asylm

CREWEST X LA COUNTY HOLIDAY CELEBRATION

We were asked to curate a live painting and stencil event for LA County's Holiday Celebration '09 event at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion at the Music Center in Downtown LA.

Artists, Asylm and Sherm, painted Holiday themed aerosol paintings while our other staff helped create stencil paintings for the kids and families who showed up on Christmas Eve for this annual free event.

Here's a festive time lapse video of the live painting:
(btw..the two paintings are available for purchase!)





We were happy to bring Holiday cheer to this community event!
Seems like the families who showed up enjoyed it as well, check out
the slideshow:




More info:
info@crewest.com
Crewest.com
Crewest on Flickr
Crewest Youtube Channel

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EYE-CANDY


Check out this show at the gallery until August 31st. It's a great show featuring some great artists and toy designers expressing there thoughts about female beauty, empowerment, and sexuality. Artists include: Blokhedz, Jesse Hernandez, Marka27, MAD*L, Biz20, ninerevolutions, Lichiban, Problak, Man One, Edgar Hoill, Axis, OG Abel, Erick Scarecrow, Gregg Stone, Asylm, Victor Sepulveda, Spencer Davis (Booty Babes), Eriberto Oriol, J. Brewer and Fearo.


Check out the review by Vinyl Pulse!

Live painting on models during the closing reception on August 30th.
Check it.

Crewest in the L.A. Times!

"Off the streets, into the gallery"

By Alex Chun, Special to The Times

Street art in Los Angeles has become as ubiquitous as bleach-blond hair and personalized license plates, so it's no surprise it has infiltrated art galleries as well.

"A lot of galleries used to be scared to put in street artists — they thought people coming in would tag up the outside of their galleries and cause chaos," says Freddi "Freddi C" Cerasoli, proprietor of the Lab 101 Gallery in Culver City. "Then people like me began to put these artists in nice-looking galleries and proved that's not true, and in the last three years I've begun to see high-end galleries start to show these same artists."

These days, L.A.-area galleries such as Crewest, Thinkspace Gallery, Gallery 1988, Lab 101, BLK/MRKT Gallery and the Corey Helford Gallery are featuring notable street artists such as Shepard Fairey, Buff Monster, Greg Simkins, Asylm and Kofie.

"My generation grew up with culture jamming and MTV, and this is what we relate to," says Cerasoli, 37. "Rather than wanting a Warhol, they want to hang an icon from their own era."

Street art encompasses spray-painted graffiti, stencil graffiti, sticker art, posters and even performance art in public spaces. Though it's illegal in many cases, purveyors of the form are quick to distinguish it from tagging and other gang-related activities.

"In contrast to gang graffiti, artistic graffiti has nothing to do with territory, threats or violence," says Crewest owner Alex "Man One" Poli. "Artistic graffiti is all about expression."

A respected graffiti artist in his own right, Poli moved his 5-year-old gallery from Alhambra to a bigger location in downtown L.A. last March and says his new gallery has been well received by the artistic community and is part of Gallery Row and the Downtown Art Walk.

"The new location brings people into the gallery who normally wouldn't think twice about a gallery featuring graffiti art," he says. "The art's really powerful and bold, and it really captures people's attention once they see it, and when they learn it's done with a spray-paint can, it really blows their mind."

For the artists, showing in galleries affords them the opportunity to flex their creative muscles.

For example, at a show a year and half ago, Buff Monster, who is best known for his silk-screen posters often featuring a character sprouting breast-like ears, built a fountain in the middle of a pool composed of six breasts rendered in 3-D.

"When you're driving on the street at 60 miles per hour, you have to be able to read what I say in a split second, and it doesn't show all my visual vocabulary," says the 27-year-old Hollywood artist, who opens a solo show at Gallery 1988 on Feb. 1. "The galleries offer a nice opportunity to create something really ambitious that you couldn't do on the streets."

weekend@latimes.com

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Current and upcoming shows

"BMG Artists' Annual" (current group show includes street turned studio artist Jeff Soto), BLK/MRKT Gallery, 6009 Washington Blvd., Culver City. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tuesdays-Saturdays. Ends Feb. 17. (310) 837-1989, www.blkmrktgallery.com.

"Buff Monster: One in the Pink," Gallery 1988, 7020 Melrose Ave., L.A. Opening reception, 7 to 10 p.m. Feb. 1; regular hours, 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tuesdays-Saturdays. Ends March 1. (323) 937-7088, www.nineteeneightyeight.com.

"007" (group show that includes street artist Asylm), Crewest Gallery, 110 Winston St., L.A. Opening reception, 5-9 p.m. Feb. 3; regular hours, noon-7 p.m. Tuesdays-Thursdays; noon-8 p.m. Fridays-Saturdays; noon-6 p.m. Sundays. Ends Feb. 24. (213) 627-8272, www.crewest.com.

"The Hunted" (solo show on Blaine Fontana, a street turned studio artist), the Lab 101 Gallery, 8530-B Washington Blvd., Culver City. Opening reception 7-10 p.m. Feb. 3; regular hours, 11 a.m.-6:30 p.m. Tuesdays-Saturdays, noon-4:30 p.m. Sundays. Ends Feb. 21. (310) 558-0911; www.thelab101.com.

"Charity by Numbers" (viewing of items for an online charity auction includes works by artists Shepard Fairey, Greg Simkins, Jeff Soto, Buff Monster, Sam Flores), Corey Helford Gallery, 8522 Washington Blvd., Culver City. Opening reception, 10 p.m.-midnight Feb. 10; regular hours, noon-6 p.m. Tuesdays-Saturdays. Ends Feb. 17. (310) 287-2340, www.coreyhelfordgallery.com.