We first met Julian standing in the alley of an art residency he had started at Danny First’s La Brea Artists Residency Studio in 2020. Covered head to toe in paint and working on canvases bigger than Julian was tall, he ecstatically pointed at the pieces he was working on with a ruler. Julian couldn’t paint fast enough as he covered every inch of canvas, shoulder to shoulder of his now iconic larger than life charactures of historical figures, sports icons, and drama queens. Later at his own studio with higher ceilings in Downtown Los Angeles, his canvases and ideas only got bigger. Coming down in his paint splattered pants, and a loose fitting t-shirt – he began to look like Piccaso with an intentionally shaved head and better shoes. He’d welcome us up into his studio with Ethiopian Jazz wafting around tables labeled “nakashima’ presumably in lieu of the real thing, shelves of paint, and piles of his moleskines. This previously abandoned spacious industrial space was quietly becoming Julain’s new home.