Jose "Prime" Reza is a Los Angeles artist born and raised in the Pico-Union neighborhood. Prime is a master painter, who is celebrated and known for his public installations and contemporary canvas work. Prime is credited with being a founding father of Los Angeles stylized graffiti lettering, a hybrid of cholo lettering and East Coast style graffiti that is often bold, aggressive, and monochromatic.Prime has exhibited at the highest level, showing his works of art in the Getty, ESMoA, LA Louver, Pasadena Museum of Art, Warner Brother’s Studios, and Ming Studios.
Prime designed the cover of The Getty Research Institute's L.A. Liber Amicorum (The Getty Graffiti Black Book), a modern-day rare manuscript bound together into a single work of art that includes 143 artists from Los Angeles.The creation of The Getty Graffiti Black Book/L.A. Liber Amicorum led to an exhibition titled "Scratch" at the El Segundo Museum of Art. "Scratch" created a live book of friendship in a gallery environment, with the gallery walls curated by Prime and 6 other artists.
Prime is considered one of the most influential artists in the history of Los Angeles public wall writing, combining geometric gangster-style blocks with traditional east coast graffiti painting techniques. Prime gained international exposure when his work was featured in the seminal book Spraycan Art, one of the earliest documentations of graffiti culture and inspired additional movements around the world.