{"id":1834,"date":"2016-07-12T21:46:09","date_gmt":"2016-07-12T21:46:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lbpost.com\/articles\/life\/arts-culture\/hundreds-swarmed-the-varden-hotel-tuesday-for-the-2nd-annual-pow-wow-long-beach-s-official-launch\/"},"modified":"2016-07-12T21:46:09","modified_gmt":"2016-07-12T21:46:09","slug":"hundreds-swarmed-the-varden-hotel-tuesday-for-the-2nd-annual-pow-wow-long-beach-s-official-launch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/hi-lo\/art\/hundreds-swarmed-the-varden-hotel-tuesday-for-the-2nd-annual-pow-wow-long-beach-s-official-launch","title":{"rendered":"Fans and Media Swarm the Varden Hotel for Official Launch of 2nd Annual POW! WOW! Long Beach"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

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Photos by Asia Morris.<\/em><\/p>\n

Long Beach Mayor Robert Garcia pointed to the Tristan Eaton and James Jean murals behind him at the official launch and press event of the second annual Pow! Wow! Long Beach, saying \u201c[…]the kind of art that is behind me is real art. These are artists, they should be respected for their work.\u201d<\/p>\n

The two murals were painted on the three-story wall of The Varden during the inaugural Pow! Wow! Long Beach last summer<\/a>, when founder Jasper Wong brought the renowned street art festival to the seaside city, thanks to the encouragement of Julia Huang of Long Beach-based businesses and organizations such as Intertrend Communications, The Long Beach Convention & Visitors Bureau (CVB) the Downtown Long Beach Associates and the Long Beach Museum of Art (LBMA).<\/p>\n

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RELATED<\/small> <\/p>\n

POW! WOW! Lands in Long Beach<\/a><\/h2>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
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\u201cThey\u2019re using a unique style that really gets to certain parts of our community, that really speaks to young people and certain communities, and I\u2019m really proud of them to be here,\u201d Garcia added. \u201cNot every city is going to go ahead and open their arms up and say, \u2018Yes, let\u2019s get street artists to paint a bunch of murals all over your downtown and the rest of the city.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThere’s a lot of people here that took a chance,\u201d said Nelson. \u201cAnd sometimes the most creative, the most brilliant moves that happen are when you take that chance and POW! WOW!<\/em> has [made that jump] and has been embraced by Long Beach.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Felipe Pantone\u2019s finished mural, located in the alley of Hotel Royal at 431 East 4th Street.<\/em><\/p>\n

Artists from around the world, including Spain, Portugal and France, are not only visiting Long Beach for the first time this year, but the United States, as well. And with more than double the amount of murals being painted in 2016 compared to last year\u2019s festival, you have to think about the team behind it all, the team that ensures, for example, the security of the over-water scaffolding that Hawaiian native and artist Hula will have to stand on to paint his mural under the Queensway Bridge; the team that oftentimes has to be just as creative as the artists themselves to make this week of visual wonder a reality.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019d think because this is the second time that POW! WOW!<\/em> is here it gets simpler, it gets easier,\u201d Huang told the press. \u201cBut the fact of the matter is, it gets a little bit more difficult because our standard is higher and we need more support.\u201d<\/p>\n

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This year the Port of Long Beach gave $20,000 to the festival, according to Steve Goodling of the Long Beach CVB. Many saw the donation as a generous statement, with Long Beach\u2019s economic engine is showing its support for the arts. And before you bicker that the locals haven\u2019t been given an opportunity to participate, please consider that not one, but five Long Beach artists\u2014Jeff McMillan<\/strong>, David Van Patten<\/strong>, Sket One<\/strong>, Gail Werner<\/strong> and Yoskay Yamamoto<\/strong>\u2014are painting walls this time around. And speaking of locals, you can\u2019t forget the building owners who are willing to trust the artists in the first place to not only produce something creative, but offer something that offers improvements to immediate communities.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s so many amazing [building] owners that have been coming to the artists to say, \u2018Hey, you\u2019re painting our wall, thank you so much for doing this for our neighborhood, come by to my restaurant, you\u2019ll have free food, free drinks all day long, we\u2019ll take care of you,\u2019 and that alone means so much,\u201d said Wong.<\/p>\n

