inprogress magazine 03

GRAFFITIFROM THE STREET WALLS TO THE STUDIO CANVAS

Part one

ROBIN VAN ARSDOLDOLLA LAMASTAZRIOTONE

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Hello, and thank you for opening Inprogress magazine 3rd issue. We are Orlando, FL new underground art scene headquarters. The magazine you are now reading is dedicated to the local artists of Florida (Orlando, Miami, Tampa, Jackson-ville, and all the cities in between). If you are an artist or creative soul and want to reach out to other artists, clients, or get more exposure then come join us because we are behind you like the paint on your canvas, 100% With a varnish seal to finish. We reject no ones art, but will offer words of wisdom when needed.

CHIEF EDITOR/DESIGNER

Chris Rodriguez CO-EDITOR

Peter Van Flores IIIChristina Rios

PHOTOGRAPHSteve Parker

CONTRIBUTORSJade Beast

Socky CHopRedefine

BOLD HYPEThe Culture Mart

MOMMORE INFO CONTACT

Chris [email protected]

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Inprogress magazine is created, edited, and published by Chris Rodriguez in Winter Park, FL. If you have any questions about Inprogress magazine or artists included please contact me at [email protected]. Unauthorized reproduc-tion of any inprogress content is strictly prohibited. All images and content contained in inprogress are intellectual property of the individual contributors to inprogress. All copyrights and moral rights to the work therein are strictly retained by the individual contributors. ©2009

08 | INPROGRESS ARTISTS NatatileRalph VeranoSaineMelody BedisDylon Roscover

12 | FEATURE Robin Van ArsdolDolla lamaStazRioTone

40 | INPROGRESS WORDS Leaving vandalism for starry nights and palm trees.

46 | PAST EVENTS Pintura Project 2009Graffiti Bus Jam

WELCOME TO THE 3rd ISSUE

TABLE OF CO

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INPROGRESS ARTISTS:FOR ARTISTS WHO’S SKILLS AND TALENT ARE STILL IN DEVELOPMENT BUT HAVE A STRONG EYE FOR DESIGN AND ART.

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My paintings are highly influenced by neoclassical artists such as Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres and Jacques Louis David. Their rendering of flesh and fabric has the superb quality I strive to mimic. However,I also want my work to evoke an emotional response from the viewer. Whether it be fragile, suggestive or macabre; the intention is for the viewer to connect with the work in their own way. Reoccurring themes in my work deal with two constants we cannot get around in life: sex and death.

Natalie

[email protected]

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What is your name?DOLLA aka DOLLA LAMA

Where are you from?Newark, New Jersey

What style would you call your graffiti and what inspired it? I have a hard time attaching a label to what I do.Basically I like to paint creepy looking characters & I like to paint ‘em as big as I can. I guess the best description I can come up with would be: original character art created with spray cans. I am inspired by clean lines and style, Cartoons have always been a big inspi-ration as well.

Best personal moment in Graffiti?Painting on the Wall Of Fame in Miami ‘08.

How do you feel about illegal bombing vs legal piecing?I prefer to do legal walls when I can, I’m most proud of the legal pcs I’ve done. I like to take my time and not have to look over my shoulder when I’m paint-ing. I’m not as concerned about getting my name up as I am about creating a work of art. I’m getting older and have a family now. I’ve been arrested in the past and it fucks up your world for a while each time it happens. I have to spend my time wisely, community ser-vice is for the birds. I keep the illegal activity down to a minimum. On the flip side, you can’t really have all that nice, clean, crispy graffiti with-out the illegal bombing. Most people start out doing illegal pcs. Tagging and throwups are the heart of it all. It’s the

starting point. Writing your name fast over and over again is key in develop-ing your hand style. Confidence in your line is what separates the men from the boys. I also think a writer earns more re-spect from their peers if they have put in work on the street and built a name for themselves first. Now, I can’t knock a new jack for starting out doing legal pcs in a graff yard. I wish I had that op-portunity when I was coming up. But calling yourself a graffiti artist is a bit premature. I’m not even comfortable calling myself a graffiti artist. There are hardcore dudes out there that have dedicated their lives to graffiti, they eat, sleep, and breathe it. I love graff, but I spend a lot more time in the stu-dio than I do on the street. Graffiti art-ist isn’t a term that should be thrown around lightly.

Favorite paint?Montana & Belton

Ever been caught doing illegal graff? how?I’ve never been caught painting, but I got caught poster bombing in Miami in ‘07. I was putting up a large 3 piece poster. I basically set up shop with a ladder and 5 gallon bucket. I was out of my element and took a chance on a busy road. long story short, I just got caught slippin’.

