User:Antonio Garcia : 2tonson

Antonio Garcia (Guillermo Antonio Garcia,born 1973, East Los Angeles) also known as Willie Garcia is an artist and photographer based in Los Angeles and New York City. He is mostly known for his photography and is very active in promoting analog and early photo process. He has created various of his own film developing formulas and toners inspired by 1940's chemistry. Greatly influenced by Arthur Takayama, Ansel Adams, and Edward Weston he has mastered Gelatin Silver Printing ,Cyanotype, Platinum and other applied emulsion techniques. Emphasizing greatly in darkroom technique it enabled him to print for many noted photographers and or archives, including Edward Colver, Herb Ritts, Derick Ion, Nicholas Triedo, Harry Gamboa Jr., Stanford University permanent collection, Carter/Ledyer/&Millbern, and many others. His involvement with photography started at age 12 through a friend of his family that was an avid photographer. Aside from photography he has been drawing since very early childhood and continues to present day.In 1984 a subscription to Popular Photography was purchased for him and sparked the life long interest. At 14 he was admitted to Pasadena City College Photography department on permission by the El Monte School District and began the more serious darkroom research. While attending Arroyo High School he was class President of the student body Freshman, Sophomore, and Junior year till defeated by best friend Evelio Raygoza Senior year. He also was a very active photographer on the school newspaper, and year book staff " The Shield". While attending High School he solicited a false I.D from a class mate and proceeded to enter the realm of nightclubs photographing while maintaing a perfect attendance all 4 years and a 3.4 grade point average. By 1990 he was an avid regular of "underground parties" later to be called "raves" documenting for Sensured Magazine, Project-X, and URB Magazine. With that same false I.D he attended The New Music Seminar in NYC 1991 as a staff photographer for URB Magazine. Garcia was a primary photographer along with B+ for URB magazine created by Raymond Leon Roker, Jason Bentley, and Todd Roberts in South Central Los Angeles, Ca. In 1991 an artist residency in Brixton ,London for 6 months grew to be rather influential in learning about contemporary music and was introduced to Psychedelic music guru Genesis P. Orrdige. Shortly after a stay in France he saw the group Mano Negra perform in Paris and grew more and more interested in combining art and music. Trips to Spain,Germany,and Italy followed. Returning to Los Angeles through recommendations by Brian Cross aka B+ he began photographing for Rap Pages Magazine. During those years along with writer Gabriel Alvarez were both enthusiasts of Chicano Rap and introduced the story about   "End Barrio Warfare" that included the band Aztlan Underground. That same year through Comic Artist Lalo Alcaraz was introduced to writer and Editor in Chief at the time of the LA WEEKLY Ruben Martinez. Martinez paired up with Garcia on various stories including the UCLA Chicano Studies March, El Tepeyac Restaurant in East Los Angeles, and Father Greg Boyle of Homeboy Industries and many more. From 1990 to 96 Garcia also began to work for various Record labels such as Mercury Records, Sony, Ruthless Records, Wax Trax, and many others both from the East and West Coast. Apart from making art and photography his involvement with various interdisciplinary media projects has continued since the early 90's to the present. In 1992 he co-produced with artist Patssi Valdez the event " Cafe Caliente" at The Women's Building in Downtown Los Angeles and included artwork by Kim Abeles, John Valadez, Patssi Valdez, and various others. In 94 he co-produced the event "In The Red" with artist's/activists Aida Salazar,Patricia Valencia, Raul Baltazar, and Zack de La Rocha at Regeneracion in Highland Park and was the first public benefit for the indigenous people of Chiapas, Mexico. Regeneracion serviced literally as a Community Center in Highland Park that offered language and various socially motivated classes for free. The event "In The Red" featured musical performances by The Watts Prophets, Stanford Prison Experiment, Rage Against The Machine, Lysa Flores, Quetzal, and Comic Book Guru Lalo Alcaraz. In 95 Garcia was roommates with Lalo Medina -Tour Manager at the time for band Ozomatli & Jurasic 5  and now Jack White. In Banksy's first LA visit they accommodated the street artist at there Los Feliz bungalow. In 1995 he received a NEA New Langton Arts Grant and in 96 with Poet Marisela Norte worked on a Los Angeles