Visual dynamite

Dris Turner got tagged.

Monday morning he woke up to an ugly piece of vandalism on the retaining wall in front of his home at 518 W. 15th Ave.

As if it’s not bad enough, he’s trying to sell his house.

Exactly one block north, on 518 W. 14th Ave., Tim Piper was working with graffiti on the wall and fence in front of another beautiful home on the South Hill.

Only he wasn’t removing graffiti. He was spraying it on. And he’s being paid to do it.

Jakob Camp and his girlfriend hired Piper, a garden designer from Grants Pass, Ore., to create the harmonic, feng shui Koi garden oasis in their backyard.

He also painted a dragon on the back fence, a tribute to a close friend of Camp’s. Camp got the idea to paint a mural on the fence and wall facing the street.

“I wanted a good speed bump,” said Camp, who is a doctor at Sacred Heart Medical Center. “I meant it in more of a cosmic way than a literal way, but people are stopping.”

Passersby can’t help but stop and ask, “What’s the deal?”

The 30-foot long, 6-foot-high fence depicts images that subtly tell the history of graffiti amid seemingly random visuals that bend into a portrait of the landscape hidden behind the wall. There is a drawing of a caveman’s carving, hieroglyphics, The Eye of Ra, Michelangelo’s “The Creation of Adam,” and The Mad Hatter next to a stack of turtle shells. A picture of a tree bleeds into the actual tree behind the fence.

In addition to gardening, Piper paints murals and portraits, but graffiti isn’t his primary arm of expression. It’s just something he happens to do really well.

Piper grew up in the ghetto near Compton, Calif. His natural talent, he says, is what kept him safe from gangs.

“They would leave me alone and let me paint. I didn’t have to bang – I didn’t have to fight or be a bug,” said the 40-year-old retired firefighter.

“I had a full ride to Pasadena Art Center, but I couldn’t go. My dad said ‘art is for faggots’ and he tore my stuff up. He was in construction. I had to learn to build houses and I’m glad I did. I learned to have a work ethic.”

Piper loves graffiti art, but he hates tagging. He makes a clear distinction between the two.

Tagging is not art; graffiti doesn’t always equate vandalism.

Piper hopes the mural in the South Hill neighborhood can be of some inspiration.

“Impress me!,” he says, oozing with passion and challenging the young guns who paint to do more than scribble their names on someone else’s property.

There are a lot of misunderstood geniuses out there making graffiti art, just as there are a lot of geniuses who misunderstand how to make the best of their talent.

“This is nonsense,” Turner said as he was scrubbing the eyesore off of his retaining wall. “If you’re going to go through all that trouble, at least make something.”

Follow Piper’s lead and you might even be able to make a living.