Graffiti-Born, New Street Art Forms Flourish at Art Center Exhibit

“Street art has evolved from something that was happening in a particular sub-culture,” said James Daichendt, Dean of Arts and Humanities at Point Loma Nazarene University, also curator at Thursday night’s OUTSIDEIN Exhibition at Art Center College of Design’s Hillside Campus.

Daichendt went on to explain that street art originated from graffiti but has emerged.

“Aspects of the professional art world have also been incorporated into it,” he said. The exhibit is a mixture of artists from “true graffiti writing, the first proponents of artistic graffiti, just using spray paint to make images, to those on the other side that are coming from the design background, using outside space as just an extension of their canvas and part of their repertoire.”

In recognition of this phenomenon, ArtCenter College of Design has organized OUTSIDEIN: The Ascendance of Street Art in Visual Culture, an expansive indoor and outdoor exhibition opening today and continuing through January 10, 2016, at multiple venues in Pasadena.

OUTSIDEIN murals are being installed in four locations at ArtCenter College of Design in Pasadena; the Alyce de Roulet Williamson Gallery, 1700 Lida Street (91103); the Hutto-Patterson Exhibition Hall, 870 South Raymond Avenue (91105); as well as the north wall and a rooftop elevator cube of the Wind Tunnel, 950 South Raymond Avenue (91105).

Featured in the show are artists Olivia Bevilacqua, David Flores, CHASE, Robbie Conal, Cryptik, Jeanne Detallante, Shepard Fairey, James Jean, Geoff McFetridge, RISK, Kenny Scharf and Jeff Soto, who is an ArtCenter alumnus.

CHASE will create work in the Hutto-Patterson Exhibition Hall (1,260 square feet) in the Fine Art and Illustration building at 870 South Raymond Avenue near downtown Pasadena.

Seen by both southbound Metro Gold Line train passengers and drivers along South Raymond Avenue, RISK’s mural explodes with color on an expansive, rectangular, north wall of the Wind Tunnel at 950 South Raymond Avenue.

Kenny Scharf painted a cube-shaped elevator shaft on the rooftop of the Wind Tunnel building at 950 South Raymond Avenue.

All 12 artists are represented by paintings, objects or site-specific murals in ArtCenter’s Williamson Gallery (4,600 square feet) on the Hillside Campus at 1700 Lida Street in the hills above the Rose Bowl.

RISK — a.k.a. Kelly Graval — said he’s been creating graffiti for about 32 years. His hands being evidence of this, paint splattered all over them. Risk said to him the exhibition was about “street artists who made a difference.”

The OUTSIDEIN exhibition also includes a “very strong piece by David Flores,” said Daichendt, which was a James Dean piece. “Very confrontational,” added Daichendt, “it strikes you right away, you know who it is, there’s an instant access to the imagery.”

Opposite of Flores’ James Dean piece was Robbie Conal’s layered campaign posters. According to Daichendt, “full of emotion.”

In contrast to the graffiti influenced pieces was Jeff Soto’s Owl, “much more design background and his image is so detailed and it draws you in and makes you want to come back more and more,” said Daichendt.

Maria Barbosa, who was at the exhibition with friends, took a moment to reflect on the piece by Soto. “It was my favorite piece in the exhibition. There’s something deep about the eyes of the owl,” she said.

On October 22, at 7:30pm, the Art Center College of Design will be hosting a panel to explore the art in the edxhibit. “We put together an interesting mix of people,” said Daichendt.

Ann Field, Chair of the Illustration Department added that they thought it was “important to do a panel to address the deeper meanings of the show, but also involve the artists.”

According to Daichendt, the interesting mix of people at the panel includes, an art historian, philosopher, and several artists who come from either design or more from the street art angle. “We are going to talk about the commercial aspects of street art and where those begin and where they end and what’s been deemed appropriate,” he added.

The Williamson Gallery is located at on the Art Center’s Hillside campus at 1700 Lida St, Pasadena. For more information call (626) 396-2446,