ODIS
How long I’ve been writing;
I didn’t get really serious about writing until late 2014. I had spent a few years around 03-06 bombing, tagging, and occasionally painting freights with a crew of my friends. Everyone seemed to lose interest at some point and the lack of painting partners really stifled my motivation. I was always drawing and creating in between this time but it wasn’t until 2014 that I got fully obsessed with spraypaint again. I was in a dark spot in my life and a friend of mine suggested I paint something in his basement, one thing led to another and the next day we were painting some abandoned concrete and a potash hopper. I think Frank realized that painting was the only thing I could find joy in, and he pushed me to paint as often as possible, suggesting characters, color ideas and full out production plans. It was cool to hear all these outsider perspectives from a non writer and I tried to balance those ideas with the knowledge I had around the basic principles of freight graffiti. From there we just tried to add more building blocks and constantly evolve. I feel like it’s been on ever since.
Based out of;
I’m based in western Canada, hence all the grain hoppers. I’m in an area that doesn’t have much for boxcar facilities or autorack yards, etc. Grain cars are what we see here, so grain cars are what we paint the most. Wall space is very rare and abandoned buildings and concrete are almost non existent. I like to travel when possible to gain new perspectives on style and life and general, and also as an opportunity to catch a different variety of car types. But at the end of the day I’m always coming back home to my grainers
Writers I like and admire;
First and foremost my crew, DGTL. I think every member brings a unique style, but no one is too proud to compromise when it comes to executing a proper production on a wall or train. Ego seems to be a reoccurring theme in this scene and it feels like a lot of wasted energy to me. I’m inspired by writers who have a life outside of graffiti. Guys with successful marriages, kids, and/or careers they love and still find the time to get out and catch a couple panels a month are the true kings in my opinion. Those are the writers who inspire me, Yikes, Newr, Rove, Jarus, Theory, Sean, Ziloe. The list goes on but I’ll spare you.
My style;
My style is based off what I saw in my region growing up. We used to bench a lot of Midwest US trains and that style always just stuck with me as “classic freight graffiti” a lot of the local writers I admired were naturally on a similar page. I loved the legible simplicity of writers like Virus, sight, much, each2, river, and Maple among others. They had so much style while still being legible from 100 feet away. Catching kwest cars were mind blowing as a teenager. Guys like Rove and Theory and later House would show me the value of really teaming up to paint a production. Matching colors, keeping a theme and even constructing similar letters. The fact that they were from a similar region was super inspiring to me.
That’s basically the game plan I’ve rolled with, keep it simple, keep it legible, understand color, plan a theme for your production, and then just keep trying to move forward every time.
I love picking obscure themes, strange characters, or even the most cliche character if it holds some nostalgic value for me, or if it will make me laugh. I want my stuff to be fun to look at.
Follow the rules, they are there for a reason, respect the surface youre painting and the history it carries and carry yourself with class. You decide the energy you’re going to attract, pay attention to what you put out there.
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