Category Archives: stickers & wheatpastes

Get Up et al

So here’s another installment of what, in the past, I’ve called “E-ville Wheaties.” This boarded up building on San Pablo at the Oakland/Emeryville border is a frequent spot for artist installations. See older posts here:

I just shot these on Friday, but unfortunately a drive by yesterday on my way to work showed they’d already been “buffed.”

My favorite pieces are the stencils by Get Up, and I plan to show another one of his excellent pieces tomorrow. Then hopefully, if I can get my act together, I’ll feature a short how-to on making your own stencils. So please stay tuned…
get up graffiti, get up shopping cart guy, get up graffiti art

This shopping cart guy is particularly relevant in this neighborhood. I’ve written frequently about the ubiquitous shopping carts in this part of West Oakland. Folks use them to collect recyclables to exchange for cash, some carry all their worldly possessions (ie my friend James who has been homeless for as long as I’ve known him), and some get even more creative than that (see below). The fact that this character is portrayed schlepping his phonograph and stacks of vinyl with great effort is particularly interesting.
West Oakland shopping carts, shopping cart people oakland
Here are a few other artists’ work, and the final image is another by Get Up (we’ve seen this one before too… Meaty Wheaties)

fox news tank graffiti, san pablo wheatpastes, oakland graffiti artists

West Oakland graffiti art, Emeryville Wheatpastes, oakland graffiti

San Pablo Wheatpastes, Emeryville Wheatpastes

Get Up Graffiti, Get Up Wheatpaste

There once was a garden here…

I was in my old hood the other day and passed a fenced in triangle of property at the intersection of 32nd and Union streets. I’ve driven or biked past this spot hundreds of times over the years.

It’s right in front of a couple loft developments, an older converted building called West Clawson Lofts (the building once housed the Clawson Elementary School ) and a newer development called Magnolia Row, built from scratch on the neighboring empty lots in the early 2000’s.

There once was a community garden installed in the small lot. I thought it was wonderful. I never knew who installed it there, but it existed for a year, maybe more, and consisted of raised vegetable beds surrounded by more ornamental flowering plants. One of the cool features was the reuse of old bicycle wheels (without the tires) along the chain link fence. They were used as trellising to encourage climbing plants (like morning glory) to obscure the ugly fence. I thought it was a lovely addition to the neighborhood.

But soon after it was established it was removed. My information is only hearsay so I can’t verify its validity, but someone told me that there was a dispute over the ownership of the lot and that, apparently, the rightful owner was intent upon installing a coffee stand/shop there.

I thought, well it’s a shame the garden is gone. But a coffee stand could be cool too.

It never came.

Years went by, and at one point it seemed promising as a small wood shack was erected inside the fence. But nothing ever followed.

And so for years, we West Oakland neighbors were deprived of our pretty little community garden, and instead, were left with a ramshackle hut inside a weed and litter strewn lot locked inside a chain-link fence. sigh.

empty lot west oakland, vacant lot art installation, west oakland graffiti

But recently some artists have taken measures to reclaim the lot, repurposing the walls of the hut as outdoor gallery space for their art. It currently houses a number of pieces but it looks like the bulk of it was jointly installed by a number of artists working collaboratively: Ras Terms, Dead Eyes, and Safety First included. I’m not sure about other participants.

Ras Terms, Safety First, Dead Eyes, Turnip, empty lot art

collaborative art installation, west oakland graffiti art, empty lot 32nd street

safety first graffiti art, safety first west oakland art

I hope more artists follow suit.

And who knows… maybe one day we could have our garden back too. A peaceful green space to sit and reflect upon the art…

BS Bombs

stencil stickers, stenciled bombs, BS bomb

stenciled bombs, stenciled wheat pastes, bomb wheat pastes

stenciled wheatpastes, east bay graffiti, oakland wheatpaste art