And I’ll Take the Lowbrow

Blériot on Melrose

BY STEVEN LEIGH MORRIS

Blériot at Work, Courtesy of Blériot

Stage Raw was in London’s Shoreditch district last week when it ran across muralist Blériot, at work for a commissioned piece for A.C. Camargo’s LIGA DO ROSA campaign for Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month. Turns out the Leeds-born artist was recently in L.A., where he left his mark – his ‘Dia De Los Muertos’ mural on Melrose Avenue’s Fame Yard.

Courtesy of Blériot

CAPTION: Blériot on Melrose

Blériot (his name honoring the French aviator, Louis Blériot who, in 1909, became the first pilot to fly across the English Channel) was invited to L.A. by artist Shepard Fairey to work on projects and designs with OBEY, founded in 2001 on the inspiration provided by Fairey’s counter-cultural artworks – call it a skateboard/punk aesthetic. (From OBEY Clothing’s website: “Through designers Mike Ternosky and Erin Wignall, Shepard works to create designs that represent his influences, ideals and philosophy.”) Fairey’s work, and consequently OBEY’s clothing items, satirize conformity by looking at American images through a Soviet, authoritarian lens.

Of course, this begs the question of whether a counter-culture clothing campaign is actually part of pop culture or counter culture, and where lies the divide between the two? For example, how revolutionary is a poster for sale in a theater lobby or a T-shirt for Les Misérables? That’s an open question, not a rhetorical one.

Blériot didn’t want his face photographed, but had no objection to Stage Raw capturing his London mural for our readers.   

Fame Yard is located next door to Sportie LA at 7753 Melrose Ave.