Budman Studios / Space Post Labs
STEAM accelerator at the intersection of art, technology, and community — Venice Beach creative technology studio connecting culture with computation.
Budman Studios is where I learned that the best technology disappears into culture. Jim Budman built something extraordinary in Venice Beach — a creative technology studio that connected graffiti artists with AR developers, gallery curators with machine learning engineers, community health workers with interaction designers. I came in as Technical Director for their STEAM accelerator program.
The work ranged from Snapchat AR filters to Google collaborations to events with Snoop Dogg — but the through-line was always the same: put powerful tools in the hands of creative people and get out of the way. Beyond the Streets brought street art into institutional spaces (LACMA, major galleries). We brought computation into street art spaces. The Venice Family Clinic partnership showed what happens when you point that same creative energy at community health.
Space Post Labs grew out of this ecosystem — a maker space where the Crow Language project, bio-monitoring experiments, and community science initiatives found their home. It proved something I carry into every project since: the garage is still the most powerful institution in technology. Small teams, real problems, no permission needed.