Backstage SoCal Interview!

Herb Alpert is a fearless creator.

During times in which the arts have been stunted by a worldwide pandemic, the renowned Grammy Award-winning artist and philanthropist has continued to sculpt, paint and record original music and share it with the world.

When his organic conscious daughter was moving into her new home, Alpert created a housewarming painting made with real organic coffee. This inspired a series of paintings by Alpert that feature beautiful swirls of coffee swept across the canvas — now on display at Heather James Fine Art as an exclusive online exhibition through June 30.

In addition, Alpert and his wife, singer Lani Hall, have continued to give back to the arts and to those in need through the Herb Alpert Foundation. The couple have spent the Covid-19 lockdown relaxing, cooking, and recording music together in their Malibu home.

What is the process of creating your unique coffee paintings?

HA: Well, it’s like everything else. It’s like making music, sculpting, or painting with acrylics. I don’t know exactly what I’m going to be doing until I do it. And then it kind of starts giving me answers as I’m going along, then it kind of paints itself.

And your daughter inspired these creations?

HA: Well, she didn’t know it at the time, but yeah, she was moving into a new facility and she’s an organic person and I thought I’d do something that would be kind of off the wall and different. I first started painting with organic coffee and I realized I was having fun doing it. And I came up with a nice conclusion for the first painting. Then little by little, I started just doing other paintings and finally got off of the organic coffee, ‘cause there’s no difference in the way the regular coffee seeps into a canvas. So, the coffee paintings are not organic anymore.

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