Interview with: CES

Bizarre Beyond Belief: You started painting graffiti in the early 80s, what was your first interaction with the culture and what fascinated you the most about it?

Ces: My first interaction was from a childhood friend who wrote. He’d show me his artwork and he’d always have these crazy markers in his jacket pocket.  Through him I met other writers and I kept broadening from there.

BBB: How would you describe the graffiti landscape in your hometown at that time?

CES: The landscape was nothing like it is now, it was very underground. Graffiti wasn’t public, it was done up on rooftops and behind buildings. And there weren’t any graffiti stores or magazines in 1983.

BBB: This was far before the internet came to prominence, how would you say graffiti was affected by the web?

CES: Graffiti was affected by the web because it gave people a greater access to see what they normally wouldn’t otherwise.  You can see a piece that someone from Australia did just an hour ago, the streams of information are endless.  

BBB: Many people now use the Internet to get their aesthetic, how would you describe the development of styles when you first began?

CES: When I first began, it was mostly through actually seeing the piece or the burner in person and through black books.  That’s all there was.

BBB: New York is known as the Mecca of graffiti, do you feel that it still holds that esteem today?

CES: On some levels, yes, and of course more partial because I’m from here, but I can appreciate what other countries and cities bring. The whole culture has grown, it doesn’t necessarily mean just NYC.  But majority of writers from all over the world would still make the pilgrimage to New York to paint – there’s just so much history. 

BBB: Graffiti is also to be said one of the elements of hip-hop, do you feel this is true or it was just attributed to it as it came up at the same time?

CES: I kind of did come up with it on that level, but I was more into rock.  A lot of kids I hung around with listened to hip -hop though, they were always fresh.  Graffiti and hip-hop definitely went hand in hand but you didn’t necessarily need to listen to hip- hop to write. 

BBB: Graffiti artists now are displaying work in galleries more than ever, do you feel street cred is affected when showing in galleries?

CES: Street cred was and still is important. But when you’ve been doing this for the past thirty years or more, these guys who are known to have tons of documented works, if they aren’t STILL street bombing, we already know who they are.  

BBB: You are also a co-owner of Tuff City Styles, what is the concept behind this company and how did it start?

CES: Tuff City is owned by my brother MED, who introduced me to tattooing almost 20 years ago.  Along with MED, YES2 and Rob SOD; we were graffiti writers who started tattooing and it just grew from our love of graffiti to where we are today.  

BBB: You also work in tattooing, how does your approach to skin differ from your approach to a burner or going out bombing?

CES: Tattooing is my livelihood, but graffiti is my life.
 

BBB: What are three things outside of graffiti that you absolutely can’t like without?

CES: Good food, good music, good sex.

BBB: With many decades of success in the craft behind you, where do you see yourself at the end of the decade?

CES: I’m just happy to be alive today ( I didn’t even think I’d make it this far).