Activist continues to bring protests and face paint to CSULB

Dave Wrathall sitting with his supplies and paintings

Long Beach graduate and political activist Dave Wrathall has developed a weekly routine of creating a painting a day from Mondays through Thursdays as a form of protest, along with free face painting. He can be found planted with his art supplies and canvases around the field of the south campus.


Along with painting brightly colored promotion for love and peace, Wrathall also offers free face painting. “Skin is the best canvas,” he joked.

Wrathall began his protests at Long Beach in Oct 5, 2006, when he gathered his friends and held signs in front and across the University Bookstore in opposition of the US military’s abuse against prisoners.  For the rest of the year, every Wednesday, he continued to protest the Bush Administration.

However, by 2008, he decided to take a different approach, one with less negativity. Since then, he has painted “Visionary Abstraction” to promote peace, not war. “It’s not a Republican or Democratic thing,” Wrathall said, “It’s about truth-seeking through art.”