I started doing graffiti in 1984 at the age of 14. After seeing the
documentaries Style Wars and Forbidden Rebels, which a friend of mine brought home with him from
coming back from a vacation to the United States. I've always been into
drawing and I was inspired and needless to say, I was influenced by the
graffiti shown in the movie because there was no graffiti at all in this
small city where I lived. At the beginning I was mostly sketching and
trying out letters, however quite quickly I started to develop my own
style. After playing around with names and letters, in 1985 I decided to
write Sal (I often use Sal-One on the internet because without the - people
pronounce it like the Italian name Salone, which isn't correct). Nevertheless,
the size of the city limited my ability to do serious graffiti and to develop myself more artistically.
Graffiti already was a big movement in Amsterdam for years (writers like
Rammelzee, Quik, Dondi, Seen, Blade, Zephyr, Futura2000, Lee were already
very frequent visitors with their expositions) and after Style Wars was
shown on tv on November 1985 the Dutch graffiti scene exploded with many
people who got into the graffiti scene. Style Wars also influenced many
of the Dutch graffiti writers at the beginning. They started to show more
on TV about what was going on in Amsterdam with graffiti. Of course I
couldn’t resist going to Amsterdam to check it out myself. I started going
from spot to spot all over Amsterdam taking photos of pieces, and at the
same time doing graffiti there. I met many writers there and writers like
Gasp (CTK/INC/GVB) and Zeis were some of the first writers I met and
hung out very frequently and with whom I painted a lot with.
I started to get to know more and more writers from Amsterdam and other
cities, and some of them influenced my style which helped me to develop
my own style even more distinctly. Some I got to know better and some
became good friends of mine, like (in a random order), Zeis, Gasp,
Delta (Mess), Shoe, Cat22 (Pone), Zar, Beat53, Sore, Renzl, Sure, Eras,
Enjoy, and so many more who were active at that time. Because I met writers
who were from other cities I also started going to cities all over Holland
to do graffiti and collect photos of pieces.
Doing walls started to bore me at some point, so I changed my playground
to the train, tram and subway yards and soon after I did nothing else but
bombing those. At one point I knew all major yards of Holland’s biggest
cities like they were my own back pocket. Sadly enough, I almost have no
photos of most of my work on trains and walls because I really didn't
care about taking pictures and I traveled around by train and had to catch
the last train back home, which was quite early. Most of the time by the
next morning the trains were gone, driving in transit, cleaned, and besides
that I didn’t want to spend extra money on a train ticket just to go back
for a photo. I could kill myself for that now. If I knew back then that
in the future, internet would exist and be such an important media for
showing your works, I would have taken pictures and as much as possible. We
didn't have digital cameras and mobile phones back then, so it was alot
different those days. Nowadays it's so easy for people to shoot a photo
or film their works.
Around 1991 I quit painting, it wasn’t fun anymore because they were
hunting down writers as hard and as much as they possibly could. So I
preferred to retire and avoid problems. Another reason was also that I had
absolutely no inspiration anymore and my intrests started to shift towards
other things. I never stopped sketching though and I always did some
tagging and bombing, once you start doing graffiti it’s in your blood and
you are never able to get it out of you. It maybe sounds like a cliche, but
it's true.
My interest in graffiti started to grow again because of an invitation
(thanks Serch) to participate at an oldskool only writers meeting, held in
Amsterdam in April 2004 called Mokum Masters. At that point I was in The
Netherlands visiting my parents because I moved to Peru in 2000. Around
2006 I started to pick up the cans again doing throw-ups and tagging in
Lima/Callao, Peru, on walls, busses and trucks and I started having major
inspiration again with sketching. I started to draw about 12 new styles or
more on paper every day (which I still have to work out in complete
sketches). In March 2007 I did my first 'comeback' with a little piece, well
actually quick piece, in Callao/Lima, Peru, across The International Airport
Jorge Chaves.
In April 2007 I came back to The Netherlands to live here permanently again.
The style I try to maintain is simplicity, letters designed in the best
possible way and as clean as possible, on paper and on the wall. I prefer
to do clean silver pieces because, from my point of view, there is no
margin for errors with silvers and you just have to present them in the
best possible style/way. With silvers you don’t have a zillion colors to
hide ugly letters and poorly painted parts in a piece. Sadly many writers
don't look past the bright colors of burners at the actual style of the
letters.
I do ALL my sketches by hand on paper, without any tools, aids, or a
computer. There are several reasons for this: I need/like the feeling
of a pen/pencil and paper when I am sketching, and it helps me keep
an eye for detail and my hands steady. Working a hand drawn sketch over
in Adobe Photoshop for an order is another subject of course.
My influences are writers like Seen, Dondi, Bando, Delta, Duster, Skeme and more.
Currently I'm working for Sean Marie Designs Inc. & Jodeci.
Crews I proudly represent ( in alphabetic order ):
BNA ( USA, New York City, The Bronx and also Puerto Rico ) - Born Notorious Aerosolist / Bronx National Artsist /Break Neck Artist/Boricuaz New Alliance
BW ( France ) - Be Wild
DA2C ( Lima, Peru ) - Different Art 2 City
KD ( USA, New York City ) - Kings Destroy
MPC ( USA, New York City, Bronx ) - Morris Park Crew
SSB ( USA, New York City, Brooklyn ) - Soul Stoned Brothers
TCK ( USA, Chigago ) - Tuff City Kings /Take Care Kiddies/True Chicago Kingz/The Chicago Kings/Till Chicago's Killed/True Chitown Kid
TSF ( The Netherlands ) - The Split Force
TSM ( The Netherlands ) - The Stonie Mallonies
TKO ( USA, Los Angeles ) - True Kings Only/Trust Know One/Takin Over/Total Kaos/The Krowns Ours/The Knight Owls/Taking Krews Out/The Kinky Ones
XMEN ( USA, New York City, Brooklyn )
TST ( USA, New York City, Brooklyn ) - The Supreme Team
What I use to sketch:
Rotring Rapiograph pens ( 0.13mm, 0.18mm, 0.20mm, 0.25mm, 0.30mm or
0.35mm, depends on the design )
Staedtler Marsmagno 2 ( 0.18mm depends on the design )
Favorite spraycans: Sparvar, Krylon, Rustoleum, Red Devil, Belton, Montana...
and besides all that a steady hand..
peace & respect,
Sal
http://sal-one.com/
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