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 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

Source Magazine- SABER

RWB KepRage, 2011

Signed & Numbered Regular Edition Of 200  $195.00

12 Color Serigraph On Coventry Rag, Size: 28 1/4 x 36 3/4

Available For The First Time Online On SABERONE.COM Through Paypal At A Special Christmas Sale Price!!

Purchase HERE

REVOK / TRIUMPH & TRAGEDY / VICIOUS GALLERY / DEC. 3RD from WWW.REVOK1.COM on Vimeo.

Shot And Edited By NOAH BANKS

DANGEROUSMINDS.NET

For the artist Saber, participation in the democratic process has always been complicated. He’s an international graffiti legend, holding the world record for the largest graffiti piece, done along the LA river in 1997. Despite its place in the history books, the city of Los Angeles spent a whopping $837,000 to paint over it in 2009. Now Saber is approaching public art laws from a different angle, spearheading an effort to reform Los Angeles’ mural policies…………THE REST.

By Andrew Reilly

Risky and I recently stumbled upon this amazing mural in the Terminal Annex building on Alameda in Downtown Los Angeles. Boris Deutsch painted the mural, from 1941 to 1944 during the tale end of the Great Depression and in the run up to the Second World War. This mural was made possible by the WPA (Works Progress Administration), which put Americans to work during difficult times. The WPA is responsible for a variety of projects throughout the country including hiring artists to create beautiful historical pieces of artwork.

Without the WPA we wouldn’t have this amazing mural in LA, not to mention hundreds of other amazing murals all over the country. This particular mural reflects what was happening historically at the time. The artwork ends with a visual description of the beginning of World War Two, leaving the viewer with a sense of anxiety knowing what was ahead for our country.

Now fast forward to my generation. The timeline we reside in is coined ”The Great Recession”. We are facing severe economic difficulties due to the decisions of current and previous lawmakers that created a wealth gap so vast that there seems to be no end in site. To put things in perspective the current city government of Los Angeles actually spent millions of dollars each year to remove art and criminalize artists. New laws have been put in place that actually ban public murals and deem them signage and not art. Groups of sheriff go to local business to harass them for having murals on their premises and threaten them with fines and jail time if the owner does not comply and remove the artwork. Basically taxpayer’s are providing the funds to pay many private “Graffiti Removal” companies to censor art at will.

The supposed war on graffiti is actually a war on small business and freedom of expression. The City Of Los Angeles, once known as “The Mural Capitol Of The World”, is now specializing in the criminalization of public art. In 2011 its more probable that an artist will go to jail to quench the private prison industry’s feeding frenzy then a tax paying citizen of the city actually get a permit to paint a beautiful mural.

As we left, a group of security guards told us terminal annex is no longer a federal building, and we needed permission to film the murals that once belonged to the people of the USA. It seems a private company that doesn’t appreciate visitors enjoying the historical artwork that was originally for everyone now owns Terminal Annex. Of course as we leave we acknowledge the generic large corporate sign “corpocorp” displayed outside that basically is equal to a no trespassing sign. Is this the future of America?…………………………