What made you get into Graffiti?I got into listening to rap music and I tried to embrace hip hop culture at pret-ty young age. I started catching tags & break dancing in the 7th grade. I was doing throw ups by my freshman year in hs and painted until I left art school in 93. After art school I put graff behind

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www.badideadesigns.com

Ralph VeranoI was born in a small town in New York state and I have been living in Florida for about 20 years. Most of my work starts out as free form drawings with no pre-conceived idea. I’m sure there are a multitude of things that have made an impression on me that work their way into my images in one way or another. Since I try to let the drawing dictate the direction of a piece, I’m not really aware of those influences at the time. I do, however, see great art all the time that inspires me to explore new directions.

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[email protected]

My art is a freestyle through my fingers - I don’t put too much thought into it, just place the pen/marker down and let whatever I’m feeling flow out. My inspiration is the beauty of disaster. Life takes us down a rocky path but there always lies something beautiful amongst the chaos just waiting to be seen. From canvas to skate decks and even glass, I can be found tagging up pretty much anything I can get my hands on.

Melody BeDis

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gorosco.com

This is a typeface-driven design based on the “Here’s to the crazy ones” ad campaign from Apple in the 90s, using Motter Tektura, Apple Garamond, Myriad, Univers, Gill Sans, and Volkswagen AG Rounded, fonts present in Apple branding and products.

I used Adobe Illustrator and the Pen tool to trace his facial contours the way I figured they would make sense, one by one using the Type on a Path tool for each path.

In total it look about 24 hours complete during three days with no sleep.

Dylan Roscover

GRAFFITIFROM THE STREET WALLS TO THE STUDIO CANVAS

}{:Graffiti started all over the world basically back when

the cave men from them writings on the wall to the Egyptian time called hieroglyphics then in the urban times we just took from that and made it our sort of version we hate then more people took from that shaping it in different ways and different colors from names to art. - WIKIPEDIA

Part one

We talked to some of Orlando’s best graffiti artists, but not all them in time. We ask them 5-6 similar questions to find out who they are and what graffiti is to them and how they got involved with the moments that change there life.

FEATURE ARTISTS

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| DOLLA LAMA

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DOLLAWhat is your name?DOLLA aka DOLLA LAMA


How did you come up with your name?

My friend Sean gave me the name Dollar Bill around 10 years ago. We would gamble at his house some-times. I guess I was pretty lucky when it came to those dollar bets. When I got back into street art and graffiti I just started writing Dolla. It was a name that only my close friends knew me by. I didn’t put much thought into it, I just ran full speed with it. I think If I was more into letters than characters I would have went with something dif-ferent because I don’t like the letters in DOLLA, I don’t like the double L.

How do you feel about illegal bombing vs legal piecing?

I prefer to do legal walls when I can, I’m most proud of the legal pcs I’ve done. I like to take my time and not have to look over my shoulder when I’m painting. I’m not as concerned about getting my name up as I am about creating a work of art. I’m get-ting older and have a family now. I’ve been arrested in the past and it fucks up your world for a while each time it happens. I have to spend my time wisely, community service is for the birds. I keep the illegal activity down to a minimum. On the flip side, you can’t really have all that nice, clean, crispy graffiti with-out the illegal bombing. Most people start out doing illegal pcs. Tagging and throwups are the heart of it all. It’s the starting point. Writing your name fast over and over again is key in de-veloping your hand style. Confidence in your line is what separates the men from the boys. I also think a writer earns more re-spect from their peers if they have put in work on the street and built a

name for themselves first. Now, I can’t knock a new jack for starting out doing legal pcs in a graff yard. I wish I had that opportunity when I was coming up. But calling yourself a graffiti artist is a bit premature. I’m not even com-fortable calling myself a graffiti artist. There are hard core dudes out there that have dedicated their lives to graf-fiti, they eat, sleep, and breathe it. I love graff, but I spend a lot more time in the studio than I do on the street. Graffiti artist isn’t a term that should be thrown around lightly.

Ever been caught doing illegal graff? How?

I’ve never been caught painting, but I got caught poster bombing in Miami in ‘07. I was putting up a large 3 piece poster. I basically set up shop with a ladder and 5 gallon bucket. I was out of my element and took a chance on a busy road. Long story short, I just got caught slipping’.

What made you get into Graffiti?I got into listening to rap music and I tried to embrace hip hop culture at pretty young age. I started catching tags & break dancing in the 7th grade. I was doing throw ups by my fresh-man year in HS and painted until I left art school in 93. After art school I put graff behind me for a long time. I got caught up with drinking and getting fucked up. Then I was doing more of the studio fine art thing for a while. Af-ter time I got into poster bombing and I met my friend M-Six who is really the one who encouraged me to start painting graff again.

