Long Beach artist Dave Van Patten, known for bold and surrealist illustrations and murals across the city, has a new accolade: Grammy winner.

Van Patten shares the Grammy win with fellow nominees Lisa Glines and Doran Tyson for their art direction work on a Grateful Dead limited edition boxed set released last year.

The Grammy Award for Best Boxed or Special Limited Edition Package has been handed out since 1995 to an album’s art directors. The award is not bestowed upon or shared by the artist unless they are also credited as an art director on the project.

Van Patten’s Grammy win came for “In and Out of the Garden: Madison Square Garden ’81, ’82, ’83,” a live album by the Grateful Dead. Packaged as a box set, it contains six complete concerts on 17 CDs.

It was originally recorded at Madison Square Garden in New York City in 1981, 1982 and 1983. It was released in Sep. 2022 in a limited edition of 12,500 numbered copies.

Locally, Van Patten’s many public art projects in Long Beach include a 60-foot mural at Alex’s Bar in Zaferia that was originally painted in 2017 as part of the annual POW! WOW! Festival, now called Long Beach Walls, which brings in artists from around the world to create outdoor pieces of art all over the city.

The mural is a local favorite, earning first place (over 100,000 votes) in the mural category during the 2019 Best of Long Beach, a project led by the Long Beach Post.

Dave Van Patten’s 60-foot mural at Alex’s Bar in Zaferia was painted in 2017 as part of POW! WOW! Photo courtesy Dave Van Patten.

Van Patten’s Grammy win follows a series of national awards and recognitions in recent years for Long Beach-based artists and arts organizations.

In 2021, James K. Bass, artistic director of Long Beach Camerata Singers, became a first-time winner. Bass won a Grammy for Best Choral Performance for his work with the UCLA Chamber Choir, of which he is director, and JoAnn Falletta, music director of the Buffalo Philharmonic, in a performance of Richard Danielpour’s “The Passion of Yeshua.”

That same year, Long Beach Opera artistic director James Darrah received a Grammy nomination for Best Opera Recording for his work as a producer of the Opera Philadelphia performance of “Soldier Songs” by composer David T. Little.

Composer Anthony Davis’ “The Central Park Five,” which premiered with the Long Beach Opera in June 2019, won the Pulitzer Prize for music.

Dave Van Patten, one of Long Beach’s best known artists, to release NFT collection