Julian Pace
Julian Pace used to walk through Central Park at around four in the morning, he’d have just gotten off a shift as a bartender at Jake’s Dilemma. The morning sun rising over rooftops, he’d light a spliff - the guiding torch through those early hours. Julian would walk to 60th and 2nd Avenue where he’d climb aboard the gondola heading across the East River to Roosevelt Island, where he was living. While the rest of New York was just beginning their day – though that may be a stretch to say – Julian would be getting home. He’d walk into his tiny apartment and start painting on jackets, cardboard, or most likely in his trusted five inch Moleskine notebook. When the weed would fade or the paint would dry up, he’d fall asleep and start his ritual all over again.
This was of course all before we met Julian. 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 industrial space was quietly becoming Julain’s new home.
Julian not only has a deep honesty presence in his work but a genuine sincerity when talking with him. He’s present, alert, and laser focused on finishing one piece and starting the next.
When looking at Julian’s work it becomes obvious these images are drawn over and over again, religiously in his notebooks. Sometimes piecing separate drawings together to form a finished work. Everything put down on canvas has been meticulously practiced on small pieces of paper. His piles and piles of Moleskine notebooks, sorted by, season, date, or one of his favorite quotes – a system of organization designed only for him. In these piles of black notebooks contain drawings of sunny-side-up eggs, Air Jordans, World War Two handguns, the Moon, Frida Kahlo, bullfighters, and Chiquita bananas. A pocket Moleskine notebook has 192 usable pages in it. Julian Pace has filled 56 notebooks since we first met him at Danny’s artist residency two years and two shaved heads ago. That is 10,752 pages. A lot of time under the pencil and planning under the sun.
Julian is an example of an artist who has come into his style through hard work and unwavering determination. From the small apartment and tiny notebooks to the larger than life canvas that fits in an even bigger studio, Julian knows how fast the tides can change. How important it is to be reminded of the gifts one is presented with and the wisdom to keep his eye on the work and his thumb on the paintings. Some say that bigger is always better, but we believe the drawings in Julian’s notebooks reveal how true beauty can take place on any scale.
