ARTIST SPOTLIGHT
LYDIA EMILY Photos by BIRDMAN
ARMED with canvas, paint brush, oils and the Sunday New York Times in her kitchen studio, Lydia Emily’s immediately identifiable painterly photo-realist images have been catching the eyes of an ever growing group of fans, bloggers, curators and many other street artists who want to collaborate with her. Asked about her creative process, Lydia Emily explains: “when I decide I’m going to paint someone, I study them for a week – I will stay up all night watching videos of them, watching the way their eyes squint, their lips move, and the way they touch their face when they are talking. Then, after a week or so of these observations, I can paint them without any reference other than what is in my head.” Recently, Lydia Emily choreographed a daytime takeover of the Sunset Junction Junkyard Wall – and curated an 80 foot long, eight foot tall collaboration (see above) with street artists Scepter Hed,
26
Text by Lee Joseph
Leba, 20, Lucky Bunny, Contra, Meer One and John Carr. Lydia Emily invited some street art fans to come out, put up fake signs on the street and direct traffic in vests and blue gloves. At one point, the LAPD drove by but continued on their way once waved through by one of the fans. There were at least 30 people across the street snapping photographs of the installation in process. Lydia Emily’s original idea for the wall (where she has been pasting posters of her works for over a year) was to create a “letter” to the LAPD featuring her “Hope Bombs” with the statement “you can arrest me, but non-violent political protest will not be silenced and I can mail my posters out for others to post” though she decided let go of her personal drama and put her energy into to a collaboration with some of the artists that she would be showing with at the “LA vs. The War” group show. Further
background on the story: in July of this year, Lydia Emily was “allegedly” disassembling a bus bench light-box when she was detained by the authorities. She sat on the pavement for an hour and a half on cuffed hands while the authorities confiscated all her posters and wheat paste. Lydia Emily now has a court date pending for felony vandalism. On the subject of her involvement in the street art scene, Lydia Emily states: “I do not deface private property. I engage in biodegradable, non-violent, political protest on government and corporate real-estate.” Lydia Emily was recently in the all-female street art show “Miss Danger on the Loose” group show at Lab Art, the “Inner Walls” pop-up show in Milan, Italy, which also featured a group of world-wide female street art-