Packing a Punch on the Mural Scene
By Terelle Jerricks, Managing Editor
Twenty-two artists and art teams put up 21 murals on the sides of Long Beach buildings and walled fences in the span of a week this past July in an event called POW! WOW!
Six of the 22 artists are based in Long Beach, including Bodeck Hernandez, Nate Frizzell, Noelle Martinez, Ryan Milner, Dave Van Patten and Sparc. Community members got to participate through a series of events designed to connect them with the mural artists.
This was the third year for POW! WOW! in Long Beach. That lifespan becomes increasingly impressive in a promotional video in which Julia Huang, chief executive of interTrend Communication, admits that business owners were reluctant to allow their walls to be painted over with spray paint when POW! WOW! first came to town.
“During our first year, it was difficult to get walls because business owners or building owners didn’t know what it means when we [asked], ‘Want us to spray paint your walls with a spray can?’” Huang said. “Immediately, it was equated to graffiti art.”
Property owners have since come around and donated wall space. Hundreds of local volunteers have followed in support as well.
POW! WOW! Long Beach has even attracted major sponsors such as the Port of Los Angeles, the City of Long Beach, the Downtown Long Beach Business Association as well as the local art museums, the Museum of Latin American Art and Long Beach Museum of Art.
LBMA Director Ron Nelson is credited with changing Long Beach’s attitude towards street art after spearheading the 2015 showVitality and Verve: Transforming the Urban Landscape. The show brought world-renowned artists to paint temporary murals in LBMA galleries.
Kamea Hadar, co-lead director of POW! WOW!, recounted the early days and why it started.
He explained that his high school friend Jasper Wong, who came to run an art gallery, had decided to do a project that highlighted the process of making art. He invited a dozen of his artist friends from different parts of the world to paint, live and work together for a week in Hawaii.
Jasper maxed out his credit cards, paying for all of the flights and Hadar and his family provided the space for them to live.
The 12 artists would paint all day on individual canvases and then destroy the work. Thereafter, they would stay up and talk all night about art.
By the third POW! WOW!, the event gathered 100 international artists together for the purpose of creating art, culture and community as well as sharing these values both in Hawaii and across the globe.
Street art became the canvas upon which Wong aimed to forge this intentional community. But it wasn’t the only canvas.
POW! WOW! has also made forays in youth mentorship through Pow Wow School of music.
PWSoM brings in budding musicians into its mentorship program, pairing them with professional musicians and providing creative, comfortable, and safe spaces for artistic expression.
Pow! Pow! captured lightning in a jar. The ambitious part is the replication of the lightning worldwide.
“It has to become an international event,” said Wong in 2012. “Every year, it has to be bigger and it has to be better…. Eventually, it will take over a block, then the neighboring block. Then it will take over a city. Pretty soon we will have so many artists coming …. that the whole city will transform.”
Wong’s intention behind the first POW! WOW! in Hawaii is still evident in POW! WOW! Long Beach. Through a series of events — including a pop-up shop grand opening at MADE by Millworks, a talk with artist Adele Renault hosted by Jeff Staple and another talk with artist Tatiana Suarez moderated by journalist Sarah Bennett — Wong’s event aims to tear down walls and foster connections through art.
While reflecting on the collaborative nature of this project, Hadar noted that something of cultural significance doesn’t necessarily have to be an ancient artifact. It can be something that is created today in your backyard.