Best personal Moment?Painting on the Wall Of Fame in Miami ‘08.

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| ROBIN VAN ARSDOLA man who has done it all, seen it all, and gave it all for the love of art and his community. Get ready to meet “RV” as the man who runs the park rules in Orlando.

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With the gangs in the 70’s & 80’s versus todays stricter graf-fiti laws and surveillance, which era do you think was more dif-ficult to get up?

During the 70’s and 80’s you had to be the sneakiest you could possi-bly could be because everyone was looking for you all the time. In fact I used to drive around, identify all the police, Follow the police and as they would go around the corner I would pull over and do my pieces. OK so it wasn’t like they weren’t all over us. The one thing that they did not have that they have now is they got more cameras. OK so it is easier for them to identify you today if you were in their surveillance area but at the same time there is a lot more legal places to get up then there ever was before. So even through surveillance is hard and it is hard to go to every public place that you want to go there is more legal stuff and its easier to get up when it is legal. So its a dual-ity. And if you ask me which of the two where the toughest in the old days it was between eleven and seven in the morning to get up. I think it’s easier to paint today.


I been caught twice, the first time I was caught I was under the Brooklyn bridge doing a mural for a German film crew from Hamburg I was doing a special for the 200th birthday of the statue of liberty. It was 86’ and I was down painting there was about 30 people doing performances and there was all kinds of stuff going on and all at once cops showed up. I was already packed up and had a chance to drive away but there was a lot of people there that I knew so what I did I stayed. The police started to harass everybody threaten to take everybody in and I stood right up and said “its all mine, nobody helped me, take me”. A weird scenario, one minute I could have gotten away and the next min-

ute I was standing up acknowledging the fact that is was mine so that ev-eryone that was there would have no repercussions. I was arrested there and one other time I was arrest in Costa Rica, I was doing a piece all at once on 1st Ave over by the museum when all the traffic stopped the cops came and took me away to the police station for a little while and then they let me go. Those are my two experi-ences being arrested

What do you call your style of graffiti, and what inspired it?

Even through I can write, nothing I do is about writing, I do use a lot of words and language. All my graf-fiti was inspired by protest since I painted air planes, gun boats nuclear landscapes and I write about “what will you do when war comes”.

What is the meaning behind you work?

Mine is more about politics mine I call urban compared to being called a graffiti writer. Mines come from a dif-ferent place. I come from studios and installation. If you go back and look at history in the 70’s there where two types of people doing urban art. One were the artist coming from the studio and going outside and doing installa-tions and the others were graffiti art-ist that were writers, there was a lot of written language. I use spray paint but I think I beat up everybody with a roller, I could paint more then ev-erybody because I used a roller and I wasn’t afraid to do backgrounds, but I was always talking about my main se-ries “about what would you do when war comes”. I drive a tank, die in my car, die now, die today, die forever. I used a lot of prophecy and the words from the bible in reference in Jesus Christ and the end of time.

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What made you get into graf-fiti?

The concept Henry Davis Monroe and the social disobedience meaning even thought you don’t want to brake the law I don’t want to have to paint on the walls but at the same time if I got a message and I am protesting something that I think is completely wrong then am I ok. Do I have the write to do what I am doing even thought everyone else is going to say that I am braking the law If after two three years I know we slowed down proliteration we spent less money making bombs and we watched what we were doing before the Reagan era.

What is the true meaning behind your imagery?

All of my images are metaphors that means there symbols for male char-acteristics there about male situa-tions how males are also a relation-ship between how we are as a child and then how we are as an adult. For example the screaming man is about when he is a man screaming fears, frustration and paranoias either your going to be afraid your paranoid about something or your frustrated the screaming man is kind of my voice on how I react to certain situ-ations especially with relationships with women also my relationships I perceive with my god.

My airplanes are about the model airplanes we made as kids they kind of come invincible so bad jet is kind of like the character that you spray paint the walls with he is invincible so no matter what you cant stop him. He is going to do exactly what he is going to do, fly upside down and over around you and in the end he cant be defeated. Because he’s YOU..

Best personal Moment?I was in Rome after having done two weeks of a tour where I had gone to 5 or 7 different places and on one day I was up on the front page of street cart newspapers in Italy so when I got back to Rome I had a group of people waiting for me and my chap-eron was one of the ballet dancers of the ballet and I was there with two writers and at eight o’clock there was a whole group of people that came in to see us, I gave a lecture and one of the assistant directors of the museum directors stood up and made a fuss at what I was saying and the general of some army told me to sit down and shut up and right then and there I said “ooo holy cow what the hell is going on in here” If any situation kind of brings you to a point where you say “are you out of place”? That’s the moment when you know.

