F/ATW
Found Along the Way
L.A. Sidewalk Stencils 2018-2022
$45
// Limited edition of 50
// Each cover is hand sprayed
// InstagramAlso available at:
Museum of Graffiti
Hennessey + Ingalls
Arcana: Books on the Arts
Daniele Lanza
Design Director
About this book
Between early 2018 and the end of 2022 I have photographed roughly five hundred stencils around the Los Angeles metro.
The point of attraction between me and these small pieces of street art has always been their unpretentious attitude, their low-fi aesthetic and most importantly their precarious existence. The minute they are born they are abused, removed, stepped on, battered by the elements and therefore very much subjected to getting lost. And there lays my interest to preserve them in this book.
I love the strong individualism that emerges in most of these stencils. I love the fact that some have something to say, some don’t, some are well designed, some are not, some are smart, some are offensive or dumb. The common trait that they all have, and what I respect the most, is the motivation of the people that make them. The drive to go get the material, to think of something to say, and then take the risk to go spray the stencil on a public sidewalk.
From an aesthetic perspective, and this is true for all the stencils in this book, I love how they appear on concrete. I think that the surface on which they are is as important as the pieces themselves. I’m quite convinced that they would lose a lot of interest if they were simply sprayed on canvas or paper. They would become precise, controlled, probably too precious. The environment in which these stencils exist is what ultimately makes them compelling. The cracks, the tags, the gums, the stains of everything, nameable and unnameable that happens on cities’ streets is the vital ecosystem in which these stencils live.
For this project I gave myself the sole limitation of photographing stencils that were in Los Angeles and sprayed on the sidewalk or in very close proximity to the sidewalk. In the final edit I removed only those stencils that were advertising something too blatantly. All the others went into this book, regardless of what I subjectively liked or disliked from a design or message perspective. This is not a curated collection of the best stencils but rather an incomplete record of all the stencils I found on L.A. sidewalks in a period of time.
In the spirit of an archival approach, all the stencils are shot the same way, without any intent to capture them at dramatic angles and without giving any importance to the photograph or the photographer. The images in this book are not placed in any particular order. I specifically resisted the idea of dividing them into logical categories or by neighbors or areas, simply because I believe that this book is not a guide. I only noted the approximate location of the stencil (street and neighborhood), so if you are compelled by what you see, I invite you to go walk around the area. Maybe you will find it, maybe you won’t.
It is important to note, with the exceptions of the design of the book and the stencils appearing on the cover and back cover, that none of the work here is mine. I have made an effort to trace ownership of each piece to give proper credit to the creator, but it has been extremely challenging. If you see a piece that belongs to you, please reach out to me and I will credit your work in all future reprints of this book. If you, on the other hand, do not like the idea of your work being featured here, please reach out and I will remove it.
Here is a partial list of artists appearing in this book:
Balt Getty, Nicky Nailed It, 1 Good Hombre, Estevan Oriol, Novy, F05H, MIII, FKZ, Ghst Pntr, Gully, Corie Mattie, Sticky Shaw, Kii Arens.