We had the good fortune of connecting with Julie Lipa and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Julie, do you have any habits that you feel contribute to your effectiveness?
I have a lot of habits, some good! When I have my sights on something I can get pretty focused and methodical. I enjoy researching and I’m curious to learn how others have done the very thing I’m trying to accomplish. I’m a little socially awkward and more comfortable with the focus on the other person so I tend to ask a lot of questions. It works out well because who doesn’t enjoy being asked questions? I certainly learn way more by listening than talking. And maybe it goes without saying that being genuinely interested in others goes a long way?

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
Well, my former career was starting an entertainment marketing agency in 1997. I’d done what I called “apprenticing” at two other agencies over the course of four years. I’d learned the industry, fostered many relationships and decided if I was going to have any professional trajectory I needed to open my own shop. After 21 years of growing an agency, getting through a recession and the inevitable changes in technology, I was beyond burnt out. In late 2018 I had a short window of opportunity to retire, and I took it. The decompression took several months and many of those were spent doing, of all things, dozens and dozens of jigsaw puzzles.

Just before the pandemic hit, I decided to revisit the art career that I toyed with and abandoned in 1993. But this time around I have the benefit of my agency experience. I’m using the habits I learned to start an agency and applying them to this second career as an artist. Making a career in art is turning out to be much like the entertainment marketing world (politics, branding, relationships) but way, way more fun.
The work I’m creating now is based on the framework I started developing when making art in the early 1990s. I call it mid-century modern mixed media. My work is largely based in journalism from 1940-1969 and explores provocative topics like smoking, atomic bombs and women’s rights. My formula is combining photo transfer collage, typically made up of journalistic text and adverts, painted backdrops, the repurposed faces of vintage TVs (I shear them off with a saw!) all mounted behind a disproportionately oversized vintage appliance spokesmodel. Sometimes I’ll also use radios or other mid-century artifacts. Unfortunately, though the pieces are artistically reflective of that period, the subject matter is still relevant today.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
A few uniquely Los Angeles experiences for a visitor would be a drink at either the iconic Dresden room or a martini at a classic Hollywood institution like Musso & Franks. Los Angeles has so many cultures here that you can eat BBQ in K-town, spicy food in Thai town or Ethiopian in Little Ethiopia on Fairfax. Maybe I’d include a stop in Venice for the local color although it’s gentrified quite a bit over the last several years. For a culture experience there’s the incredible Getty Center with its architecture, its vast collection and sweeping views of the city. But one thing I wouldn’t let them miss is the booming local art scene. There are so many talented emerging artists on display all around Los Angeles. A few local hot clusters are the semi-annual Brewery Artwork and the Bergamot Station Arts Center. The great thing about galleries is there is no admission charge and you can see a more varied collection of works than in traditional museums. Then I’d get them out of the traffic and into nature with a hike on the gorgeous Backbone Trail to Sandstone Peak and Mishe Mokwa Trail Loop where you’ll find the highest point in the Santa Monica Mountains and a fresh ocean breeze.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
I would be remiss if my shoutout wasn’t to my longtime partner of 35 years Steve Ochs. He was my business partner with my entertainment marketing agency, and he’s been a valuable sounding board, consistently redirected my frenetic artist brain to “stay on brand.”

Website: www.julielipaartist.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/julielipaartist/

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@julielipa/featured

Other: https://linktr.ee/julielipaartist

Image Credits
Photo credit of me with “Miss Atomic Bomb” (Justin Kelly)

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