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Where are you from?Brooklyn, NY

What style would you call your graffiti and what in-spired it?

Simple, wild style...so many styles that I saw growing up as a kid in NY, I noticed I was just always drawn to the wild styles by other writers.

Best personal moment in Graffiti?

That would have to be the first time I played “hookie” from school to go watch the older writers in my neighborhood go bombing at the train yard. I wasn’t even paint-ing that day, I was just looking out for them, but the adrenaline of watching them and the overall experience was enough to get me hooked.


Honestly, I love illegal bombing! But at my age I have too much to risk so I prefer legal piecing be-cause it still allows me to do what I love without fear. This is one of my main reasons for coming up with the annual Pintura Project events...to allow writers from all around the world to come together and paint without fear and be able to see eachothers style live and in person.

Favorite paint?Montana Black

Ever been caught doing ille-gal graff? how?

Close...but No

What made you get into Graf-fiti?

Growing up in my neighborhood in NY there wasn’t one block without graffiti so I had it all around me. It just naturally became a part of my life.


A cousin of mine that used to write “Vision” gave it to me at age 13 or 14. He brought me along when he and his boys went bombing one night. I was watching them paint and he just came up with the name and I’ve used it ever since.

How do you feel about the different methods of graf-fiti (Traditional Graff, Wheat Paste, Stencil)?

In my opinion there is only one method of graffiti which is tradition-al graff, but I can appreciate other artist that use other tools such as stencil or wheat paste and incorpo-rate graffiti into their art. I just say to each his own.

What has been your favor-ite piece to date, where and why?

None are my favorite-I am my own worst critic. In each piece I do I always find a way that I can perfect it on the next one.

| RIOTONE

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What is your name?riotone I rep kd and tnb crew from NYC.

Where are you from?I’m originally from queens New York, Richmond hill that is (liberty Ave )

What style would you call yourGraffiti and what inspired it?

I consider my style to be old school new York style with some new school flare. My style is a combo- of artist from my hood combined into one,you can say its really underground cause a lot of my idols from my time people never heard of them in Florida like dole cac , rab cac,python pic,suster tnv,my brother who got me into the graff game cader tdk and baby 168 tvs squad

Best personal moment in Graffiti?

For me was kinging the insides of the (a)-train in 1986 with my boy demerock,AZ and mega of ksw crew, it felt good to see my name in every car the (a) train had, it took us three long months of bombing day and night


Legal vs bombing , well every writer starts by bombing, I did and many others have ,its like a right of pas-sage, in my days you could do it and not worry about it much,but today its a legal issue that comes with it and cats is doing time for it. I would hate to see it end but the system is very hard to beat, but I say keep it going

Favorite paint?My favorite paint has to be beltons but I paint with anything I can find skinny caps for, right now I been rocking with montanas,monster paint,clash,rusto and montana black


I never been caught doing illegal walls or trains but been real close to it, the rush is like no other feeling in the world, that’s why illegal bombing is so hot.

What made you get into Graffiti?

My older brother got me into graf-fiti, he use to take tags on the way to taking me to school,so I wanted to be just like him but better. I lived one block away from the train station so I would take a walk and look at all the graff on the outsides and get ideas on how to get better then my brother, I had great teachers like iz the wiz, min rtw,quik,sach, doc tc5 and many others


My boy demerock up north gave me the cause we use to bug out many nights in the park drinking beer and breaking on mothers and I use to crack him up , so he use to call me quiet riot like the rock group. I drop the quiet and became the riotone

How do you feel about the dif-ferent methods of graffiti (Tra-ditional Graff, Wheat Paste, Stencil)?

To me any style of graffiti is art, and the day we start saying that graff should only be like this and like this ,its time to retire cause graffiti is about freedom of expression

What has been your favorite piece to date, where and why?

I have so many favorite pieces in my time cause I put 120% into my work , but if I had to say my best piece then it was done in new York (queens bridge) with cope2-demer-muse-fime and soco. We did this spider wall and my 3-D came out fat. I still get props on that wall till this day.....

