New York, NY –– WHAAM! is pleased to present Coney Island Summer Blast, a solo exhibition of paintings and a diorama by Luis “Inca” Ramos, on view from May 30 through June 28, 2025. This marks Ramos’s first solo presentation with WHAAM!.

Bringing together a vivid body of work that channels the singular spirit of Coney Island, the legendary Brooklyn neighborhood that has long served as a stage for New York’s most democratic spectacle. Known for its grit, joy, and sensory overload, Coney Island emerges in Ramos’s work as a dreamspace—both timeless and alive, pulsing with fireworks, fried food, and the heat of summer crowds.

Building on Ramos’s decades-long exploration of New York’s visual culture, this body of work reflects his lifelong commitment to place, memory, and storytelling. Ramos first gained recognition in the 1970s as part of the city’s pioneering graffiti movement, painting subway trains and public walls under the name “Inca.” He helped shift graffiti from spontaneous tag-based writing into a stylized, narrative form of public art. Today, his studio practice—spanning acrylic painting, sculpture, and diorama—maintains that same deep engagement with the urban landscape, layering meticulous observation with personal history to render the textures of the city in rich detail.

Works on view include a depiction of the Cyclone roller coaster, a bustling boardwalk scene, and a series of acrylic street scenes painted directly onto pizza boxes—materials readily available to all, and gently tethered to the everyday fabric of Coney Island. These unconventional surfaces reflect Ramos’s enduring interest in transforming the overlooked and everyday into sites of meaning. For Ramos, a surface is never neutral—it carries history, texture, and context, becoming an active participant in his acts of memory and visual storytelling.

Together, these works are not just depictions—they’re portals into Ramos’s mythic version of Coney Island, where fantasy and memory collide. Coney Island Summer Blast is a love letter to a place that refuses to be anything but what it is: unruly, sincere, magical, and unforgettable.

About Luis “Inca” Ramos

Luis “Inca” Ramos (b. 1958, Jersey City, New Jersey) is a pioneering figure in New York’s 1970s graffiti movement, known for his early work painting subway trains and public walls under the moniker “Inca.” Alongside a generation of street writers, he helped evolve graffiti from a form of tag-based expression into a stylized, narrative-driven art practice. Ramos’s current studio work spans painting, sculptural relief, and diorama, blending personal memory with rigorous visual research to reconstruct the physical and emotional textures of New York’s past. His pieces serve as both urban document and dreamlike reconstruction, preserving the layered stories embedded in architecture, signage, and street life. Ramos lives and works in Brooklyn.