhoods for nearly 3 hours in search for ideal urban canvases to house my artwork. Scouting is just as important, if not more, than the actual placement of the artwork. A seamless relationship with the aesthetics of the art, the urban surroundings and the anticipated audience is paramount.

My first successful implementation of art was on N. Miami directly across from the parking lot of the Scope Art Fair. A freshly painted green dumpster sat just off the main drag with its flat backside facing oncoming traffic. A surveillance camera secured to the nearest building pointed in my direction, but I knew I could approach the location masked in the shadow of the dumpster with art in hand.

Same ‘Ol created in my signature drip technique where I drip paint through stencils onto paper was the first piece implemented into the Miami streets and the beginning of my ‘Urban Pop Up Gallery’ Installation.

With astute attention to location, I continued scouring the Miami urban environment for ideal placements. I found a slightly texture wall on the facade of a kitchen for kids where I placed a colorful mushroom, the first of a collection mushrooms that I scattered around the streets. Another was placed on a brightly painted red door deeper within the back graffiti laden alleyways. Another was placed on the front wall of the ‘Compound’ were LA artist Free Humanity painted a signature Audrey Hepburn mural.

A long wall on 29th near the corner of Miami St. has been bare for the first few days of my trip, but I was deterred by the number of patrolling police vehicles which seemed to be constantly attracted to the nearby intersection. After days of scouting, I decided it was time to introduce the wall to my project. I prepped one of my largest pieces on the ground just around the corner. I soaked it in paste and exited the shadows and headed to the wall. It was approaching midnight and  a trail of paste dripped on the dark sidewalk. I reached the wall and noticed I wasn’t the only one with the same idea. A giant Obey piece still wet from the recent pasting dominated the first half of the wall so I shifted my plan and targeted the second half. With my back to the roar of the traffic, I placed the giant shark onto the wall, smoothed out the clumps of paste and slipped back into the shadows.

My collection of imagery included a sunflower design I had first created nearly 7 years ago when developing my drip technique. I brought 2 large scale sunflowers on this trip painted in thick yellows, oranges and greens. I carefully searched for complimentary urban colors.

The first location was on a Thrift Store that sported a giant hand painted “Graffiti Artist Wanted’ sign. I later inquired about the sign and soon after found myself painting my Doodle character on a canvas to later be auctioned to help needy families. I finished the canvas and donated in to the cause, placed a yellow and orange sunflower on the store amongst the complimenting collection of purples and pinks of the facade, thanked the business owner and continued my adventure.

My goal for the location of the second sunflower was the same where the surrounding colors would justify the installation of this similarly painted yellow, orange and green piece. I found a light blue wall on the corner of a clothing store removed from the more urban art cluttered walls of the Art District. The sun beat down hard as I prepared for installation. The street was active with both cars and foot traffic. I waited until a delivery man entered the front doors before I attached the art figuring that anyone who could potentially interfere with the installation would be preoccupied by the delivered packages for at least the amount of time I needed to install and vanish.

I had created a drip painting on canvas of a wolf for a solo show back in 2010. I have always enjoyed the piece and decided to include in this ‘Urban Pop Up Gallery”. I found a milky teal tiled wall on 2nd street just down from the Wynwood Walls and placed the wolf up against the edge of the wall. A day later I returned to the location to find a giant tag by legend graffiti artist Cept on the wall, but instead of covering my wolf, he had decided to mask his letters behind the wolf. I was thankful to find that Cept decided to preserve my art and appreciate the compliment from a true legend.

I usually seek out empty corners on walls high above the ground for my ‘Rocket Pop Boy’ piece, a design of a boy being launched skyward by a Popsicle in hand. This design was first placed in the streets of Carlsbad on the underside of a bridge, but visible from the neighboring 78 highway representing the resurgence of a once subversive art culture into popular art culture.

But on rare occasions I find an ideal canvas close to the ground that still provides what I am looking for. An old outhouse with a fading tag and upward arrow provided the this desired canvas. I pasted the design within the debris of broken beer bottles and the stench of human feces.

Another piece that I have pasted all around the world and brought to Miami a naked Janet Leigh full body piece from the shower scene in Alfred Hitchock’s Psycho. I found a great perch atop a bricked ledge wedged between a white wall and barbed wire. This piece is ideal because it is thin and can be sneaked onto walls normally to thin to house other pieces. I found another sneaky placement on a gray pillar on the corner of Miami and 29th just across from the shark.

Another pillar on 2nd just up from the wolf became home to another Janet Leigh piece along with a nearby piece of  a design based off a photo I took of a man playing harmonica in Charlottesville, VA a few years back. The colors of both pieces reflected the colors of a giant nearby Retna mural.

One of the last pieces I placed was on a wall I had been keeping my eye on since the beginning of the trip. I graffiti laden wall against the train tracks had a ledge about 10 feet from the ground. A number of graffiti and quick tags had been clustered around the base of this ledge, but a visible blank patch could be seen from the street. I had been looking for a place where I would put a graphic I had first designed nearly 10 years ago of an old granny graffiti artist.

I knew I would need assistance getting up on the ledge, but was alone and without a ladder. Luckily I found a large red couch down the alley hidden in the bushes. I dragged the couch down the street a good block. I got to the edge of the overhead ledge and rolled the couch up against the wall. The sun was at its peak strength and sending beads of sweat down the back of my neck. I prepped the piece of art and began climbing up the couch. A green clump of paper caught my eye. To my surprise it was a wad of three $1 bills. I snatched it up and reached the top of the couch. The ledge was at eye level as I stood atop the couch and hoisted myself up. I pasted the old granny graffiti artist as if she was spraying multiple layers of tags herself, headed back to the edge and jumped to the awaiting couch cushions as a car slowly approached the wall.

While high profile galleries enticed thick wallet collectors within the mazes of each art fair, I sneaked within the shadows of the outside urban atmosphere pasting hand dripped pieces of art to unsanctioned walls which I had surveyed for hours. Over a 6 day period, I curated and installed my 2nd large scale ‘Urban Pop Up Gallery’ in the streets of Miami. There was no wine, no opening reception and no sales… just art in the streets.

Click HERE to view ‘Urban Pop Up Gallery: Australia and China’!