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Los Angeles-based artist du jour and former prison inmate Louis Carreon is Tinsel Town’s go-to graffiti artist, mingling with Hollywood socialites at art gallery openings and schmoozing with rock stars at hot spots throughout L.A. – all while sober. Already popular with the young Hollywood crowd – Paris Hilton and Adrian Grenier are fans – Carreon is still in the precarious position of being simultaneously not-quite-mainstream and almost too “industry” for the art world. 

 

The graffiti artist, who spent 10 years as a spray-and-sprint illegal tagger on the streets of L.A., is now an entrepreneur with a vision. In addition to his silkscreen creations, Carreon raps (stage name: Pettytom), designs (he’s the brainchild behind fashion line Klozhorse and his self-titled label), and, according to his Hollywood pals (among them Kevin Connolly and Dave Navarro), throws one hell of a party.

 

His pieces, many of which feature his trademark skulls and cartoonish animals (often a bear or cat) holding a single message-etched heart (“Glamour,” one reads, “F[r]IENDS,” another one says) are bright and almost kitsch, but there’s no denying the underlying dark messages they’re meant to hold.

 

And it’s true. Push aside the smog, and in Louis Carreon’s eyes, Los Angeles just bursts with color, though not necessarily of the visual kind. Trying to capture the chaos of the City of Angels in one bright visage after another has become his passion and his challenge.