I remember back in 2014 while surfing the web I found some pics of some artwork done by a French artist named Pez and I thought they looked cool so I shared them to Facebook. One of my coworkers, Beto also thought they looked cool and thought it would make a great feature for the art section in Lowrider Magazine. Since I had some downtime I told him I’d take care of emailing the artist and writing the story and that was how I wrote my first story, a feature spotlight on Pez for Lowrider Magazine.

Fast forward to 2017 and I’m on Pez’s newsletter list, the latest edition stating that some of his latest additions to his Distroy series will be on display as part of Avenue des Arts LA’s grand opening. Seeing that the gallery was in downtown LA and thinking that if I just snap a few extra pictures I could turn in another feature story into Lowrider and have something I could crank out for for samuraijosh.com I thought “what the hell”, so I told Beto I’d go check it out.

Originally I didn’t feel like going to the grand opening cause I wanted to go somewhere else that day. I figured go a week later get pics, of the art it’s not like people would tell the difference, but Beto talked me out of doing that and he convinced me to go to the actual grand opening because in his words, “the artists will probably be there and you’ll get a better story out of it.” I’m glad I listened to Beto because while I was there taking photos of stuff I met a dude who I’m like 99% sure was Matt Gondek who was one of the featured artists there and he introduced me to Pez.

I never actually met Pez before or even talked to him. When I wrote that first story on him it was all done through email. However he did remember the story I wrote on him for Lowrider and he was very grateful for what I did to help get his name out there. He in turn introduced me to a photographer friend of his who wrote a book called LA Kingz which was about LA street culture as well as the owner of the gallery, Dimitri Loren who was more than willing to talk to the media to help gain some exposure for his gallery.

Like I said earlier, I’m really glad I listened to Beto and went to the actual grand opening. Talking to Dimitri I was able to get more information such as how it was his second gallery, and how his galleries are aimed at bringing awareness to street art and urban culture. This is something I never would have gotten if I just stared at the pictures on the walls and just bullshitted. I also learned about the cool murals that they had in the alley behind the building which I never would have known about if I didn’t talk to the gallery owner.

Talking to people is a skill I need to learn if I need to expand on my abilities as a writer. I can’t be shy. Whether it’s writing for this site, or for some other site or for some other publication, I need to get over my fears and anxieties and get out there. Even if it’s not to write, it would be a good idea to get my name out there, because it would always come in handy to know people.

I’m not sure if my story will run in Lowrider either on the website or in print, but in case they don’t, I had the foresight to take extra pics which I’m putting on here.

Enjoy!

Here are the pieces that Pez unveiled. From left to right the pieces are titled, “Spinach Boy,” “Betty Boobs,” and “Parabolic Mouse.” Like other pieces in Pez’s Distroy series these pieces have a theme of taking a pop culture icon and presenting it into an alternative or deconstructed manner. It was his alternative approach which appealed to both me and Beto. Originally anything was fair game for Pez but talking to him he said recently he was trying to focus on American pop culture icons from the 1930s for his subjects.

Here are some pieces by American-based artist Matt Gondek. The Dragonball Z themed one is titled “Vegeta vs. Goku,” the Simpsons themed one is titled “Nuclear Family 2” and the Animaniacs one is titled “Animaniacs Deconstructed.” Like Pez, Gondek’s work has a theme of taking pop culture characters and presenting them in a deconstructed style.

These Pink Panther paintings have no titles and were all done by Las Vegas-based artist Seen. Seen is one of the more famous graffiti artists in the world with many referring to him as the godfather of graffiti.

The above pieces are by another French artist named Alexandre “Hopare” Monteiro whose style revolves around uses of geometry and abstract graphics. The piece on the left is titled “Saved View” while the one on the right is titled “Stiffness.

Here’s another piece by Hopare titled “Burkina”…

… and this one is titled “Ferguson”.

These two pieces were both done by French-based Louis Boidron and Edouard Egea aka the MonkeyBird. The name MonkeyBird is more than just a name it is also a description of the subject matter as both much of the MonkeyBird’s crew work revolves around bird and monkey imagery reminiscent of scientific illustrations like the kind you would find in old text books. The top piece is titled “Heliocentrisme” while the bottom piece is titled “Epimetheus.”

These two pieces titled “Neon Sign 1” and “Neon Sign 2” were both done by Kan who mixes computer and video game design with traditional graffiti techniques to create intricate patterns of dots which form his portraits.

This piece titled “Forest City” is by Kriki, another French artist whose style is influence by punk culture.

Here’s another Kriki piece, this one is titled “Mme BOBO & M.Songye.”

This piece also done by Kriki is titled “Hip Hop Hip.”

1 more done by Kriki titled “York.”

These three pieces were done by Italian artist Pixel Pancho. Pixel Pancho’s work is is filled with robot motifs and is said to use a narrative that “revolves around a forgotten world sitting under a blanket of dust.” These three pieces from left to right are titled: “Another Mans Word,” “Mono En La Cabeza,” and “Mademoiselle Le Gru.”

At this point I thought I had everything I needed so I was about to leave, but luckily Dimitri stopped me and told me to check out the graffiti in the alley behind the gallery. I’m glad I learned about this cause there was some really cool shit in the back.

Here’s a Deconstructed Simpsons mural that was done my Matt Gondek. I really wish I took more time photographing this. I rushed myself and ending up fucking it up by getting the shadows in there.

Here’s a “Krustyburger” that was done by Frankzilla. According to social media Matt Gondek also had a hand in this one.

Here is the crown piece of the alley graffiti, a mural done by Hopare that stretches about 6 stories directly on the building.

The piece is titled “The Freedom Move” and was done by somebody who goes by the name “Bust the Drip.” His Facebook pages says that he’s “a young urban painter floating between different medium, inspired by the Hip Hop culture.” Other than that I honestly don’t know much more about him.

This is another piece I wish I took more photos of. I kind of blame the timing on it mostly. As you can see by the lens flare the sun was in a really bad position right behind the wall and unfortunately it was hard to get a clean photo of the entire thing without getting lens flare. I should have tried from some other angles but it’s too late now unless I’m willing to drive all the way back down there. This piece was done by Caroline Karenine who was another Avenue des Arts featured artist. She didn’t have any pieces on display in the gallery. Instead she was actually doing tattoos in the basement. I really regret not getting any pictures of her in action. I really should have, but I was a bit scared. I didn’t want to be rude and just start taking photos of her while she was working but at the same time I was scared of asking for permission. I think it was a bit of a self-conscience issue and I was scared of hearing her tell me no since I’ve had that happen to me in the past. But looking back, I highly doubt she would have said no given the circumstances, hell she probably wouldn’t have even cared if I asked permission or not.

That’s it for what I have on the Avenue des Arts LA Gallery grand opening. Like I said earlier, it was good practice to help develop my photography and interviewing skills. I’m planning to hopefully do more of these not just for my regular job but also for here. I already went to 2 more art shows so hopefully like I said before I can get those up soon.