The Walls Belong to Alan Ket
So it’s nowhere near Las Vegas, but since we feel a certain kinship with New York City, I’m going to share a little about the upcoming “The Walls Belong to Us 2” benefit being held on Thursday, Nov. 8 at 55DSL (281 LaFayette St.) in SoHo from 7 – 9 p.m. It’s the second in a series of art benefits held to raise money for the legal defense fund of Alain “Ket” Maridueña, the legendary NYC graffiti artist, author and activist who was arrested and charged with graffiti-related crimes in three of New York’s five boroughs.
On Sept. 10, Ket plead guilty in a Brooklyn court to one count of second-degree
criminal mischief—a felony—for painting a train in
The art benefit at 55DSL will feature an open bar, music by DJ Soul and new artwork by such street-born artists as Shepard Fairey, Rolo, Grotesk, Daze and Mario Pena.
If you live in or plan to be in the NYC area, you can RSVP for the event at rsvp@soundofart.net. Suggested donation is $20. Online auction of the art opens on Thursday at www.thewallsbelongtous.com. More info can be found at www.supportket.org.
November 6th, 2007 at 3:28 pm
Actually, the $3k is only for the Brooklyn plea bargain– remember, they sent him through the trifecta-Queens, Manhattan and Brooklyn- and instead of pleading out separate felony charges, the plea bargain reached between the D.A. and Kuby threw all three locations into one.
KET is technically paying over $12K if you take into account all three areas, and is spared prison time (even though the D.A. initially charged him with illegal possession of marijuana upon NYPD searching his home. But if that was not included in the search warrant- i.e. no illegal substances search mentioned in warrant when it was signed by a judge- then they cannot keep it as a charge due to the 4th Amendment and subsequent Supreme Court rulings).
NYPD Special Investigations Unit has been tracking him for some time and tossed 2004-06 graffiti into the charges. Granted, they didn’t catch him “in the act” when he was arrested, but the D.A. had enough circumstantial evidence to warrant a plea agreement. One would presume that KET’s colleagues would assist directly- from their pocketbooks- in a legal defense fund as opposed to holding a public forum (Ecko, Atari, MTV, etc.), but such is life.
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B00EEDA1330F936A35753C1A9619C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=1
November 6th, 2007 at 3:34 pm
Uh yeah. I didn’t get into all the legal details because I already did that in the last issue of Racket. Just wanted to sum it. Thanks for the expansion. It makes up for my having to copy and paste the entire Racket story here now. 😉
November 6th, 2007 at 4:38 pm
Ah, yes, of course. And it would help if the Racket site offered hyperlinks to certain articles in a particular issue: like the days of yore… But, fair enough. Just making sure your blog entry was credible and factually accurate 😉
P.S.- Isn’t it slightly paradoxical to hold the event in SoHo? So much for the inner city/urban youth arts movement. I guess we all cash in our chips for the higher power of currency, and attorney’s fees.