Nestled in LA’s Palms neighborhood stands a deceptively ordinary 1950s home. But beyond its humble exterior lies a vivid, evolving wonderland – the personal canvas of controversial artist David Choe. Over nearly two decades, Choe has transformed every inch of this house into an uninhibited artistic playground pulsing with color, erotica, and cultural commentary.
Both a reflection of its creator’s identity and an influential icon in its own right, David Choe’s house offers an unprecedented glimpse into the artistic process through the lens of interior design.
David Choe purchased his Los Angeles david choe house in 2003 as his budding art career took off, and over 20 years of embellishing its interiors with tagging, illustrations, and multimedia flourishes, the ever-changing art-filled space has allowed Choe to continually reinvent his surroundings while nurturing creativity.
Serving as a personal creative headquarters and evolving “journey of self-discovery,” the david choe house has left a lasting impact on art, design, and culture by inspiring similarly personalized artistic living spaces, while offering insight into Choe’s complex personal growth. As Choe continues ornamenting this deeply personal living canvas, his david choe house promises to remain an iconic work of art in its own right for years to come.
David Choe’s Artistic Journey and Influences
David Choe bursts onto the contemporary art scene in the early 2000s, but his artistic roots stretch back to a rebellious youth heavily influenced by hip hop culture, comic books, and the 1990s Los Angeles graffiti scene.
Early Life and Graffiti Beginnings
Born in 1976 to Korean immigrant parents, Choe grows up in LA’s multicultural urban landscape. He is drawn to comic books and graffiti art from a young age, admiring their raw, provocative aesthetics. As a teenager, Choe befriends future collaborator Harry Kim and begins tagging buildings across LA under the moniker REVOK. He joins the prolific graffiti crew MSK in the 1990s, creating socioeconomic themes critiquing capitalism and conformity.
Transition to Fine Art in Early 2000s
In the early 2000s, Choe transitions from underground graffiti artist to fine artist creating paintings exhibited in galleries. His provocative figurative works feature erotic themes, dark humor, and brash cultural commentary rendered in vibrant, graphic styles. He begins showing with LA’s Gallery 1988 in 2003.
Mid-2000s Commercial Work and Success
Throughout the mid-2000s, Choe enjoys massive financial success illustrating for magazines and directing TV pilots. Most notably, he paints a mural at Facebook’s headquarters in 2005 and accepts company stock instead of cash payment. When Facebook goes public in 2012, his shares are valued at around $200 million. He subsequently works with major brands like Nike and fills creative directing roles.
Controversies and Problematic Behavior
Never one to shy away from controversy, Choe often sparks outrage in the media for his sexually explicit artworks depicting nude women and his brash, reckless public persona. In 2014, an online backlash arises over graphic podcast comments allegedly condoning rape. While never charged criminally, Choe issues a public apology in 2021 for past “toxic behavior” towards women as the #MeToo movement gains steam.
The History and Description of David Choe’s David Choe House
Background and Purchase in 2003
As Choe’s sophomore art exhibition garners attention in 2003, the young artist purchases a 1950s home in LA’s modest Palms neighborhood for $710,000. Choe actually recognizes the house from his wayward youth spray painting graffiti nearby with crew MSK during the 1990s. The nondescript property with a bright blue exterior provides the ideal blank canvas for the visionary artist.
