There was always something remotely hip-hop about Sesame Street. Elmo, Big Bird, the Count, Oscar the Grouch -- especially Oscar the Grouch -- looked like they'd really seen some shit in their eternal youth. They swaggered through life lessons with a knowing limp, putting some soul into the ABCs of every square kid everywhere.

Which makes their new partnership with L.A.'s biggest and bestest graffiti collective, the Seventh Letter Crew -- with Neff Headwear on the bill, too, for some sweet Grouch beanies -- an easy transition. An exhibit of Seventh Letter artists' interpretations of the famed kids show ran for two nights only this past weekend at Known Gallery.

More >>

Shannon Cottrell

Zes

Zes, aka Zeser, aka Zes AWR/MSK, is a Los Angeles graffiti artist with a feral stare that you might only notice in serial killers or creative geniuses. He has been one of L.A.'s most prolific taggers for many years. If you look up every now and again, you may have noticed his burners in back alleys or on the ledges of buildings in Echo Park, but until very recently, you wouldn't see his work in a gallery. And, if he had had his way, you weren't going to.

More >>

Morgan's Last Supper, a work by Ron English

Morgan Spurlock is best known for his documentary Super Size Me, but is also a prolific creator of other works, such as his reality TV show A Day in the Life. When I spoke to him on a recent Friday morning, Spurlock was wrapping up a busy week of press junkets for his new documentary Comic-Con Episode IV: A Fan's Hope, about the famed San Diego fan fest, before he jumps into Tribeca Film Fest mode with a new project named Mansome. But movies and TV are not really what this phone call is about.

Spurlock is happy and excited and talking a mile a minute about art, as he is now adding "curator" to his list of professional interests. Opening Saturday, April 28, at Thinkspace gallery, the show "New Blood" reflects Spurlock's passion for art and collecting. Spurlock jumped at the chance to curate his own show when offered by Thinkspace's Andrew Hosner, and "New Blood" revolves around work from established art stars like Camille Rose Garcia, Shepard Fairey, the Date Farmers, Saber, Elizabeth McGrath and their hand-picked protégés that the artists themselves have chosen as ones to watch.

More >>

Shannon Cottrell

It's a bright crisp day on the Sunset strip and LA Weekly's at Prism Gallery waiting for our turn to meet Otavio and Gustavo Pandolfo, Brazilian brothers who are known in the contemporary art and graffiti worlds simply as "the twins," or "Os Gêmeos" in Portuguese.

The brothers are here in L.A. for their sparkling, surrealist "Miss You" solo show, their first here since 2003, when they staged a tiny yet groundbreaking exhibit in a 300 square foot space -- the original New Image Art gallery, then a little house on Fairfax.

More >>

Shannon Cottrell

For more photos check out our slideshow, How + Nosm Paint the L.A. Weekly Building

The L.A. Weekly celebrated Valentine's Day 2012 like no one else could, with a new red, black and white façade painted by artists Raoul and Davide Perre, known as How & Nosm.

In October, during our interview with How & Nosm about their show at Known Gallery, we half-jokingly asked if they'd want to paint the L.A. Weekly building, but we never imagined they'd say yes and actually set a date. The concept is, loosely, "messages in a bottle," representing perhaps those the newspaper delivers every week, yet conveyed via familiar surrealist How & Nosm imagery: fish, hands, faces, hearts and brains, plus secret visuals we may never decipher.

More >>

Nanette Gonzales

Mr. Brainwash, left, still has his fans

In the 2010 documentary Exit Through The Gift Shop, Mr. Brainwash hires a team of artists to create his art for him and becomes a millionaire after just one hugely successful Los Angeles show, despite the fact that other artists in the film think he's a hack and possibly mentally ill. It's not exactly a flattering portrayal.

"That's why at the end of the film, when people said 'Oh you're not this, you're not an artist,' I said, 'Time will tell,'" Mr. Brainwash told LA Weekly in an interview on the closing day of his recent "Art Show 2011" on Sunday. "You'll follow me through time and you'll see who I am."

More >>

Shannon Cottrell

JR in L.A.

Yes, year-end lists. Not even street art is exempt. But hey, 2011 was a banner year for the Los Angeles street art and graffiti communities, as they enjoyed plenty of worldwide attention.

LA Weekly put together the ten L.A.-related street art and graffiti stories that we think were most remarkable in 2011. Please add your own in the comments below.

More >>

Wait, what? Is that Shepard Fairey putting up a mural in broad daylight on La Brea at 11 a.m.? The cops are going to stop him any second!

Fairey is the street artist who rose to fame in 2008 when his Obama "Hope" poster became the emblem of an era, and was a major player in the 2010 Banksy documentary Exit Through the Gift Shop, where you see him and other street artists hastily plastering their creations on rooftops at 3 a.m. That was my image of street artists, not casual crews chatting and spray-painting in the noon-day sun.

"This is a legal wall," Fairey explained. "I used to put stuff illegally on the roof of this place all the time. Then all of a sudden they stopped cleaning it off." Turns out they liked it. They liked it so much they asked for a full building mural. For free, pretty please. And Fairey agreed.

More >>

Courtesy L.A. Louver, Venice, CA

East vs. West, from 2010

Gajin Fujita has email now. The Japanese American, Boyle heights resident and retired K2S graffiti crew member has finally come into the computer age, albeit rather reluctantly. Until now, the only way to reach the reclusive artist was by landline at his family home where he still keeps his studio.

But while Fujita may have been one of the last to jump on the Google train, he has been one of the very first of Los Angeles' graf artists to graduate seamlessly from tagging on the street (using the name Hyde) to selling art in international blue chip galleries. His first show in L.A. in five years, "Made In L.A." at L.A. Louver, showcases a record 13 new works, including a mural sized, 7' x 22' painting comprised of 12 panels called East vs. West. The gold- and platinum-leafed, graffiti-style Samurai portrait marks Fujita's largest work to date -- indoors of course.

More >>

Nanette Gonzales

For more photos, see "How and Nosm in L.A."

Raoul and Davide Perre, otherwise known as artists How and Nosm, are identical German twins that yes, speak their own graf language and even finish each others sentences.

To mark their first solo exhibition in Los Angeles, opening Oct 15 at Known Gallery on Fairfax, How and Nosm have just completed a new piece titled, Heartship, a 160' x 60' mural on Traction Avenue downtown. It was their second outstanding wall in that neighborhood in less than a year. The first was done in April, about the time MOCAs Art in the Streets exhibit opened.

More >>