Not too long ago, it was still possible to sit down for a conversation face to face. Those days are over for now, but our state of individual isolation—I hope you are all staying home and keeping your distance from each other, particularly from the elderly—also offers an opportunity for introspection and entertainment. All We Got Is Us, directed by REBOE LNE, is a bombing film, it’s raw and primal, and part of its power lies in showing what you can accomplish with the help of your friends when you set your mind to it. In this interview, we touch on many issues that are relevant in graffiti today across different generations of writers. Keep these words in mind as you watch the film once it’s available online in early April. (Photos: Ray Mock.)
CARNAGE: What's the state of New York City graffiti right now?
SOUTH: Graffiti is so bad now, I hate it. People are doing it for the wrong reasons, the wrong kind of attention. Graffiti has become passionless. It's sad, because back in the days I would look at graff and be inspired by it, but now it's just a bunch of colorful shit.
ACEM: It ebbs and flows. New York is a microcosm of the universe and that fact alone creates an environment of constant change that is reflected in the state of its graffiti. People moving in, people moving out. Spots come and go quick in coherence with the physical infrastructure of the city. The buff keeps people active and the scene alive. New York graffiti is alive and well in 2020. The scene being different from how it was in the ‘90’s, early 2000’s, or even 3 years ago doesn’t make it “dead”. It makes it different. Change is constant and the only thing in life that is guaranteed. Humans fear change and label it as negative far too often. It is what it is.
REBOE: I feel like no matter what era of graffiti it is, there’s always going to be good graffiti, and bad graffiti. People are going mad hard and doing crazy spots, but a lot of people are also not showing respect to those who paved the way, there's a lot of dumbasses out there that really don’t know what they’re doing. People hide behind color schemes, getting down in popular crews, getting up with someone who’s “popular”, and having can control, but they lack letter structure. Being able to paint the same shitty letters clean doesn't change the fact that the letters are bad, it just means you know how to paint that throw-up. A lot of people have good throw-ups, but have a very shitty/no handstyle. That should be the first thing you learn, tags are the root of it all.
SMOE: There's a lot of good things going on right now, but--not to sound generic--there’s also a lot of people who shouldn’t be painting at all. There’s a big lack of creativity nowadays. Most of what you see now is just the same fillins over and over again. I feel like people aren't pushing new styles as much as in the past. Dudes out here will have a million fillins, and every single one is the exact same. And a lot of heads don’t have nice handstyles either, I gotta keep it a hundred. But there’s definitely groups of people who are keeping it real and pushing the limits.
ZAM: It's hard to find inspiration nowadays, because back then people were coming out with new styles so often. The beauty of graffiti is its potential, like a blank canvas. It's limitless. You can literally do the craziest shit and seeing people settle for garbage and being proud of it is sad. You should grow every single day. For me, if it wasn't for SOUTH I would not have progressed as much as I did, trying to paint clean. I would rock next to him when we first started and I'd be like, all right, my shit doesn't look that good, I gotta clean up my lines, fix my shadows, I gotta really take my time, and that would motivate me to go home and draw. I don't think kids do that nowadays.
SOUTH: People aren't sketching enough for sure. Sketching is vital. Go home, take your time, sketch. Some of the older generation are not schooling the new generation, but a lot of the new generation doesn't want to listen to them when they are kicking game and giving them criticism
ZAM: A lot of good writers are locked up in their houses with their ego and they don't want to help the young generation. They don't realize that we are the people that are going to keep doing this no matter what, so they might as well teach us.
REBOE: Another thing that sucks is Instagram. It gives a false perception about who's really up. It’s also pretty hilarious to see this social game that people play and how hard they try to get down with other peoples crews, shit is mad funny.
SMOE: And when someone sees your work through the internet, they get a false perception of who you are. So they're going to hit you up and think that you're going to be friends and want to hang out because they're giving you respect and it's like, no dude. I'm not gonna go link with some random ass person off the internet.
BAT: I don't trust anybody.
CARNAGE: On the subject of quality, what defines good or proper graffiti for you?
SOUTH: There is no one correct way to write graffiti. There is no one set style. I think it's cool that people have different styles. Self-expression, man. No human in this world is exactly like another person, everyone's unique, so it should reflect in the graff. Don't copy other people, let it come from your heart.
ZAM: It's broken down into so many things. In one spot, you may have to look at the bricks, how the paint's going to eat it, what paint to use, what colors to use, what style to use. One little line can make a difference.
SOUTH: It's all about execution and creativity. Every writer is gonna have their own perception on how they want to hit spots and what's considered good/proper graffiti. Writers are going to see a spot and all have a different approach to how they wanna paint the spot. Some might wanna solid or dusty fill, others might go all out and burn it. What makes it done properly is when it’s done creatively and with grace.I always enjoyed painting spots that forced me to get creative to work with the space. It pulls new ideas out of me.