On the west side of  Los Angeles where I  used to live, small 1940 vintage  homes were  being  demolished   to  make  way   for  high-rise  apartments   and condominiums.

These were simple houses so there’s very little of the poetry and mystery that one finds  in the grand  old ruins  of once majestic  homes, yet  it seems that something  holds my fascination–something  still retained  in their walls; something crystallized from the energy of human emotion  and activities of human nerves.

Once a house is vacated and scheduled for demolition, it may spend  weeks or even months on  death row.  During this  interim a strange and  varied procession of occupants  seek shelter, refuge,  and/or recreation in  the vacant houses.   This series  of paintings  (which includes  Posse  Boys, Phantasy and Sister  Torch, Sad  Boy’s Gambit, Brave  Starr, and  Setting Free the Bears) is about those last days.

The more graffiti I saw, the more impressed I was by the tremendous energy contained in a well-done “tag” or “piece”.  Highly stylized, broadly imaginative, and bursting with color, this amalgam of several “pieces” became the background for Setting Free the Bears.