before
after
4334 Sunset Boulevard is the address of a mural that has been the Elliott Smith memorial for almost 7 years now. It was immortalized in the Elliott Smith’s mythology by Autumn de Wilde as the background for the Figure 8 album cover
As soon as the news of Elliott Smith’s death spread on the radio waves, fans began to write on this wall, they wrote lyrics, messages, deep thoughts and less deep thoughts, visceral declarations and funny tirades, the wall became a living thing, with layers and layers of sharpie ink. When there was no room anymore, people began to write at the top of others’ writing, it became a mess, but a beautiful one, and at the end, quite moving despite the occasional weird things you could find on the wall.
But it also became the target of taggers, and large graffiti appeared, covering the fans writings. There was the MOUSE episode when a huge sky blue tag saying only ‘mouse’ suddenly appeared, covering the whole wall. And I have lost count of the graffiti series… there were several attempts to clean up the wall, but the tags kept coming back as ants on honey. The wall now seems like a sad abandoned ruin, and even though fans continue to add writings on it, almost nothing of the black and red swirl figure is still visible.
Then yesterday the wall became the center of the blogosphere and the root of all this was a LAWeekly blog declaring: ‘Roger Waters Paid Street Artists to Deface Elliott Smith Memorial Mural.’ Waters has indeed launched a ‘viral street’ campaign for his upcoming ‘The Wall Live’ tour, by hiring street artists to strategically wheat-paste an anti-war quote from President Eisenhower: ‘Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and not clothed.’
There was a sudden uprising on the web, tons and tons of outraged comments on each blog reporting the story, a sea of fans protesting and trashing Waters’ wheat pasting on the holy memorial.
Since, Waters has been busy, first this was posted on his facebook page:
Regarding the Elliott Smith memorial…
“Some of you may have seen a story going round, claiming that I paid person or persons unknown to deface a mural featured on the cover of the 2000 album, Figure 8, by the late Elliott Smith, intentionally disrespecting his memory. What a load of crap! I’m told the mural in question has been there for ten years and has been tagged many times. What possible motive could I have for targeting it?
However, I’m also told that there are fans of the late Elliott Smith who look upon that particular piece of ‘Wall’ as a memorial to him, I respect their feelings and would not wish to offend them for the world, so I shall ask my guys to remove our biodegradable Wheatpaste a.s.a.p.
– Roger
PS. Elliott Smith fans, check out the Wheatpaste text, I think Elliott would have approved.”
Then the LA Times went into action, interviewed him on the phone and he apologized to Smith fans:
“It was absolutely an accident, I didn’t want to disrespect Elliott Smith’s fans, and I’ve instructed (the team) to remove the wheat paste immediately. It was a random pasting in the normal course of this, and I want to make it public that we had no intent to offend or cover up something precious.”
Waters also added: “I admit I didn’t know his music, but I’ve talked to people who do and it’s clear he was a young man who felt deeply, and any empathetic person wouldn’t have an issue with publicizing that quote.
‘I would guess, and this is only a guess, but it’s my guess that he would have been sympathetic to that message.’
So if yesterday there was a wheat pasting of a soldier cradling a child with the pacifist Eisenhower quote, I went to the wall today to see that, effectively, this thing had been removed. Instead there is another black white and red wheat pasting of a clock mechanism exiting a zombie head. Is it related to Water? It seems to be the same kind of material and certainly reminds some of the Pink Floyd imagery. Weird! If they removed the Eisenhower-war thing, why did they put something else?
In Waters’ defense the pasting is made of biodegradable material, and can be very easily removed. But, above everything, look at the pictures!!! The wall is already so defaced, you cannot even identify what has been added.
The whole campaign is just questionable, is Roger Waters that desperate to fill up the giant stadiums he has booked for his tour? Up to $500 for a seat in LA!! That’s outrageous! Talking about a theft from those who hunger and are not fed.
