Kelsey Fair, the artist behind Hermosa Beach anti-oil posters, sheds anonymity
“I just wanted to say something.”
Artist Kelsey Fair.
The anti-oil campaign meant different things to different people. For some, it was about preserving property values; for others, it was about protecting the health of Hermosa’s children. For Kelsey Fair, a 26-year-old artist and art teacher, it was about respecting the planet, but it was also about finding purpose and using her gift for good.
Kelsey was the No On O campaign’s version of Banksy, the artist who used the pseudonym Veritas – Latin for truth – to create a series of provocative anti-oil posters that appeared around the city, printed on T-shirts and stuck onto buildings.
“Being able to make art for something I believe in – man, that’s a rush,” Kelsey says. “That was cool. I’ve never experienced anything like that before.”
She chose anonymity because she wanted the people who saw her art to think about its message, and not who created it. They might form an opinion about her work if they knew she was young, or that she actually lives in Redondo and not Hermosa, or that she can’t vote in America. (She grew up in New York, Oregon, California, and Switzerland, but she was born in Canada and is still in the process of becoming a citizen.) She didn’t want any of that to muddle her message.
“I just wanted to say something,” she says, and laughs with what seems like relief. “I was pissed.”
Kelsey is mindful of how she uses and interacts with the environment. She’s an avid rock climber, prefers being outside, and loves animals — she lives with three dogs and has been planning to adopt a California desert tortoise since she found out the species was nearing extinction. But she didn’t consider getting involved in the campaign until she talked to Katrina and Jose Bacallao, vocal opponents of Measure O, whose kids she teaches art. Katrina asked her if she’d consider creating monthly posters to publicize the dangers of oil drilling, and in September Kelsey got to work. She poured herself into the project. Some pieces took 10 hours, others took five 10-hour days. She wasn’t paid; she was passionate. Each month, she came up with a concept, focused around the nine ways oil drilling would unavoidably impact Hermosa – noise, safety, land use, risk of upset, water quality, biology, recreation, air quality, and aesthetics. Counting the victory poster she made after March 3, she did nine pieces.
“The pressure was on,” she says. “I really wanted those posters to look good.”
The victory poster Kelsey created after she heard about Measure O’s voting margin. Photo used with permission
The posters gave Kelsey the chance to explore new artistic territory. She’s been creating for years, but painting and graphic design are new forms of expression for her. Kelsey takes photographs for both love and money, and she studied creative writing at UCSB until the economy crashed and it became financially impractical to continue college.
That’s when she and her fiancé Ryan hit the road. They lived two years outdoors — in a tepee for one of those years — and then they returned to Redondo Beach, where Ryan’s mother Diane runs a studio called The Artist Within.
Taken with a sketch she saw lying around the house, Diane encouraged Kesley to pursue art. Kelsey obeyed. She took classes at Otis and now she teaches at The Studio Within. She gets commissioned to paint and her work has been featured in in local galleries. She was involved, in a big way, with the anti-oil campaign, and now that it’s over she’s focusing on studying for her Master’s in creative writing and working toward a credential to teach art in public schools.
The novelty hasn’t worn off, though. Kelsey’s still buzzing from being part of a movement waged by a community of people who care more about the planet than profits.
“It was just so cool to be a part of that because I’m not from here and this is a really locals’ town,” she says. “A lot of people have been here for generations and I’m a newcomer. My fiancée grew up here but I felt super embraced… They let me fight for something I believe in, for the good of my community, the larger South Bay community.”
There were moments that made the pressure and the lack of payment all worth it, like when a campaigner who had been targeted by E & B said he found hope in one of her posters.
“I was like, ‘That’s just really cool,’” she says. “These are people I don’t even know, so that really made me feel like this isn’t just about my motivation to protect nature and the environment, but also about helping out the people who were real soldiers in the campaign.”
Her primary motivation, though, she says, was to “win one for mother nature.”
“Thinking about drilling, and digressing to century-old technology? It’s like, ‘Come on, guys,’” she says. “We’ve got the technology – we have solar, wind, turbine energy. We’ve got some really cool alternatives. We don’t have to do this.”