At Your City Block we strive to reinvent blighted lots, in turn enhancing communities and the surrounding areas.

We do so by looking for Activators within the community that exhibit a passion for creating and can create memorable experiences; one such group of activators being the artists that call San Diego home.

Recently we called upon three artists to repaint parts of the venue, thus creating a new experience for our guests and the surrounding community as they pass by the venue. Below is a little bit of info about each artist and their work.

Photos by Javier Luna

Maxx Moses:

Maxx Moses brings his artwork to Your City Block to transform the blank surfaces into a dream-like reality. His tools are spray paint and acrylics. His inspiration is life, which he views as an ever-changing natural canvas of chaos and order.

As his artist vision and identity evolved, so did his relationships with art and neighborhoods.

Maxx has emerged as a Graffiti Artist from New York whose grown into an international muralist. He also educates through workshops, has written a play (Graffiti Life, the color of my soul) and is currently working on an interactive outdoor kaleidoscope with students from Sweetwater High School.

As a professor, his curriculum is innovative and unpredictable which is engaging.

For this project Maxx brings his creative process named Concrete Alchemy, defined by Maxx Moses as “transforming blank spaces into objects of beauty”. A new art movement where spontaneity is the essential element.

Maxx States ”This process of creativity nourishes and supports the ideas of individuals. This, in turn, cultivates, enhances and transforms our communities

Carly Ealey:

Carly Ealey is a self-taught fine artist, muralist, and photographer based out of San Diego, California. Carly prefers acrylic ink on wood panels when painting small, and a combination of acrylic paint and aerosol when working on large-scale murals.

Carly is passionate about the ocean and has participated in and produced mural festivals for Pangeaseed Foundation’s Sea Walls in collaboration with her artist organization, Cohort Collective.

With a natural inclination to painting the familiar figures of women in her work, she is drawn to the seductive and celestial while exploring an introspective view of human existence, spirituality, and the natural world.

Carly Ealey – The Seeker

Carly gives a little insight into her piece on 13th Street ‘The Seeker’ stating    “The Seeker was inspired from my studies on the Law of Attraction and specifically about choosing the mind’s focus. The center of attraction is up to you. Your vibrations ripple outward to create your reality”

Austin Reed:

 

Austin Reed is an International American Contemporary artist known for his unique fusion of styles referencing from city streets, graffiti, and abstract influence.

Each of his artworks is inspired the composition and imagery of city life. Incorporating elements of street views and abstract layering into his varied compositions, Reed combines conceptual photography references and cityscapes, along with poetics to explore an eclectic range of media.

When beginning each painting, Reed uses the compositions of the cityscapes as a guide for the underlying color blocking. He then transforms that rather linear view with emotionally driven gestural expression, adding movement and life to the artwork.