Initial Eccentric Decor in Mid-2000s Party Pad
In the mid-2000s while enjoying his growing celebrity status, Choe outfits his self-proclaimed “ultimate party pad” with eccentric, customizable decor. The entryway features a salvaged glass security door allowing visitors to glimpse the burst of color within. The sprawling living room contains offbeat elements like a horse saddle sofa, hanging disco ball, and monkey skeleton art. The back yard studio offers space for Choe to work large-scale as his fine art career accelerates.
| Feature | Description |
|---|---|
| Original Purchase | 1950s home purchased in LA’s Palms neighborhood in 2003 for $710K |
| Signature Blue Exterior | Repainted bright blue exterior with white trim and Choe’s dreaming whale character mural above door |
| Salvaged Glass Entryway | Security door made of salvaged glass pieces providing glimpse inside |
| Sprawling Living Room | High-ceiling open-concept living room with offbeat saddle sofa, hanging disco ball, monkey skeleton art |
| Backyard Studio | Large outdoor studio providing workspace for large-scale art like murals and sculptures |
| Customized Dining Room | Table crafted from vintage pinball machines and carved dragon, chairs feature Choe’s risqué pinup art |
| Hand-Painted Wall Murals | Almost every wall reinvented with colorful graffiti tags, illustrations, flourishes in Choe’s signature style |
| Collaborative Elements | Features interactive art, video projections and mixed media additions by Choe’s artist friends |
| Gallery Wall Displays | Select walls utilize salon-style hanging to display Choe’s own artwork from past decades |
| Bold Color Palette | Vibrant signature hues of orange, green, pink used in murals, custom upholstery and accent decor |
Current Family-Friendly Iteration
Now in his late 40s, married, and a father, Choe adapts the david choe house into a more family-friendly abode without losing his signature artistic edge. Whimsical murals and hidden rooms appeal to his young son, while feminine flourishes like floral wallpaper and heart motifs pay tribute to his wife. As Choe’s lifestyle evolves, so does the ever-changing design scheme of the decades-long work in progress that is his david choe house.
The David Choe House as a Canvas for Choe’s Artistic Process
Choe quite literally transforms his LA abode into a dynamic, evolving art exhibition serving as the ultimate creative sandbox fully showcasing artistic process across media.
Murals, Illustrations, and Mixed Media
The artist first makes his mark directly on the david choe house walls in the mid-2000s via colorful graffiti tags in his signature style, reinventing every surface into a vibrant mural. Choe soon incorporates further mixed media elements both created personally and in collaboration with other artists. His fantastical erotic illustrations, Eastern-inspired flourishes, and cryptic text graffiti intermingle with sculpture, video projections, and interactive components.
Uninhibited Creative Freedom
Free from commercial constraints or public judgement within these personal interior spaces, Choe and his collaborators enjoy uninhibited creative freedom limited only by imagination. Choe continually reinvents rooms over the years and incorporates new objects sparking his latest creative visions. The ever-evolving installations reveal his capricious creative process adapting to current interests rather than any predetermined scheme.
Self-Curated Personal Exhibition
Choe essentially utilizes the home to self-curate a uniquely personal interior exhibition spanning decades. Its gallery-style walls display paintings and illustrations representing different stylistic periods in his prolific career. The david choe house offers fellow artists, critics, collectors and the general public alike a glimpse into Choe’s prolific imagination through the lens of his meticulously crafted surroundings.
The Intersection of Art and Design in the David Choe House
Choe’s artistic identity shapes the david choe house’s overall aesthetic from wall artworks down to smallest decorative details in holistic harmony.
Signature Color Palette
An vibrant, contrasting color palette visible in Choe’s mixed media art carries over into the space’s background walls, accent decor items, and custom-upholstered furnishings. Pops of orange, green, pink and metallics enliven the home’s open floor plan.
Integrated Artworks
Choe directly incorporates large-scale mural paintings showcasing signature fantastical themes into the architecture itself. Custom upholstery and printed textiles feature graphics from his drawings and watercolors to further integrate fine art pieces.
Bespoke Furnishings
The handcrafted furnishings echo Choe’s curvaceous figurative drawings through sensuous shapes like curved couches and chairs. Elements like collaborative graffiti rugs and Choe’s own risqué pinup girl line art adorning dining seats push decorative boundaries.
Tactile Artistic Details
Nearly every tactile interior detail from wall hangings to cabinet knobs embodies Choe’s artistic identity, creating a cohesive aesthetic universe visitors can fully immerse themselves within.
