During a Housing Crisis, Graffitied Buildings Expose the Cruelty of Excess

The Oceanwide Plaza complex, a $1.2 billion ultraluxury development in Los Angeles, if built to completion would have included three towers—a hotel with residences, and two 40-story residential towers containing nearly 500 condominiums—located right across the street from the city’s downtown convention center. In 2019, when the Beijing-based developer Oceanwide Holdings Co. axed their involvement, the construction site went dormant, save for a few guests in the spring 2024: as the site’s three towers languished, graffiti artists (“taggers”) took to making it their own. Across all three of the 40-plus-story buildings, they scrawled their tags, some as tall as 12 stories. A year ago, at least 27 stories of an unfinished skyscraper in downtown L.A. were covered in graffiti. But it didn’t stop there: In September, three single-family mansions across the city’s wealthy enclaves were reported to be covered in graffiti—some with similar tags. The first two, both located about five miles apart in the Hollywood Hills, are owned by film producer John Powers Middleton. On Mulholland Drive, neighbors told CBS that the house had been vacant for years and was hosting squatters; NBC reported that the second Middleton home on Sunset Plaza Drive, which was for sale at $21.5...