June 1999, Venice Beach. Brooks Crossing.
I started selling my art. I took it to the Venice Beach Boardwalk. It was a little scary at the time but, I'd just had my first solo show at a gallery in Venice, at which I'd made 0 sales. I'd just moved with my wife-to-be from our little apartment on Brooks Avenue between Main and Pacific to a little bungalow behind an empty old house in Santa Monica. But I had all this art! I'd hadn't hung my show and had so much more! So before I moved I took it a block and a half to the boardwalk and screwed them to a construction wall right on the Ocean Front Walk! 15 big pieces with a little write up about running around the then nude beach boardwalk in the mid-1970s with my best friend Nicky Delmonte (whose father was an artist and who had a foundry/ studio on and California- a studio that was floated there from Santa Monica canyon in the early 1900s!) Anyway, I also mention my upcoming show at The Soapbox gallery across from Beyond Baroque the following Friday. That was a Friday and that Sunday I went down to the boardwalk to see if my art was trashed or tagged or whatever.. nothing! All still there. I asked the guy across from my art selling incense if the tourists were noticing my art. "Yeah man, they're taking pictures all day." Nice. Art seen. Guess I'll leave them there. The construction company said I had another week before I had to tak ethem down. I'd have a sell out show (haha a sell 0 show- It was his first show and in hindsight I should have packed the walls.)
The next Wednesday I hung my show and was standing out side with Vitor the owner and who pulls up? L.A.P.D! Hey we just caught some kid stealing your art. We think he's on PCP. COme down to the station and get your art. Vitor looked at me. "I told you. I put a bunch of art on a construction wall."
After the show, I went back to the boardwalk and picked up my art. While I was there I talked to a few artists (Ra Ra Superstar) and