By MARIKO LOCHRIDGE, Rafu Contributor
Published March 28, 2024
When Suehiro Cafe shuttered its doors for the last time on Jan. 9, historic First Street lost a caretaker of 51 years of community memories. Its nearby new location at Suehiro DTLA has not yet hit the level of popularity of its Little Tokyo home, and some nights are tougher than others.
It’s on those nights that a mural, a two-story dedication to Suehiro founders Junko and Yuriko Suzuki painted by local resident and famed artist Robert Vargas, keeps owner Kenji Suzuki going.
“New locations are difficult; we are still trying to build a customer base here,” Suzuki shared at the dedication of the mural at the Suehiro DTLA grand opening on March 19.
“Unlike Little Tokyo, where we had a lot of foot traffic, we have to earn every single customer that comes through these doors. And then we have to do our best to make sure every single customer comes back with their friends or family. It’s a very difficult situation. Some nights when we’ve had a very slow day my heart aches a little bit, but I look at that mural and I feel better. I feel better because my mom and my aunt are looking after us and I think that helps me quite a bit.”
Before introducing Vargas to the audience gathered for the grand opening of his family restaurant’s new location, Suzuki joked that he was surprised that the artist had the time to be there. That’s because Vargas has been busy painting a very, very big mural down the street at the Miyako Hotel.
Born and raised here, Vargas is a decades-long L.A. resident whose portraits have ranged from as small as a postage stamp to as tall as a 12-story building.
A graduate of the Pratt Institute in New York, Vargas began drawing during his Boyle Heights childhood. Today, Vargas’ art is rooted in bringing visibility to the faces of the community he grew up with as a Boyle Heights native alongside his bigger-than-life heroes of L.A. His prolific portraits have included faces as iconic as Kobe Bryant and as local as the Suehiro Cafe’s founders.
“The real joy for me is the journey of the creative process and how people are building a relationship with the wall and how that interaction between myself and the public and creating work that humanizes the built environment,” Vargas shared with The Rafu Shimpo on Day 17 of consecutively painting for 7-10 hours per day on the side of the Miyako Hotel in Little Tokyo.
The 13-story, 150-foot-tall Shohei Ohtani mural has a corresponding QR code that will allow for an immersive experience for the viewer to see Ohtani swinging and pitching over the rooftops of Bunkado and the rest of historic First Street.
“As I am creating this mural with the Downtown L.A. skyline behind it and framing it, and it starts to become something bigger than Shohei Ohtani or Little Tokyo,” Vargas explained.
“It really anchors Little Tokyo in a way that allows people to want to explore these shops and the small businesses here and to contribute. Little Tokyo is such an integral part of the L.A. fabric and culture. I am humbled and pleased to be able to contribute to this canon.”
“L.A. Rising’ was unveiled to the public on Wednesday, three weeks after painting began, and is located on the southeast-facing wall of the Miyako Hotel, 328 E. First St., in the heart of Little Tokyo.
Q: How much of the mural was planned?
A: All of it was planned but it is painted in a freehand style that is pretty much me working without any kind of grids or projections, but I go off of a set design that I put together.
Q: What kind of toll do such large pieces take on you, especially considering the time constraint?
A: All of the work that I do is really demanding because it’s much larger than the norm but I think that the intention behind the work and meaning behind the work is what powers me through to completion.
Q: How would you describe the feeling after finishing these projects? How do you think the feeling of this project will differ from others you’ve done in the past?
A: Obviously, there’s a sense of satisfaction and joy. Not necessarily relief because that’s more of if I think I can achieve it, and for me that’s never a doubt. There’s definitely a sense of accomplishment, but I think the real joy for me is the journey of the creative process and how people are building a relationship with the wall and how that tends to – that interaction between myself and the public and creating work – humanizes the built environment.
I think what it does is it goes beyond just the player itself, although, Shohei is this perfect intersection of East and West, offense and defense. What he’s doing on the field and off the field is an example of how doing it the right way will work. And that’s why he’s not just so loved in Japan but here in Los Angeles and around the world.
Q: Do you have final wisdom you’d like to impart?
A: This mural is about unity and bridging cultures together and I can’t imagine a mural existing anywhere else but in the heart of Little Tokyo. I am honored to collaborate with the Miyako Hotel. There are a lot of local businesses that are very excited about this project and see the importance of this mural. This mural serves as an important reminder that there is so much more that we have in common than not and I am excited to be a part of it.
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Mariko Lochridge is a bilingual consultant passionate about trains, dinosaurs, and small business. She loves to explore new murals in Downtown Los Angeles and is looking forward to the art that will be created for the Windows of Little Bronze Tokyo, a project by Sustainable Little Tokyo.