Eviction night at City Hall. Occupy LA was forced out by a small army of heavily armed para-militarized local police force. In this image a young man and his little doggy fearfully await the inevitable of being shot by a police officer using a shotgun at a lethal close range. From what I heard the man was injured. Apparently the LAPD denies this but hey whose watching when the media they allow on the premises was carefully selected. Some of the signs displayed on the Occupy LA Tree Fort were pieces from my OccupyFlag project. This simple image amazingly depicts the overall discussion of extremely heavy handed violent measures executed by police to crush a peaceful display of the 1st Amendment rights nation wide. Welcome to our U.S. of police state…………

It’s that time of year: the time when everyone is dropping their two cents on what they liked and didn’t like this year. Of course, we have some opinions–especially when it comes to what’s happening in the art world. Today through Wednesday (our last working day of the year!) we will be sharing our thoughts on “bests.” Today: our thoughts on art happening in Los Angeles for 2011 (in no particular order).

Read more: Los Angeles, I’m Yours

It’s time for year in review posts, and while there are certainly more than a few everywhere on the web…

Read more: LAist

For a city with a moratorium on murals, the art form managed to be in the public eye in 2011. Street art took its place alongside traditional works, vintage works were restored, policy and enforcement were being questioned–all while ordinances that stopped new mural works from going up on private walls were being reviewed.

If you are not saddled with year-end list fatigue, here’s a timeline of some mural stories from the year.

Read more: KCET Departures

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.

Read more: LA Weekly

L.A.’s murals are believed to outnumber those in every other city in the world with numbers ranging in thousands. With influence from the punk, hip hop, and skate scene a new street culture was born that fueled a new generation of artists. Artists like SABER, SWOON, KID ZOOM, ROA, HOW & NOSM, KOFIE, D*FACE, CR, RIPO, INSA, BECCA, Thank You X, LADY AIKO, JR, and Shepard Fairey having all tattooed L.A. with murals that redefine the word “graffiti.”

Read more: Frank 151

A proposed new ordinance would allow artists to create murals legally on private property across Los Angeles as long as the property owners agree. If approved, the ordinance would end a controversial prohibition on murals that has left city officials and artists grappling over what is legal……….

Finish Reading HERE

For months, the L.A. Department of City Planning has been teasing street artists with announcements of a new ordinance that would lift the current ban on all pre-approved murals on private property in Los Angeles.

And it’s about time: Our urban sprawl was once considered by many — including local celebrity Saber — to be the “mural capital of the world.”

So where on Earth is this thing?…………

Finish Article HERE

Opening under cover of night somewhere in Paris, four stories beneath la rue, a secret subterranean gallery in a sealed tunnel appears suddenly. While activity on the street overhead is hectic and dense with cars, trucks and pedestrians, the dry dust is ankle-high here in this darkened silent morgue, its cool dank air now permeated with fresh aerosol. The Underbelly has been here, and if you discover this curated collection of Street Art and graffiti in the chilled dim light, you are officially lost. And lucky……..

READ MORE AND SEE MORE IMAGES HERE

By Radley Balko

In February of last year, video surfaced of a marijuana raid in Columbia, Mo. During the raid on Jonathan Whitworth and his family, police took down the door with a battering ram, then within seconds shot and killed one of Whitworth’s dogs and wounded the other. They didn’t find enough pot in the house to charge Whitworth with even a misdemeanor. (He was, however, charged with misdemeanor possession of drug paraphernalia when police found a pipe.) The disturbing video went viral in May 2010, triggering outrage around the world. On Fox News, conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer and Bill O’Reilly cautioned not to judge the entire drug war by the video, which they characterized as an isolated incident.

In fact, very little about the raid that was isolated or unusual. For the most part, it was carried out the same way drug warrants are served some 150 times per day in the United States. The battering ram, the execution of Whitworth’s dog, the fact that police weren’t aware Whitworth’s 7-year-old child was in the home before they riddled the place with bullets, the fact that they found only a small amount of pot, likely for personal use — all are common in drug raids. The only thing unusual was that the raid was recorded by police, then released to the public after an open records request by the Columbia Daily Tribune. It was as if much of the country was seeing for the first time the violence with which the drug war is actually fought. And they didn’t like what they saw.

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