The final show entitled, These Friends 4, at This Los Angeles opens Friday 26 April and runs until 17 May. I’ve got a piece in the show and I’ll be back home in LA for the weekend.. come out Friday night and see the house Justin built. 

This Los Angeles 5906 N. Figueroa St. LA, CA 90042

My J Crew installation is featured in the new Gestalten Press book, Brand Spaces. There are some really amazing installations and examples of branded architecture, it’s really an amazing book.. pick one up asap!

TIKAL, GUATEMALA

I went to Tikal for my birthday.. it wasn’t this ominous, but it was really fun pretending.

Woohoo! I’m flying out to El Salvador, Belize & Guatemala tomorrow.. finally going to get some sun! Later skater!

Before Justin’s untimely passing, he was in the middle of curating a show in San Francisco at Guerrero Gallery featuring art from a variety of artists from his home state of South Carolina: Bill McRight, Brent Owens, Frank MCCauley, Jason Filipow, John Hill, Jon Prichard, Jon Rajkovich, Jeremy Shockley, Kelly Keith, Kevin Morrissey, Kevin Taylor, Paul Martyka, Reed Elliott, Shepard Fairey, Tim Hussey, and Tom Stanley. He also curated the project space, which features artists from his book Milk And Honey Contemporary Art In California all of which reside in California. I have a few small pieces in the project space, so come say “hello” and look at all the amazing things my friend Justin managed to achieve.

Our mutual friend, the amazing UPSO, sweet talked Threadless into reprinting a long out of print T shirt Justin did for them a few years back, and that will also be available. Hope to see you.. Saturday January 12, 7-11pm - 2700 19th St. San Francisco, CA 94110

MTV’s HOUSE OF STYLE w/JUSTIN VANHOY

A few days before his untimely passing, Todd Oldham sat down and interviewed my good friend Justin Van Hoy. Get a view into his awesome life, the amazing book that Ammo just published, Milk & Honey Contemporary Art In California, and great little snippets from friends Sage & Shepard.

JUSTIN VAN HOY 1981 - 2012

Justin was one of my closest friends and this is the not so quick story of the last 10 years of my love for him and his wife Holly. I met Justin in 2003, he’d been doing work for Shep (who made a nice post about his passing) and was going to be making a move from LA to ATL with his future wife, Holly. We hung out and ate, talked about design, screen printed posters.. art stuff. They moved out east, we talked everyday on iChat and when he moved back to LA a year later things were awesome. Then Justin got sick. Leukemia. Fuck. And he beat it! Then a year+ goes by. We’re chatting on iChat like always and he has a routine follow up visit, be back in an hour. 3 days go by and no Justin. Won’t answer the phone, not online.. nothing. Holly won’t answer her phone either. Cancer’s back. FUCK. The spring wedding in South Carolina we had all been waiting for is happening in their house in LA in 48 hours. Far from their dream scenario, but so much love was in their house. But Justin needs a marrow donor and fast. Homie Roger Gastman hosts an event at his office for people to get tested. And people do the same in Seattle, New York etc. They found him a donor and get him into chemo & radiation. The next 6 months Will & I take turns spending days with him and feeding him, helping him go to the bathroom, basically everything. He could barely move or speak. The radiation fucked him up beyond anything I had ever seen. We had to scrub up to get in the house because his immune system was nonexistent. He was in agony. Holly was amazing. The absolute perfect relationship I have ever seen. I have never seen a couple more in love. After months of a very slow recovery and several hospital emergency runs and scares.. he pulled through. Not before whipping his dick out in front of me at the hospital and even though he was in agony said “fuck it, you’re getting an eyeful ‘cause when you gotta go you gotta go.” Through all of it he was still ridiculously awesome. Now after 6 months he’s walking and talking, finally. Will and I put together a benefit called “Fuck Cancer We <3 Justin” for him and I ask my friends at Poketo if they could host the silent auction in their space. They never even met Justin and were so overly willing to help out it was amazing. In the one night we raised like $12k to help out with medical bills. Justin was so hyped. He couldn’t believe it. So many people contributed artwork and time, it was unreal. I can’t thank everyone enough for that night and what we were able to raise for him and Holly. And then 3+ years of relatively smooth sailing. Some minor hospitalizations here and there, massive nerve damage in his legs.. but Justin was Justin again. He beat Cancer again. My homie was back. We talked and hung out almost everyday. Literally. I was at the house with our squad every holiday getting in Holly’s way, ganging up on her as she was always the lone girl. It was our little LA family. I’m an only child and hate most people.. Justin was my brother. When I started having health problems he was all over it. Supporting, helping out, looking shit up, checking in non stop. He was an amazing person. Everyone that met him, loved him. His death comes as a surprise and shock to all of us. 