The David Choe House‘s Influence on Interior Design Trends
By essentially crafting a full-fledged art world sculpture within a functional living space, Choe helped expand the definitions of interior design while pioneering trends.
Fusing Interior Design and Fine Art
Choe demonstrated creativity and self-expression need not end at merely decorating with store-bought art by literally transforming the entire home into an evolving mixed media artwork itself. His approach helped merge the disciplines of environmental fine art installations and utilitarian interior design.
Street Art and Graffiti in Homes
The david choe house made graffiti, murals and street art techniques like stenciling hugely popular aesthetics translated to interior spaces through wallpaper, digital prints and original art commissions. Choe helped recontextualize subcultural public art forms into high-end interiors.
Promoting Radical Personalization
By constantly reinventing his residence’s aesthetic over decades to align with his current identity, Choe pioneered promoting complete radical personalization aligned with self-expression over cohesive “rules” of design. His house inspired creative individuals to utilize living spaces as canvases reflecting dynamic inner selves.
The David Choe House as a Reflection of Choe’s Personal Life
More than simply quirky decor, the evolving interiors provide rare insight into Choe’s persona and personal growth through the decades.
Turbulence and Catharsis
During erratic early fame filled with drugs, gambling, and all-night parties in the mid-2000s, the ever-adapting david choe house serves as both refuge and creative release. After suffering a breakdown in 2007, Choe channels cathartic emotions into renewed creative energy renovating the space.
Maturation Into Family Life
As Choe enters marriage and fatherhood in the 2010s following past turbulence, he adapts the residence into a child-friendly but still stylized sanctuary. Whimsical kid’s rooms, play areas, and sentimental family mementos reflect his new domesticity, complementing residual provocative artwork nodding to his wild past.
Journey of Self-Discovery
Allowing such personal creative freedom transforms the richly layered interiors into a therapeutic venue for self-expression changing in tandem with Choe’s identity. The david choe house ultimately serves as an introspective mirror charting Choe’s ongoing “journey of self-discovery” via the objects, artwork, and design motifs continually integrated within its walls.
The Impact and Legacy of Iconic David Choe House
Influential Creative Hub
Beyond giving glimpse’s into its resident creator’s psyche, Choe’s ever-evolving installation space has broadly impacted creative culture by pioneering trends from mixed media art to radical interior personalization. It serves as an iconic LA locus where fellow luminaries like Anthony Bourdain and Street Sects founder Leo Ashcraft have found their own inspiration.
Mainstreaming Street Art and Graffiti
As images of Choe’s impeccably decorated interiors went viral across interior design blogs and publications in the 2010s, the house played a monumental role in bringing street art and graffiti into mainstream consciousness. His DIY creative ethos helped ignite fellow artists and designers to similarly transform personal spaces.
Celebrity Design Inspiration
Today, Choe’s handcrafted david choe house remains celebrated in popular culture as the ultimate example of rebelling against minimalism and injecting identity into surroundings. Rappers, artists, and actors alike find inspiration between its one-of-a-kind walls.
Evergreen Personal Project
Even decades later, as long as Choe’s ever-restless imagination conjures new interior visions, the david choe house promises to continually evolve as his personal creative headquarters, man-cave, and legacy. This intimate sanctuary will likely stand for years as David Choe’s most legendary work of art.
Conclusion
Through two eventful decades of artistic embellishments aligned with his dynamic personal growth, David Choe molded his Los Angeles residence into a vivid ever-changing wonderland pulsing with creative spirit. Both intimate reflection and enduring legacy, the legendary david choe house pioneered fusing art, design, and self-identity by transforming interior space into an uninhibited personal canvas that still fuels inspiration across creative fields today. As Choe infuses his latest artistic inspirations within its bespoke walls, this uniquely immersive living installation promises to remain his magnum opus for decades yet to come.