Metropolitan Transit Authority  photo-essay project. An extensive photo essay of MTA workers from CEO's to Bus Drivers that was rather successful and was used as a model project by LA MTA in international symposiums. The earnings of this project were funneled into an extensive photo journey through various parts of Mexico, all of Central America,  South America and Puerto Rico photographing musicians,writers, and visual artists. After evading several sketchy customs crossings checked in a bag with 47 rolls of film via Carnival Airlines and they  misplaced the bag that contained the majority of the film never to be seen again. After thousands of dollars and miles invested in creating a photo portrait series but with no material he opted to finding a deeper meaning with the use of photography and began focusing more on creative Montages,Tryptichs, Dyptichs, photo installations,and playing music. During this era he was introduced to sweat lodge and grew a strong bond with Native American artist/musician Joseph Gallarza. Together they produced the event "7th Generation North and South" at the Aztlan Cultural Foundation that was a music and arts festival that celebrated the unity between North and Southern Indigenous people. The event featured Eagle Plume Lakota Singers, The Mecolodiacs, Tijuana No, Aztlan Undrground, and visual art by Joseph Gallarza and Antonio Garcia. By 97 he practically abandoned the idea of "Commercial Photography" and was solely focused on photography as "Original" prints that were fusing up to 5 separate negatives on one sheet of paper. Sharing a studio with master photographer and conservation specialist Adam Avila from LACMA had a tremendous impact on his quality control as well as elaborating on various developing chemical formulas. In 1999 Garcia relocated to NYC and began working in art conservation, acquisitions, restoration, archiving, and printing editions. Through that period he worked with artists such as Vik Muniz, Shirin Nishat, Pat Stier, Duane Michaels, Hana Liden, Terence Koh, Banks Violette and many more. In 2001 he founded the company TWO TON SON that focused on bridging the protocol of the ART world with Music Media. He also formed the Punk Band The Loveless along with Micky Junior of Australian Punk Band "The Space Juniors" and " Dee Dee Ramone Band" on lead guitar and Steve Young of " Holly and The Italians" on drums. Together they recorded a self tilted full length LP. Garcia also recorded an EP with musician Gass Wlide of " The Manish Boys", "Lightning Raiders", and " Johnny Thunders Band" with Wilde on guitar and Garcia on Vocals. In 2003 he worked on the Lollapalooza bringing in "local talent" both in art and performance.In 2004 he produced the first South East Asian Tsunami Benefit at NYC's famed CBGB with The Loveless headlining. In 2007 along with artist Jody Morlock and Isaac Aden he transformed NYC's South Street Sea Port into The East Village Radio Music Festival of which Garcia was a regular DJ with the show " The Roots" with audio wizard Steve Cohen. Cohen was one of the few engineers to work on recording music with artists Jean Michele Basquiat and David Byrne as well as creator of quintessential art band " China Shop". In 2007 both Garcia and artist/curator Isaac Aden discovered a "missing" mural by artists Jean Michele Basquiat and Fab 5 Freddy that was later to be restored by Guggenheim workers. That same year Aden and Garcia were both commissioned by the City of Coachella to create a mural on a million gallon water tanker in honor of Dr.Reynaldo Carreon. Oversized photo screen prints were made directly on it's surface and a map of the city was reproduced. In 2010 Garcia returned to the West Coast via the Bay Area to focus more on creating art and music. TWO TON SON now produces print editions in the form of photographs,screen prints,LP's and custom made garments all signed and numbered. He is currently working with musical groups TRULY, Dead Combo, The Unhinged, Aztlan Underground, Levi Dexter, Bob Ebeling, on artist development/merch/and cover art. A music anthology of the TWO TON SON will be out in 2012 and will  include recordings from 1999-2007 with various guests artist and Garcia on all Vocals. His solo project " Zoot-Suit Riot" is a 20 song full length double LP of both Rockabilly/Blues and traditional Mexican Corrido music mastered by Bob Ebeling. Currently TWO TON SON operates out of Downtown Los Angeles and it's office in Hollywood, California. He continues to make art and was included in recent exhibition " No Human Way To KIll" at Whitebox Gallery /NYC curated by Robert Priceman and was featured in the NY Times Art Section.