Art In The Streetsby Xander Melkonian

Art in The Streets is a street art exhibit located in Little Tokyo Los Angeles, at the MOCA

art museum. It displays the growth of several types of Graffiti: Wild Style in New York, Cholo

Gang Graffiti in East Los Angeles, and Surf and Skate Culture in Venice Beach and Santa

Monica. Art In The Streets has 50 unique artists from The Graffiti and Street Art Community.

The exhibit has all sorts of different types of Street Art that go from painted cars all the way to a

dark alley with sounds of a raging storm! The three artists that stick out are Swoon, Shepard

Fairey, and Banksy.

Swoon is a street artist from Daytona Beach, Florida. Swoons real name is Caledonia

Dance Curry, and she also a member of the Justseeds, an artist cooperative that sells art

online. She moved to New York when she was nineteen, where she studied painting at the Pratt

Institute in Brooklyn. Swoon started doing Street Art in 1999, and now works with life size

wheatpastes and paper cut-outs of figures.

Shepard Fairey is an American contemporary artist, a Graphic Designer, and an

illustrator who was born in February 15, 1970. Shepard became popular due to his “Andre The

Giant Has a Posse” sticker campaign. This was better known as the OBEY stickers. In 2008

Fairey blew up with his Obama HOPE campaign,that was seen around the world. His work can

be found at The Smithsonian, The Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern

Art in New York, the Museum of Contemporary Art in San Diego, the National Portrait Gallery in

Washington, and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. Fairey went to the Rhode Island

School of Design, and currently works in the field of Public Art and Stenciling.

Banksy is an anonymous street artist from England, who is also a political activist. His

movements include Anti-Fascism, Anti-War, Anti-Capitalism, Anti-Imperialism, and Anti-

Authoritarianism. Other movements that he supports include Anarchism and Existentialism. He

works in the field of Stenciling, Street Art, Sculpture, and Social Commentary, Banksy started in

the Bristol Underground Scene which gave birth to various musicians and Artists in the city of

Bristol, UK. Banksy’s first film, “Exit Through The Gift Shop”, also made an appearance at the

Sundance Film Festival in 2010. A year later in January 2011, Banksy was nominated for the

Academy Award for best Documentary, with “Exit Through the Gift Shop”.

Art in the Streets is a great way to express street art, legally, in the public eye. Even

before the show opened, some street artist were angry. There was a mural painted by the

Italian street artist Blu, which MOCA decided to paint over. Some protested in words, and

others even did their own street art on the walls outside the museum! Even with this kind of

controversy, It still is a great exhibit. I hope many people get to see the exhibit while its still

there.

Here is a painting by Banksy showing Thomas the Tank Engine being bombed by some graffiti,

and another

An installation by the artist Swoon. It’s made of cut out paper and other materials. It is standing

in a room on its own and is almost 20 feet tall.

These walls inside the museum include many examples by Shepard Fairey.