Street Art Tuesday

For this week's Tuesday day off I happened upon a LA Street Art tour in an industrial section of the Boyle Heights East Los Angeles neighborhood. Graff Tours [Graffiti Tours Art Studio] offered it; Mala was my host for the 90 minute walkabout. Mala's website is La Mala Luna.

I won't list all the information I got, but I'll tell you if it's not illegal, it's not graffiti. If you ask anyone casually about street art, graffiti probably would be their first response. Some of the pictures I took are graffiti (illegal because it defaces someone's property) or graffiti-style (legal because the artist has permission), some have elements of fine art, while others combine different styles.

Whenever I present a banner workshop, I remind participants they're doing public art that needs to contain concepts or elements most people understand. In other words, art out in public generally is not an obscure insider pursuit, although if it's specific to a particular culture – like Persian New Year or a new Egyptian restaurant on the block – people may get curious and need to ask questions to find out more.

LA is full of graffiti everywhere and it's a form of public art, yet it still is somewhat of an insider endeavor. I learned a tiny amount and expect to learn more as I look around and when I have a chance to collect a few people and create my own graffiti-style art in one of the workshops Graff Tours offers. Remember, it won't be graffiti because it will be legal.

I hope you enjoy this collection of graffiti and other street art; I trust you'll appreciate the "Museums" tag for this blog post.

For a late afternoon lunch, i had an amazing big Greek salad and a peach lemonade at the new to me Salata: The Next Generation Salad Bar in the Fig At 7th food court. (I'm finally resigned to even that section of DTLA being gruddier than it used to be.) And later a large Mocha Frappe.