We spoke 14 hours before his death for almost 2 hours about some projects in January and had planned for him to come crash at my place in SF in January. We talked about getting a house in Palm Springs for a mellow New Year’s. I’ll never hear that slight southern drawl again. He hooked me up with RVCA for my installation, put me in his book along with all of our friends, I had shows at his gallery.  I log into my computer and our last iChat conversation from the day before is the first thing that pops up. His phone number is the 2nd one listed on my phone right under my mom. This is so fucked. I can’t delete any of it. I won’t delete any of it. I can’t imagine what Holly is feeling.

Now, this isn’t just a sad story of me losing one of my closest friends, this is a story of all of you losing an amazing artist & designer. You may not know it but you’ve seen his work. He worked for Shepard Fairey, Mark the Cobrasnake, he curated things for RVCA, he was the Art Director of Swindle Magazine, he designed books for Juxtapoz, he designed Jim Houser’s books, he worked with Roger Gastman on a bunch of books including the History of American Graffiti, a book about the Crips, Saber’s book, he rebranded our favorite burger spot The Oinkster, he opened an amazing gallery in Highland Park called This with homies Jeremy/Claire Weiss and Aaron Farley, he curated the art installations in the restrooms at Gagosian Gallery, made a guest appearance with Roger in Exit Through The Gift Shop, and recently published a book (that you should buy) with Ammo Books called Milk & Honey Contemporary Art in California. All this and more in 32 short years. 

Justin I love you and I already miss you so much.. I can’t believe we haven’t spoken yet today. 

Revolution Daily’s Wesley van Eeden was nice enough to interview me, and I think it’s probably the best one I’ve done.. I’m not the best about talking about my work, but I like how this one turned out. Thanks Wesley!

October!

I also went to Ireland this month!

Here’s a little video of my trip to Casablanca, Morocco.. I stayed at the really nice and centrally located Hyatt Regency.. rad times! I got to check out the Hassan II Mosque, the lighthouse d’El Hank, the Medina & beaches in the Corniche neighborhood.

Gagosian Gallery in Los Angeles is hosting the book release party for Milk and Honey: Contemporary Art in California which features work not only by myself but also: Ed Ruscha, Steven Harrington, Richard Colman, Barry McGeee, Sage Vaughn, Megan Whitmarsh, Florencio Zavala, Ashley Snow Macomber, Andrew Shoultz, RETNA, Ed Templeton, Souther Salazar, Cleon Peterson and several others who call California home. Come out November 3rd! Most of us will be in attendance! 

The book was written by Justin Van Hoy and you can now purchase your copy.

Here’s a bit about the book from the author: “In the same spirit as Roger Gastman, Aaron Rose, and Jeffrey Deitch’s recent seminal MOCA show: Art In The Streets, ‘Milk and Honey’ celebrates a group of contemporary artists with roots across various areas, including graffiti art, surf, and skate culture, and other uniquely californian influences. As is evident in that highly acclaimed museum show—as well as the current Pacific Standard Time show throughout los angeles—California affects trends and sets the stage nationally and internationally, for some of the most creative art being made in the world today.”

Tomorrow, exactly two weeks after spinal surgery I’m heading out to Dublin, Ireland & Casablanca, Morocco. Surgeon cleared me. I’m walking ok, slowly, but ok. So a big “fuck you” to my spine, I’m going anyway! If anyone has any tips on places to eat or rad things to do in either, let me know.. If something happens to me, there’s no need for an “I told you so” because my mom already did.

September! An installation, a NYC trip & spine surgery. From awesome to shitty.

Imprint Culture Lab did a nice feature / interview with me.. Thanks guys!