Hypogeous Tractatus 2
I was made aware of all art forms as a child, but noticing subway graffiti on my own for the first time was the discovery that would open up possibilities for my personality to grow along lines of originality. Sure I’d seen it before; it was a core element of the 1970s New York City environment, but that day on the subway platform holding Dad’s hand I understood at once that someone had DONE all that coloring all over our train and he explained that it was kids who broke into the System by night to write their names, and draw their pictures in spray paint. I had to become that- it was written in my soul. Pops told me to practice, and when I got a little bigger, I should follow this calling. No sooner did I get to work practicing than I saw how hopeless it was. My handwriting was the worst in the class, even for kids who didn’t dream of being a writer. My big sister Regina would write her name around the park, and other teenager hangout spots and was the first to tutor me about bubble letters. I made a mess of some perfectly good sheets of sketch paper.
The author as a graffiti student harassing SEEN U.A.
Around Halloween a drawing I made of a ghost got passed around the classroom with some excitement, so maybe my rendering wasn’t such an abject shame, but mastering lettering was uphill all the way. Mom brought me to the public library in Jamaica Queens, and I sat at a research desk with books on calligraphy, because they had nothing about the art of graffiti. I spent an hour copying out Old English letters and then I reviewed, comparing my attempts to the primer, found a perfect place for my work in the waste paper basket. Outside the library an enormous graffiti piece in bold silver letters with black 3D that read Cey City. It was like learning to read hieroglyphics, the written language that was all around us, but meant little to nothing to the uninitiated.
I lived on the white side, and some of the white kids were doing it too, and some to great effect, but it seemed all the black kids were either practitioners, masters, or at least knew about it. My school was divided down the middle but I never got the memo that I was supposed to stick to my own race. Anyway, sticking to my kind meant immersing myself in the graffiti community. And seeing my notebook overflowing with doodles it was one of the black boys who first asked my tag.
It was so obvious though I hadn’t considered it until just then. Graffiti writers weren’t just writing random words, but went by some kind of nickname, and through repetition would gain recognition in this wild city.