Polish sculptor Magdalena Abakanowicz said, “Art does not solve problems but makes us aware of their existence. It opens our eyes to see and our brain to imagine.”
If the ambition of art is to spread awareness, then the creative forces behind the Hermosa Beach anti-oil campaign succeeded in spades.
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The art of the anti-oil fight was a collaboration of some of the South Bay’s finest painters, musicians, graphic designers and guerrilla artists.
“It was such a group effort with so many people involved doing their part,” said Chris Prenter, lead designer for the activist group Stop Hermosa Beach Oil. “That was the amazing part. I have to thank the oil company for bringing the community together.”
Prenter was involved in the crusade against E & B from the beginning, before there was a formal organization with its battle cry “Keep Hermosa Hermosa.”
The slogan was dreamt up by Mike Collins, another early face in the fight against oil. After he and a few fellow residents gathered at the Hermosa Beach St. Patrick’s Day Parade in 2013 with crude banners reading “No Oil,” Collins realized the group needed a rallying phrase to define it.
“We had gotten some feedback from parade and people were hoping that we wern’t going to be too negative or fanatical,” said Collins. “Kevin [Sousa] and I went back to my house and we were noodling on stuff. I said we need something like ‘Keep Tahoe Blue,’ a really positive message. I remembered that Waterman’s years ago participated in a beach cleanup and had a T-shirt that said ‘Keep Hermosa Beach Hermosa.’ So I came up with Keep Hermosa Hermosa.’”
Once the slogan was approved by the group — leader former city councilman George Schmeltzer took some convincing — Chris Prenter was tasked with designing a logo.
“The logo was me trying to find something that resonated with locals,” he said. “I just pulled the unique font and the sun from the city emblem. And it had to be green because of the cause. Clean and green.”
The Stop Hermosa Beach Oil group emptied its bank account printing banners, T-shirts and hats, hoping that locals would be interested in buying them. The merchandise was so popular it became the biggest source of fundraising for the campaign. Even better, the iconic green logo differentiated itself from E & B’s campaign signs.
“I’m glad the oil company went with brown,” Prenter said. “Because I got to call them Brownshirts.”
Keep Hermosa Hermosa banners went up all over the city. The first 50 were delivered to buyers and hung by Collins and Sousa at 3 a.m. on July 4, 2013 so the city would wake up to a sea of signs on the Fourth of July.
“I have a neighbor who has been a Chevron executive for 30 years and he was against project because of safety concerns,” Collins said. “When the banners went up, he said to me, ‘You have no idea how much you’ve freaked out that oil company.’”
Other artists began working on their own ways to express disdain for the oil project. Local creatives like Claudia Berman, John Wayne Miller, Alex Smith, Ron Siegel, Nikki Solima and Allan Mason painted, sang and designed for the cause. Silent auctions became another major source of revenue for Stop Hermosa Beach Oil, and artwork garnered the highest bids.
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Collins painted an image entitled “March 3, 2015” and on the stretch bars behind the canvass he wrote the whole story of Keep Hermosa Hermosa. It sold for $1,400.
“Our two biggest donations came through art,” he said.
Documentary filmmakers David Keane and his wife Arcadia Berjonneau produced a public service video that depicted the town’s beauty while residents expressed their fears of the town’s beauty being lost.
Kevin Sousa, a musician, brought together Pennywise and other prominent local musicians for recording No on O songs at studio 637, adjacent to the proposed drilling site. The recordings were also posted on social media. History Channel documentary filmmakers David Keane and Aradia Berjonneau produced public service announcements.
Some of the artists involved in the campaign chose to stay out of the spotlight. One of the most prominent designers, responsible for some of the most iconic anti-oil posters, has remained anonymous and only answered questions through Katrina Bacallao.
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“This artwork was not from Keep Hermosa Hermosa,” said Bacallao. “This was done as an underground effort to join the people out on the fringe who wanted a different way to speak out. This became their own story, their own way to speak out and speak loudly against the threat to the health of our community, our children and our way of life.”
The anonymous artist created the seasonal anti-oil posters (Dracula, for Halloween, a Thanksgiving turkey and a Christmas piece), as well as iconic posters featuring a Pelican flying off of the pier, a child in the sand, and the victory T-shirts with the unfettered Pelican.
“I was asked to complete each of these from a fellow supporter of the No on O cause, and was given a specific theme for each piece,” the artist said, through Bacallao. “For instance, she wanted something that would outline the nine unavoidable impacts of drilling for oil incorporated into each holiday so that they were not purely political pieces, but something that someone may stop to look at because it grabs their attention.”
“The idea was to grab people’s attention so that we could gift them with the knowledge of what oil would do,” the artist said. “That’s why the campaign against oil worked: People were educated with the facts from a number of sources, not just my artwork.”
Local guerrilla chalk artist K.P., the creator of Funism, also got involved. She helped create a massive mural on the side of Betsy Ryan’s house on Hermosa Avenue. The mural displayed the words “No on O” in huge chalk letters. Local residents signed their names on the wall to show their support. It also had a running meter of the days left to register to vote and a countdown to election day.
“I was so happy K.P. got involved,” Collins said. “It meant a lot to the community. She tries to stay out of the spotlight.”
One of the most inventive ways the no on O campaign used art was a projected image of a stop sign with the words “Vote No Stop E & B Oil 3-3-15.” The art bandits snuck around Hermosa at night and projected the sign onto the Community Center, the library, Stars Antiques, Von’s, the Easy Reader, and the E & B offices, among other locations.
“The art of this campaign brought people together, gave us something to talk about,” the anonymous artist said. “Conversation is what won the vote. People were educated and disillusioned with the lies they were told. I think the art also brought a lot of encouragement to those who fought hardest against Measure O, seeing that they were not the only ones in this fight.”
Sousa and fellow local musician Allan Mason did their part by writing songs to protest the oil project. Sousa’s “It’s Not Right” was written with Wais Katubadru and enlisted local band Sand Section for bass and lead guitar.
“We wrote it from the belief that this project is just not right for Hermosa or for any town that has to live with the threat of carcinogens filling the air and radioactive materials being raised outside their bedroom windows with the majority of the profits go to one company,” Sousa said.
The lyrics include: “We’re signing up today/ This is where we live/ Some were born and raised/ It’s not right, it’s not right/ To dig up the earth before our children’s eyes/ It’s not right, it’s not right/ For you to destroy this beautiful place.”
Hermosa resident Allan Mason wrote “Go Back to Bakersfield,” a folk anthem telling E & B to head back to where they came from.
“After I played this song last spring, I challenged the local pro-oil sellouts to write a song for their side, if they feel so strongly,” said Mason. “Of course, I never heard a peep. Must be kind of hard to write about killing the best little beach city under the guise of protecting it.”
“And besides,” he continued. “We have all the creativity and passion on our side.”
The song’s chorus is “We’ll send them back to Bakersfield/ With surfers nipping of their heels/Let them stuff their crappy deal/And crawl back to Bakersfield.”
Activists like Chris Prenter hope the group can maintain its unity and message even now that the threat of oil drilling is over.
“I want to see a Keep Hermosa Hermosa Day,” he said. “I want to see this unity carried through and to remind people what we can do when we stick together.”