EXTRA

STARRY

NIGHTS

ANDPALM

TREES

LEAVING

VANDALISM FOR

WRITTEN BY: JADE BEAST PHOTOS BY: STEVE PARKER

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EXTRA

“Don’t hate me cuz I’m beautiful AND clean” is what the city of Orlando would

affirm with a sweet, slight- southern slur if it could talk-back to the haters. “Don’t playa hate, appreciate” is what it would have squawked at the pessimism oozing out of some friends and foes’ lips when they forgot to tell me “go for it babe, good luck honey because you will only live once” after I shyly confessed that I was moving on down to O-town with my starving artist beau. “But you are sooo NEW YORK, how could you leave?” is what shot out of some of their mouths. Well, yeah I am sooo New York, like a sweet saucy, oil induced, hot cheesy dripping mouthful of a perfect not too crunchy and not too doughy-soft slice of Ray’s Pizza, but it doesn’t mean I shouldn’t open my heart up for a hard reality slapping change.

For twenty-one colorful years money making Manhattan hand crafted me ac-cording to survive in its core, my heart is officially tatted NYC’s. I’ve got Legs to walk concrete miles, eyes a million places at once, arms like Super Woman because it takes real strength to one day be able to carry a stroller with a crying baby up and down a flight of jagged stairs at a train station. I’ve learned to always tune my

ears in to the stories because

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there is always a life lesson or a lie to scribble into a mental note. I was built to be an urban New Yorker, and urban New Yorkers have the tendency to be a tad bit attention crazy. Which is where my soft spot for a little underground art movement by the name of graffiti comes from. The skillful form of vandalism is an ap-proximately forty year evolving shout to the world saying “hey look at me, I exist too” and anybody who loves me knows I am all about existing boldly.

America in the late 60’s and early 70’s, cities where slums were ignored by the government and mistreated destitute minori-ties cried out for an innovative outlet to be heard. Furthermore, when one possesses a creative way to shine bright out of a large drab group of humans, this is called swagger, and swagger my friends is extremely coveted and sometimes contagious. Fellows by the names CORNBREAD, COOL EARL and TOPCAT hailing from Philly, had mad swagger. They were the first known inner-city graff writers to go out and about and write their names in spots they had been for various reasons. Un-derground New Yorkers like Taki183, learned of this outlet adopted it, ran with it and even-tually “spawned pen-pals”. Over a course of four decades graffiti has spread drastically. It also has grown to be more and more illegal and dangerous, but still Illegal graffiti here in Orlando just doesn’t speak volumes like it does back home. Riding a very crowded train feeling like you melted into the background of life and seeing a certain somebody’s four lettered

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Illegal graffti here in Orlando just doesn’t speak volumes like it does back home.”

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name etched onto the window can hit home. Sometimes you see a name repeatedly and you feel con-nected to this person, like they have been on a similar journey as you have. That spark of mystery, that rebelliousness, it feels like a subtle protest where the voices of the people in your neighborhood can be heard. Conservative non-believers may not want to see that graffiti writers are like cocky, ballsy ‘hood representatives. They use their name to not only rep themselves but also places like Parkchester Bronx, Bushwick Brooklyn and less glamorous places in Manhattan like

Washington Heights and Alphabet city on the Lower East Side, that usually don’t get much love through the media. There’s a certain level of pride that you feel seeing a writer from your ‘hood on a wall when visiting a friend in a whole ‘nother borough.

As at home as I am beginning to feel in Orlando there are just a few things that haven’t survived the transition, like my secret love of vandalism, in the grand scheme of things here it feels a bit out of place. I almost see it as instead of roaches and rats sneaking into homes in NYC

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or running the streets, you peep armadillos, baby turtles, frogs, like “What? Where’d you come from?” I can finally admit I have opened my heart and stubborn mind for a lot of changes in this past year like ordering food at the drive thru on a weekly basis, practically living in a car, never walking to corner stores, the absence of snow in the winter and I have even somehow let go of the idea that graffiti is something I needed to see in my daily life in order to feel at ease. I have matured and grown, New York will always be home, word to big Bertha, no one can take that away from me, but

Orlando is dope. One of the things I love is the humble underground art scene, there are even dope graffiti artists who use canvas to express their love for hip-hop and gritty-pretty-city life. So, for those people who didn’t wish me luck when I made the big move and told me I would “hate Orlando” and that I had way too much “New York swagger” to fit in, well the city of Orlando wants me to tell you “I am sorry but you were wrong” and wants to give you a cherry red Mickey Mouse lollipop to suck on.

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PINTURA PROJECTGRAFFITI CONFERENCE

2009ORGANIZED BY STAZ AND ES

PINTURA PROJECT09’

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GRAFFITIBUS JAMPRESENTED BYTAKEDOWN MAGAZINE

2009

BUS JAM 09’

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BUS JAM 09’

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