LALA Gallery’s Daniel Lahoda landed in the Arts section of the LA Times this month in a feature story about the divided opinions on the street art the “mural mayor” brings to Downtown L.A.

A man whose profession contains many hyphens, Daniel has been instrumental in transforming the industrial Downtown streets into what we know as L.A.’s Arts District. This is largely due to his LA Freewalls Art Project, an initiative that sees Daniel brokering deals between businesses owners and street artists to cover up unwanted graffiti with fresh wall canvases.  Not all are pleased with Lahoda’s mission to bring street art murals to the commercial main street, and the newspaper explores the opposing forces and controversy within “grafitti politics” that Daniel has to navigate to get these works painted, with emotions running high on both sides of the spray can.

The LA Times article also features a LA Freewalls Mural Project Map to showcase some of the 120 new murals that Daniel has commissioned for public streets by the world’s leading street artists, among them Shepard Fairey, French artist JR and SEEN.