[2] The principal organizers of the Studio Watts Workshop were jazz musician Jayne Cortez and accountant and arts patron James Woods.
[5] In order to work in the Studio Watts Workshop space, artists had to agree to give public exhibitions of their work at least two times a year in Watts and in an artistic space outside the area and also to provide free instruction to any student with, in the words of James Woods, "the initiative and the desire to participate in the creative arts.
In the early years, UCLA management professor Will Mc Whinney worked with Woods on strategy and leadership issues and LA native Joel Fadem, then a Yale University grad student and later at UCLA, assisted Woods in many foundation fund raising efforts.
Twelve-year-old Richard Wyatt won the top prize at the first Chalk-In and credits the experience for starting him on his career as a prominent Los Angeles muralist.
Even while moonlighting as a doorman at a Hollywood jazz club (Shelly's Manne-Hole), he would go on to organize the second and third festivals (in 1969 and 1970), and artists affiliated with the Studio Watts Workshop were among the participants.