I’m Chris Vega and I paint LA the way it sounds when you’re walking through it – loud, bilingual, and funny if you’re paying attention. For five years I’ve been chasing the moment when a phrase lands in two languages at once and the picture around it does the rest of the work.
This one is a palm tree. Dodgers blue. Growing straight out of a taqueria awning that says CON TODO in letters I painted by hand.
Ruby said it captures the playful essence and she’s right but it’s more specific than playful
Con todo means with everything. Onions, cilantro, lime, the red sauce, the green sauce, all of it. You say it at the counter and the guy nods because of course you do.
But it also means all in. The whole situation. No half-measures, no holding back. That double meaning is why the phrase works in a painting and why I put it over a taqueria instead of anywhere else.
The palm tree is there because it’s the only thing in LA more common than a taco shop and because Dodgers blue is not a color you apologize for.
The black brush line does one thing the spray colour can’t
I work in layers. Spray the colour field first – flat, bright, no blending – then come back over it with a thick black brush and draw the shapes in one continuous line if I can manage it. The line is cartoon-simple but it has to move. If it sits still the whole thing dies.
The awning stripe is three pulls of the brush, wet enough to stay loose. The letters are slower because they have to be readable, but I still paint them freehand. A stencil would look like a stencil.
Charlotte called the linework bold and she’s being polite. It’s not bold, it’s loud, which is the point.
This is not the last taqueria
I’m working through a set of twelve LA places with twelve phrases that work in both languages. This is number seven. The palm tree will come back because it always does, but the next one has a different colour and a different awning and you’ll know it when you see it.
If you grew up saying con todo, this one is for you. If you just like a blue palm tree over a taco shop, it’s also for you. If you need your art to be quiet and respectful, skip this one and come back when I paint something calm. I haven’t yet.
Matte fine art poster, in 3 sizes — 11×14, 16×20, 18×24 in. Ships free within the continental US.
