What He’s Got
Culture Magazine
Thu, Apr 7, 2011
Opie Ortiz lives the dream. His tattoos are seen around the world, most notably on Bradley Nowell’s upper back that was featured on the cover of Sublime’s eponymous 1996 album. Ortiz went on to front post-Sublime incarnation Long Beach Dub All Stars and later Dubcat, despite having no prior musical background other than jamming with friends.
Between working days at his American Beauty Tattoo Parlour slinging ink, he still likes to stretch his fine art fingers, most recently contributing to the upcoming Chronic State gallery opening hosted by Long Beach Chronic on April 20 at Lyons Art Gallery. Ortiz and low-brow art sire The Pizz are featured artists on the bill.
Participating artists lent their interpretations of Southern California’s marijuana lifestyle culture, with skateboard decks as their canvases. Each design, signed and numbered, is also available as a print for those looking for something to frame.
Growing up in Long Beach, Ortiz became enthralled with the art world at an early age, with doodling graduating to drawing, then to painting, before his attention gravitated toward some of the guys in his neighborhood who wore their art on their sleeves.
“Older teens and friends of mine had a lot of tattoos, but crappy ones,” Ortiz says. “I still remember which tattoo inspired me to make a tattoo machine at age 15 and tattoo all my friends—or people who would allow such a thing.” The tattoo was by an apprentice of Bert Grimm’s named Jason Paul on Ortiz’s buddy Brent French. It was an ace of spades card with a dagger.
Ortiz studied under Grimm back in the early 1990s, continuing to find inspiration in various art forms outside of the tattoo world. He was drawn to the fluid artistic sensibilities of Asian artists.
“I was fond of a lot of artists’ styles and took what I could or borrowed what I thought was cool to meld into my own style,” Ortiz says.
Japanese tattoo artists amazed Ortiz, particularly Horiyoshi I and III. He also looked to various European artists with their motifs and off-the-wall designs, most notably Luke Atkinson, Henk Shiffmacher and Filip Leu who were pushing the realm of what a tattoo could contribute to the art world.
Back in the states, Ortiz was on the brink of unknowingly contributing to the eye of pop culture. It was not uncommon for Ortiz to tattoo friends on the fly back in the day, but it was his friendships with Nowell and Sublime bandmates Eric Wilson and Bud Gaugh of Sublime that would make him a part of history.
Aside from adding backup vocals occasionally for his buddies’ then up-and-coming band, he also created all the artwork for their albums, T-shirts and various merchandise. He also, fittingly, tattooed Sublime’s members, including Nowell’s infamous “Sublime” tattoo that became the self-titled album’s cover as well as the band’s logo.
Nearly two decades later, Ortiz’s eye for catchy graphics with a musical lean have gone on to grace the covers of releases for Capitol Eye, Salir, 3.6 Milk, Shrub, Pilot Touhill, River Jetty, Slightly Stoopid, One Draw and the Hangars, many of whom also openly support the ganja grind.
“I think legalization can be a good thing, hopefully, if it’s done correctly,” Ortiz says. “With the financial situation of California, maybe it can be helpful, who knows. I think that’s a small drop in comparison to other problems we face as Californians. I have hope for the future.”
opieortiz.com.
http://freeculturemag.com/2011/04/featuredstories/what-he%E2%80%99s-got/
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A Day in the Life
IE Weekly
of artist Jason Maloney
Jason Maloney walks out of his bedroom with his bundles of joy wrapped tightly in his arms, proudly displaying the fruits of his labor. “I bought them on eBay,” he says gushing. The Newport Beach-based artist known primarily for his pop surrealist, cool-yet-creepy social commentary is temporarily caught up in the minutia of 1980s Iron Maiden concert T-shirts.
Click below for the full story:
http://www.ieweekly.com/cms/story/detail/a_day_in_the_life/1180/
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Amid Laguna's plush party pads and modern mansions, LAM celebrates cool, lowbrow construction
The Laguna Art Museum’s summer exhibits always rock, with opening night casts of characters—past shindigs saw Lance Armstrong dodging paparazzi and Patricia Arquette wearing a lobster bib—barely outdone only by the artwork within. This year, the walls are closing in for “Art Shack,” opening June 12. The show combines art and architecture by 29 Cali artists, including Don Ed Hardy, Shag, Paul Frank and Sandow Birk, to name a few.