But I will let the last words to Autumn de Wilde herself who took the time to post an answer on one blog. After all, she was the first person to bring attention to this wall:
“In 2000, I took a picture of Elliott Smith in front of a mural on Sunset Blvd. It was a stereo repair shop called Sound Solutions. I had been staring at it since I was a kid. I loved it, it was kind of ugly, kind of beautiful and when I showed it to Elliott he loved it too. I was paying homage to a side of Los Angeles t
hat I felt was often overlooked at that time. Random, strange and beautiful murals, street art. We were into the kind of art that was not allowed in a wealthy neighborhood. The side of Los Angeles we loved. We put it on everything that had anything to do with his album “Figure 8” because it meant something to us and yes, it was a visual “hook”. Elliott did not however, ‘strategize’ a memorial to his songwriting. Elliott’s fans chose this wall as a memorial the night he died, not me, not his manager, not any of the record labels, his fans. They just started showing up. Honestly, if Elliott was still alive, he would probably feel bad for the artist who painted the mural and the owner of Sound Solutions, apologize and offer to help repaint it. Honestly, I’d rather have Elliott back, than a wall. But the wall is a nice memorial for a few reasons. I think that if Roger Water’s himself had gone out there and done this I would respect him more. But sitting in an overpriced armchair while a “street team” disrespects not just this memorial but real street artists that are actually risking something to go out into the night and plaster the city with their point of view pisses me off. I know that it’s not just fans that write on this wall. Street artists are pasting over each other, gangs are at war and crossing out each other’s tags, some kid doesn’t even know who the fuck Elliott Smith is or why everyone writes on this wall, but he really wants write FUCK YOU all over it because he’s mad at his mom. Isn’t this what Pink Floyd used to represent? I think this is what makes me sad. I love Pink Floyd. Maybe, just maybe, when I took that photograph of Elliott Smith in front of that wall I was kind of inspired by Pink Floyd’s “The Wall”, Sid Barrett’s “The Mad Cap Laughs”, the Beatles’ The White Album” and that fucking amazing photo of Nick Drake standing in front of a wall, looking to one side as a girl runs by. Maybe Elliott and I were trying to sell his record, AND pay homage to other artists. Maybe it was one of those really special times where I wasn’t participating in a corporate strategy myself. Maybe I am pissed off today because I think I’d rather hear that Roger Waters had woken up yesterday and decided that he was so sick of his fancy chair and his big house and his fancy car and all those fancy meetings where everyone comes up with fancy strategies that he decided he was going to drive to the east side of Los Angeles, walk right up to that weird wall on Sunset Boulevard where everyone gets to write whatever they are feeling that day and spray FUCK YOU in big red letters.
hat I felt was often overlooked at that time. Random, strange and beautiful murals, street art. We were into the kind of art that was not allowed in a wealthy neighborhood. The side of Los Angeles we loved. We put it on everything that had anything to do with his album “Figure 8” because it meant something to us and yes, it was a visual “hook”. Elliott did not however, ‘strategize’ a memorial to his songwriting. Elliott’s fans chose this wall as a memorial the night he died, not me, not his manager, not any of the record labels, his fans. They just started showing up. Honestly, if Elliott was still alive, he would probably feel bad for the artist who painted the mural and the owner of Sound Solutions, apologize and offer to help repaint it. Honestly, I’d rather have Elliott back, than a wall. But the wall is a nice memorial for a few reasons. I think that if Roger Water’s himself had gone out there and done this I would respect him more. But sitting in an overpriced armchair while a “street team” disrespects not just this memorial but real street artists that are actually risking something to go out into the night and plaster the city with their point of view pisses me off. I know that it’s not just fans that write on this wall. Street artists are pasting over each other, gangs are at war and crossing out each other’s tags, some kid doesn’t even know who the fuck Elliott Smith is or why everyone writes on this wall, but he really wants write FUCK YOU all over it because he’s mad at his mom. Isn’t this what Pink Floyd used to represent? I think this is what makes me sad. I love Pink Floyd. Maybe, just maybe, when I took that photograph of Elliott Smith in front of that wall I was kind of inspired by Pink Floyd’s “The Wall”, Sid Barrett’s “The Mad Cap Laughs”, the Beatles’ The White Album” and that fucking amazing photo of Nick Drake standing in front of a wall, looking to one side as a girl runs by. Maybe Elliott and I were trying to sell his record, AND pay homage to other artists. Maybe it was one of those really special times where I wasn’t participating in a corporate strategy myself. Maybe I am pissed off today because I think I’d rather hear that Roger Waters had woken up yesterday and decided that he was so sick of his fancy chair and his big house and his fancy car and all those fancy meetings where everyone comes up with fancy strategies that he decided he was going to drive to the east side of Los Angeles, walk right up to that weird wall on Sunset Boulevard where everyone gets to write whatever they are feeling that day and spray FUCK YOU in big red letters.