BEHIND THE STREET ART SHOW
If you missed “Street Legacy: SoCal Style Masters” this past summer at the California Center for the Arts, Escondido, no worries. That memorable exhibition of Chicano culture street art, graffiti, lowriders and more is documented in “The Street’s Legacy,” a YouTube film by Point Loma Nazarene University alumnus Hunter Scheidt.
What was intended to be a three- to five-minute recap video of the event turned into Scheidt’s 20-minute-long documentary. It includes not only works featured in the exhibition, but behind-the-scenes footage in the gallery, interviews with some of the street artists represented, and insights from the show’s two curators, Bobby Ruiz, a local legend in this cultural art scene, and G. James Daichendt, vice provost for undergraduate studies at PLNU.
The making of “The Street’s Legacy” required, Scheidt says, about 40 hours of filming and planning in collaboration with Ruiz, Daichendt and the CCA art gallery.
For Scheidt, who makes films and videos for architecture firms, the street art exhibition doc became a passion project.
“After filming architecture for work the last couple of years,” he said, “I have learned the importance of gaining the ‘why.’ People love insight into why artists do what they do.
“I hope people (who watch the film) have the same experience I did with the culture. It’s a deep-rooted family that will do anything to help one another out.”
The vibe of the CCA show proved inspiring to Scheidt.
“Many shows or exhibits are for the privileged with a set of guidelines: Don’t spill your drink. Don’t talk too loud. Don’t touch the art. Don’t bring the kids. ‘Street Legacy’ was a show where they said to bring anyone and everyone and let them see our culture.”
See it again in Scheidt’s “The Street’s Legacy,” then look for it throughout
San Diego County, where Chicano art and culture thrive.