“I didn’t take my graffiti painting into art school. I separated the two and just did graffiti in the holidays. I never use my street tag in my canvases, but I think describing me as a sellout for working on canvas is a weak argument. They’re completely different things. It’s frustrating that people try to pigeonhole me as a street artist or graffiti writer. It’s all very tenuous.” — from BBC interview
The Codex Serpahinianus has a reputation as a mysterious, impenetrable book. Having gotten ahold of an excellent scanned copy, I have to say that reputation was unfounded. The Codex is an early study of the fractal dimensions of apparently “flat” surfaces, such as paper, and the shapes generated by ink along that landscape. As you will see in the first two scans, all of the intricate species, landscape and cultures within the pages of the Codex are the result of iterative changes in a chaotic environment—just like you and me.
The extraordinary “Codex Seraphinianus” is a book of 400 pages in the form of an encyclopedia—graphical letters, signs, animals and plants, anatomy and chemistry, creating a book to view and to admire. Its writing, completely invented, could never be deciphered even with the most technologically advanced machine, but it can be intuited, loaded with emotional meaning that washes over the eyes.
“Like many of us, as a child I had many insecurities. Adopting an identity was not only tough but often temporary. Growing up, we experience many trends in fashion, music and acquaintances. One thing that has remained constant since I was a child is the ability to create. Marcel Duchamp called this the creative act.”
I was born in a little Rajasthani town called Kota, in India. My dad’s military postings kept us constantly on the move. It made me love and hate traveling. My dad is an artist and a soldier. He documents his life with sketches and pictures, something that inspired me in many ways. I have studied in many schools all over India, but Kolkata is where I have lived the longest. I studied commerce at Calcutta University, and began hating it… I am a self-taught graphic designer and wish to pursue a life in graphics and photography. I am and will be a student forever.
GOMAR2 is the leopard skin on your mom’s steering wheel. The new shoe outside the box. GOMAR2’s heart shaped brain has been nurtured for decades inside of young Michael James. With Dolemite as a father figure and bowling lane bumpers for guidance, GOMAR2 has grown to the man he now is through mere dedication mixed with desperation. We sit down to rap with our new friend and take you out to the train yard.
He’s “tagged” the wall segregating Israel and Palestine with nine murals. He’s painted a live elephant pink and gold for a Barely Legal exhibit in L.A. and auctioned three of his pieces to Angelina Jolie for a sum total surpassing ₤200,000. Eyewalls exhibits some photography of Banksy’s work and delves into the mental framework of the unidentified artist behind the stencils.
Chase is a piece of work. Only, it’s hard to say exactly what piece that is. He moved to L.A. from Belgium in 1995 and has made a huge mark in the world of street art, graphic design, fashion, music and very soon — film. What impresses us even more than Chase’s immense success is his message of compassion toward his fellow human. Eyewalls looks at Chase’s history, philosophy and raps with the artist himself.
