Union Los Angeles

Dotted all around the world are spaces where creatives of all types set up shop and release what’s in their head, heart and guts. It is in these spaces where imaginations and ideas transform themselves into the likes of sculptures, films, drawings, songs, paintings, animations, collages, etc… Entering this type of space is like walking into the head of the person who creates in there where you can see all the bits and pieces their work is comprised of.

We took an afternoon off to wander around our friend Noah Davis‘ head at his inconspicuous studio somewhere in Los Angeles, that’s close to some really good Jamaican jerk chicken.

Union: Can you tell me about the first painting you ever made?

Noah: Uhhh… I don’t remember. First painting I ever made to show?

Union: Ever.

Noah: Ever. I don’t remember the first painting I made.

Union: OK what’s the first painting you ever remember making?

Noah: Hmmm great question. I remember I got a studio when I was in Seattle, when I was 16… but I was painting well before that… I got a studio when I was 16 in the back of this kind of low brow art gallery and I got a couple of big canvases, store bought, and I just made these really awful paintings (chuckles). They were suppose to be abstract but they were just really bad. I remember making that painting and painting throughout high school and it being really hard. I just remember I could never get it to look the way I wanted it to look so I just stopped painting.

Union: So what got you back into painting?

Noah: I think for the early part of 2000. I was in a lot of museums and working in a lot of museums and I saw a lot of paintings. By seeing them I just wanted to. I couldn’t really do photography and there seemed to be better opportunities for me as a painter because all my ideas were pointing in that direction. It seemed so immediate, so quick and probably what I was best at doing.

Union: Funny how people gravitate towards certain mediums, right?

Noah: Right, yeah, like I was too scared to go take a photo of somebody on the street or a situation so I just painted it cause I wasn’t really socially capable.

Union: Because it’s non-confrontational.

Noah: Yeah, it’s very private so I can do a lot of stuff I wanted to do.

Union: Have you overcome that or do you still think…

Noah: No, I definitely want to do more film and photos now. I enjoy making paintings but I think they’re kind of influencing one another these days. I still need the other one. I don’t really like using other people’s images. These (pointing to canvases scattered around studio) are other people’s images but it’s more like watching television. I’m taking a still from something. I don’t know, I need my own imagery. I’m very much on that path towards creating and painting it.

Union: So this series of paintings are all television stills?

Noah: Yeah.

Union: Are there specific television bits that you take or are they random things you select?

Noah: I wanted to create a series. I was watching a lot of television… Jerry Springer, Maury… you know. Basically, I really wanted to do this series for a long time. It’s kind of out of left field.

Union: Out of left field is good sometimes.

Noah: It’s a little different but I’ve been wanting to do it.

Union: Does the subject influence your color palette?

Noah: Yeah. It’s going to be interesting. We’ve been talking about this while we’ve been working on it. It’s just these very cheesy, kitsch palettes… the real shows, they’re like blue, light purple carpet with red, you know, and the background of these particular sets almost look like a contemporary art set, which sounds weird but all the flat screens and all that stuff kind of allude to an installation so it’s really funny to paint it. The palette is affected by that so I can have fun. It’s just like a modern stage the way all these angles are working. It alludes to the history of painting, which is really strange because these are really low, white trash television shows. A lot of these shows take place in Chicago. It’s very 90’s. It was big in the 90’s and now it’s just disappeared into the vacuum of the 90’s. And the characters are kind of like Fellini characters, they’re just the extreme. Instead of having to go out and cast, they’re already there. Crazy, fucking characters. They’re so funny to watch. It took me awhile to get it to look the way I wanted it to look.

Union: Are you from Chicago?

Noah: No, I’m not. My mom is from Chicago.

Beth: And his brother Kanye is too.

Noah: (laughter) My brother Kanye… so funny.

Union: (laughter) When you put those glasses on, I thought in my head “He kind of looks like Kanye.”

Noah: That’s so sad. (pause) I heard Kim Kardashian and him are having a baby.

Noah was also shot by Shaniqwa Jarvis who is endless fun to be around!

(It was a good week… we got to spend time with three people we really like. Thanks Shaq, Sal & Noah!)

Noah wears:

Photo 1 & 3: Neighborhood Military BDU L/S Shirt, Fuct The Party Is Over Tee, Neighborhood Kendall Narrow Pant & Neighborhood Sus. Dot Suspender

Photo 4: Neighborhood Lumbers Flannel Shirt, Tantum Floral Flap Pocket Tee, Carhartt Sid Pant & Sperry 2Eye Boat Shoe

Under the public eye, the legendary Sal Barbier is known for his Sal Flip and SLB 23 shoe. But behind closed doors in the depths of his lair, where no one can see or hear, Sal is working away on music, cars and animations that are awesooome! However, it is unavailable to anyone but himself… Guess we’ll just have to settle for skateboards, graphic tees and denim with exceptional fit that’s available on his website to everyone.

This week we got some time with Sal to talk about cauliflower and chicken while we dressed him handsomely in a pink Comme des Garcon cardigan.

Union: What was the first thing you ate this morning?

Sal: Oatmeal. Not that stuff that comes in a packet… like real oatmeal I make from scratch.

Union: What was the first thing you put on this morning?

Sal: “Ummm… starts with boxer shorts, then I work my way up to Dickies pants. I wake right up and head to the garage usually to do some garage things.

Union: Do you play the drums?

Sal: No, I play the guitar.

Union: What do you think will be the last thing you eat tonight?

Sal: I eat the same thing all the time. I’m on a tapout diet plan. I’m on a mixed martial arts diet.

Union: Do you do MMA?

Sal: Secretly… No. I don’t do it. I don’t want anyone to hit my ear. Have you ever seen their ears?

Union: The cauliflower ears? Yeah, it gets all… (gestures to having a swollen ear)

Sal: Yeah, that’s why I won’t do it.

Union: It swells up and… bubbles. Why?

Sal: Yeah, cause you keep hitting it over and over again, it’s like breaking your ear. So the last thing I’ll eat will be… I bet it’ll be brown rice and chicken again.

Union: Is that your favorite?

Sal: I don’t have favorite foods. It’s all fuel to me.

Union: Hmmm… So you see food as purely fuel?

Sal: For the most part, yeah.

Union: You don’t enjoy when it touches your tongue, swirling around your mouth and going down your throat?

Sal: Mmm, not really.

Shaniqwa: Are we talking about food or semen???

Union & Sal: (laughter)

Union: What’s the last thing you’re going to take off tonight?

Sal: Dickies pants.

Sal was shot by our lovely friend Shaniqwa Jarvis who always has a camera stuck to her hands, is always shooting photos for a myriad of magazines and advertising agencies and is the photographer behind This Charming Man, a book full of good looking boys, including our own mustached Ryno!

Sal wears:

Photo 1: CDG Shirt Knit Cardigan, Post O’Alls Engineer S/S Shirt, Fuct Leopard Logo Tee & Neighborhood Military Reef BDU Pants

Photo 2: Fuct Orgy Tee, Visvim Slim Chino & Roberu Braided Bracelet

Photo 3: Neighborhood Early C Shirt, Mark McNairy x Union Saddle Shoe Version II, Visvim Slim Chino & Oliver Peoples The Soloist

Photo 4: Neighborhood Ivy Hunt Jacket & Visvim Slim Chino