Jason Hernandez, Lifeline (2008)
“Even among art that aims to be free of traditional categories and definitions, there is an ever-present danger of calcification and rampant commercialization,” warns a recent dispatch from Atwater Village gallery Black Maria promoting its upcoming “No Brow” exhibit. “These dangers threaten to turn even the most unorthodox of movements into an exercise in mainstream banality. The very success of the Lowbrow movement may curb those features that once distinguished it from ‘Highbrow’ art, with its rules and value judgments.” I’ve actually been hearing this line of critique for a few years now — particularly since 2006 with the sudden departure of longtime Juxtapoz editor Jamie O’Shea and equally untimely demise of the Lowbrow journal of record’s publisher Fausto Vitello. Juxtapoz, which claims to be the most widely read art magazine in the world, and Lowbrow were completely synonymous for a time. But the once-hermetic underground comics/hot-rod/tattoo/graffiti scene has exploded more than anyone could have imagined, with a bigger tent that includes digital artists, sneaker designers, collector’s-doll manufacturers and several generations of commercial illustrators ±— and an increasing number of gifted young artists from the Highbrow art world.