"NEO-GRAFFITI 2000" AT AGNES B: HAZE, FUTURA 2000, AND MORE....

Used to be, you could arrive at an art opening "fashionably late" and still get the fuck inside. Nowadays though, as with hot club parties, you either go early or face the prospect of herding outside (where, unless you're smart, you stand around for forty minutes, pretending to decide which of all the night's better party alternatives to pursue, until you skulk away invisibly, secretly thinking you should have dressed better). Getting into places late is hardly even a matter of coolness anymore. Now that everybody's sorta cool and nobody's that cool, party planners just invite way more people than can possibly fit in their venues, then close the door when the party comes to that inevitable crush-point.

So we were glad we arrived ridiculously early-- 7:15, when the invitation said 7 to 9-- for Thursday evening's totally fun opening of the "Neo-Graffiti Project 2000" show at the Agnes B men's store in New York's Soho. It was already crowded, but with minimal fuss we were able to get inside, grab a mini-bottle of champagne, and begin checking out the work on display. The show is small but packed with power, amply demonstrating how, over the last few decades, the street-level vision of graffiti greats Doze, Futura 2000, Haze, Lee, and Phase 2 has mightily influenced not just mainstream art but global culture.

Who came? It looked like everyone. When we left, around 8 (to rush to another party), it was obviously crush-point. Seen inside-- chatting over the inspired, early-evening audio catalysis of Major Force's DJ Takagi Kan-- and outside, which become a scene in itself (because it was a beautiful summer evening), were Giant Step's Jonathan Bernstein, 360hiphop.com's Jon Caramanica, PR wiz Roy Dank, Tokyo Street 2000's Suzi Funahara, Indie 5000's Matt Goias, Platform.net's Tina Imm and Steve Greco, 360hiphop.com's Jazzbo, creative-marketing genius Steve Klein, creative-marketing genius (and art collector) Mike Neumann, artist and art director Ro Starr, and tons of other people on the same tip.

"Neo Graffiti Project 2000" runs through July 14. So if you're in or around New York, you gotta hustle over to the Agnes B store, at 79 Greene Street. And when you're there, look for the special edition stickers that each
artist has created for Tokion, the magazine that's presenting the show along with Agnes B. The sale of these stickers benefits the Tokion Tree Fund, a newly established charity whose goal is to beautify the Los Angeles neighborhood of Union and Alvarado. According to the nice people at Tokion, "the fund was created in the hopes of helping regenerate the area. The project will receive assistance in the care and upkeep of the trees from the local Esperanza Elementary School‚s fifth grade class as part of their science curriculum."