Jul 19, 2016 Three small slivers of Pow! Wow! Long Beach 2016
Since Wendy, Eloise, and I paid a visit to Pow! Wow! Long Beach last Wednesday, a lot has happened. Murals have been finished, closing parties have taken place, and artists have moved on. But dropping in even for just a little bit of time when the artists are at work has value. I think it’s cool for our daughter to see the artist at work and maybe even say hi. It makes the pieces seem less monumental and more human. We met Defer hard at work underneath an overpass by the Long Beach Performing Arts Center and he was a real humble, nice guy. He said had only been working on the wall for a day and it looked like it was halfway done!
Then we headed over to the Westin where The Draculas were working on a row of emergency exit doors. I had met Jeff McMillan and Gary Musgrove at last year’s event and we hit it off pretty well. I thought they might be willing to answer some questions for Eloise, who happened to be taking an iMovie class at the Apple Store and was looking for a subject for her short. She asked them if they’d mind brief interviews while they were still setting up and they immediately said yes.
How did The Draculas meet? What does their name mean? How do they work together? Is the third, canine member of the team there to protect the gear when the humans are focused on their work? Questions like these are answered in the short video, which also includes an anecdote about a guy who ran out the doors and triggered an alarm. Perhaps it will be posted someday.
Questions asked and B-roll taken, we made promises to hang out before the next Pow! Wow! Long Beach takes place, brought them some iced coffees, and then let The Draculas continue painting unbothered. After all, they would be presenting the work-in-progress to Westin employees later that afternoon and we wanted them to have something good to share since the hotel was a sponsor of the annual mural painting event.
We headed toward the Psychic Temple, headquarters of Pow! Wow! Long Beach partners Imprint and interTrend. Although Kami and Sasu (a.k.a. Hitotzuki) were up high on a lift, watching and taking a picture of them felt very personal and familiar for me. The married couple and art duo were a cover story for a magazine I used to help make. I never met the artists because they were interviewed in Japan, but it was nice to witness them in action. On top of that, I had spent a lot of time in and around the second-oldest commercial building in Downtown Long Beach when it was being renovated. It was nice to shoot it once more.
There is a large crew that works hard months in advance to make the festival happen: Julia, Tanya, Calvin, John… I’m glad at least we saw Brandon out in the wild doing some documenting as well as coordinating. It’s important for Eloise to witness them in action, and know that it’s not just the painters making it happen but a team of friends who get permission, line up the gear, and do all the other stuff that makes the artwork possible. You don’t have to be an artist to make the world more artistic. And if you want to make art, there is not only a need for it but a demand.
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