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POW! WOW! Long Beach<\/em> revolves around street art, but the LBMA has also capitalized on the now-popular form of art, when last year their exhibit Vitality & Verve: Transforming the Urban Landscape<\/em>, drew a record-breaking crowd to see murals painted inside the walls of a museum, led by a director who believes this type of work should not be restricted to the streets, a concept that has pushed the LBMA to think outside of the box, as well as the artists they\u2019ve invited to participate.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think at the museum we\u2019re looking at artists that have been marginalized that are doing contemporary art, that have been doing this for years and years and years and it deserves to be studied, it deserves to be looked at and it deserves to be celebrated,\u201d said Nelson.<\/p>\n

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RELATED<\/small> <\/p>\n

LBMA Announces Continuation of Record-Breaking Vitality and Verve Exhibition<\/a><\/h2>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
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Vitality and Verve: In the Third Dimension<\/em><\/a>, will be the museum\u2019s second go at opening a coinciding major exhibition soon after POW! WOW! Long Beach<\/em>, this time featuring murals, as well as sculptural installations. Pow! Wow! also offers a full schedule events, featuring artist talks, pop-up shops and performances by POW! WOW! School of Music<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\u201cLong Beach is probably one of our most supportive cities out of all the cities that we\u2019ve worked in, and we\u2019ve worked all over the world, so we\u2019 re always happy to come back here and do more murals and help beautify the city,\u201d said Wong. \u201cAt the end of the day it\u2019s really a community project; everyone\u2019s involved.\u201d<\/p>\n

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For the full schedule of events, including tonight\u2019s Imprint Presents a Talk with Martha Cooper and Ernest Zacharevic at the Art Theatre<\/em>, click here<\/a>.<\/a> Visit the web page here<\/a>\u00a0to find each mural location.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Long Beach Mayor Robert Garcia pointed to the Tristan Eaton and James Jean murals behind him at the official launch and press event of the second annual Pow! Wow! Long Beach, saying \u201c[…]the kind of art that is behind me is real art. These are artists, they should be respected for their work.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":136,"featured_media":67211,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_sponsor_sponsorship_scope":"","newspack_sponsor_native_byline_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_native_category_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_style":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_placement":"inherit","inline_featured_image":false,"newspack_ads_suppress_ads":false,"newspack_popups_has_disabled_popups":"","_EventAllDay":false,"_EventTimezone":"","_EventStartDate":"","_EventEndDate":"","_EventStartDateUTC":"","_EventEndDateUTC":"","_EventShowMap":false,"_EventShowMapLink":false,"_EventURL":"","_EventCost":"","_EventCostDescription":"","_EventCurrencySymbol":"","_EventCurrencyCode":"","_EventCurrencyPosition":"","_EventDateTimeSeparator":"","_EventTimeRangeSeparator":"","_EventOrganizerID":[],"_EventVenueID":[],"_OrganizerEmail":"","_OrganizerPhone":"","_OrganizerWebsite":"","_VenueAddress":"","_VenueCity":"","_VenueCountry":"","_VenueProvince":"","_VenueState":"","_VenueZip":"","_VenuePhone":"","_VenueURL":"","_VenueStateProvince":"","_VenueLat":"","_VenueLng":"","_VenueShowMap":false,"_VenueShowMapLink":false,"_":"","_author_alias":"","cap-aim":"","cap-description":"","cap-display_name":"","cap-first_name":"","cap-jabber":"","cap-last_name":"","cap-linked_account":"","cap-newspack_employer":"","cap-newspack_job_title":"","cap-newspack_phone_number":"","cap-newspack_role":"","cap-user_email":"","cap-user_login":"","cap-website":"","cap-yahooim":"","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_email_html":"","newspack_email_type":"","newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_hide_page_title":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_show_share_buttons":"","newspack_sponsor_byline_prefix":"","newspack_sponsor_disclaimer_override":"","newspack_sponsor_flag_override":"","newspack_sponsor_only_direct":"","newspack_sponsor_url":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[53],"newspack_spnsrs_tax":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-1834","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-art","tag-pow-wow-long-beach","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1834","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/136"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1834"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1834\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/67211"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1834"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1834"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1834"},{"taxonomy":"newspack_spnsrs_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/newspack_spnsrs_tax?post=1834"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=1834"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}