Curator Greg Escalante saw a theme among pop-leaning artists: building beach shanties. So, Escalante, the former board president of Cal State Fullerton’s Grand Central Art Center and founding member of sacred lowbrow mag Juxtapoz, went with the clapboard construction ode.
Click below for full story:
http://orangecounty.modernluxury.com/style/humble-abode-lams-art-shack
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Humble Abode:
LAM's 'Art Shack'
By Arrissia Owen Turner | Riviera magazine | June 7, 2010
COOL CONSTRUCTION Shag's modernish orange abode, which previously caused buzz at Culver City's Billy Shire Fine Art (top) and artist Esteban Bojorquez building his new work for LAM's exhibit.Amid Laguna's plush party pads and modern mansions, LAM celebrates cool, lowbrow construction
The Laguna Art Museum’s summer exhibits always rock, with opening night casts of characters—past shindigs saw Lance Armstrong dodging paparazzi and Patricia Arquette wearing a lobster bib—barely outdone only by the artwork within. This year, the walls are closing in for “Art Shack,” opening June 12. The show combines art and architecture by 29 Cali artists, including Don Ed Hardy, Shag, Paul Frank and Sandow Birk, to name a few.
Curator Greg Escalante saw a theme among pop-leaning artists: building beach shanties. So, Escalante, the former board president of Cal State Fullerton’s Grand Central Art Center and founding member of sacred lowbrow mag Juxtapoz, went with the clapboard construction ode.
Click below for full story:
http://orangecounty.modernluxury.com/style/humble-abode-lams-art-shack
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Made in China
IE Weekly
Sweeney Gallery’s Absurd Recreation exhibit seeks to break the China syndrome
If you think life as a struggling artist blows, try making it in China. On top of the crappy pay and living on the fringe of society, there was a time when you got your share of harassment from the government if you’re weren’t creating what was acceptable by Communist standards, like, say, if you portrayed General Mao with tits or something. Which the Gao brothers did—tsk tsk.
See, our artists could totally get away with something like that, and who wouldn’t want to see Bush characterized as the country’s nurturer with a good rack? God bless America, indeed. Or could we get away with that? Maybe we’re not as different as we think.
These days, China’s artists have more autonomy and spend their wheels expressing the country’s loss of identity, spawning from the loss of Confucianism to its Communist regime to its current quasi-blend of Commies and Capitalists living in distorted harmony amid unprecedented growth.
Click below for the full story:
http://www.ieweekly.com/cms/story/detail/made_in_china/1440/
A new Laguna Beach art gallery is all about giving back to action sports’ creative cadre
From tragedy sometimes sprouts inspiration. Leaving a party in 2003, Mammoth local turned professional snowboarder Jeff Anderson died after attempting to slide down a handrail of a fourth-floor staircase inside a Japanese hotel.
The 23-year-old left behind his Burton team, friends, family and an entire board sports community that shared his zest for creativity and going big. Building on Anderson’s artistic streak, Torrey Cook, along with Jeff’s brother and mother, Billy Anderson and Jane Baer, opened the 210 AR4T Space in Laguna Beach.
AR4T, which stands for Artists Republic for Tomorrow, gives the stoked industry a space to show face. It is a seed, Cook says.
Click below for the full story:
http://orangecounty.modernluxury.com/style/board-bonds-210-ar4t-space-finds-art-sports
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Board Bonds: 210 AR4T Space Finds Art in Sports
By Arrissia Owen Turner | Riviera magazine | September 6, 2010
From tragedy sometimes sprouts inspiration. Leaving a party in 2003, Mammoth local turned professional snowboarder Jeff Anderson died after attempting to slide down a handrail of a fourth-floor staircase inside a Japanese hotel.
The 23-year-old left behind his Burton team, friends, family and an entire board sports community that shared his zest for creativity and going big. Building on Anderson’s artistic streak, Torrey Cook, along with Jeff’s brother and mother, Billy Anderson and Jane Baer, opened the 210 AR4T Space in Laguna Beach.
AR4T, which stands for Artists Republic for Tomorrow, gives the stoked industry a space to show face. It is a seed, Cook says.
Click below for the full story:
http://orangecounty.modernluxury.com/style/board-bonds-210-ar4t-space-finds-art-sports
