Time Bomb

History. What is it? I wasn’t there!

Moving to London in the early 80s I contrived to miss graff’s heyday because (a) I cycled everywhere and (b) I couldn’t stand hip hop. Some things never change. Today on my ride home, a chance encounter with a door ajar allowed a glimpse into a hidden time capsule of ancient tags from some home grown legends.




Let's play a game popular on flickr called Guess Where London. Show you know your history, tell us the name of the location where these photos were taken. No prizes.



Sadly, clip clop cycling shoes and an unlocked bike outside meant I couldn't explore further. Booo. Still, we love clandestine photo missions and when they are also impromptu - even better. I think I have seen this particular stairwell on a youtube clip somewhere, or is it in a book, I couldn’t find it – anyone know?

Curly – Sticking It Up ‘em

London has witnessed a surge in statement based illegal art in the past year or so, not just letters or mere words but often whole sentences and even punctuation. Elbow Toe scribbled haikus; Mobstr stencilled witty check lists; Ron English pasted up dis-embodied private secrets in speech bubbles and thought balloons. There has even been a very polite voice on lurid mini stickers urging us to “Please be nice to each other” and “Please say please thank you”. You may be thinking “basic information - graff worships the font, dude” but what we are talking here is a bombing mode that unlike graff eschews repetition, each intervention an original.




Chief protagonist of this prosaic prose vandalism is, let’s not quibble about definitions, sticker artist Curly. In a movement that lionises those most “up”, sticker artist Curly has captured a safari park’s worth of attention in the past year with more than a 1,000 wordy pronouncements stuck on street furniture all over the World. His stickers have the air of insider jokes, very market aware, very art joke infused, very tuned in to sensitive matters impacting a street artists’ credibility yet at times his thoughts betray an air of self-effacing vulnerability.




Getting wind of a planned Summer visit to the UK, Graffoto managed to secure an interview which the sticker prince elected to conduct via his preferred media, the United States Postal Service label. Curly led Graffoto a merry jaunt around London and into one or two tensely balanced and rather risky situations, we hope you find the results worthwhile.

We start with the most important issue – have you ever been busted?


Only by the NYPD


Another answer that nearly got your photographer in the pooh after the artist legged it: Is it ok to do stickers if you can't skate?


Skateboards are for suburban pre-teens


The answer to “Will stickers ever become appreciated as graffiti?” had me wondering if this Curly character was out to get me lynched:


Why would anyone want that? Graff is for pussies. Art-fags have balls


Pressing on with the interview, do you know Banksy?


You mean in the biblical sense? Yes of course. But I make him wear a mask, so I have never seen his face


Should stickers be political?


If that sells


Do you think it is important for stickers to have a message?


Conceptualism is a vastly over-rated concept


Are all your stickers installed illegally?


Technically this is illegal but nobody cares


Will stickers ever become appreciated as art?


Only by those boring enough to care


Should street stickers be protected by perspex?


Perspex is a perfect surface to get up on


Do you think a sticker artist will ever have a solo gallery show?


If you can’t get a solo gallery show, you’re not really an artist


Could any of the candidates in the US presidential nominations benefit from a sticker campaign?


I would love some free pizza from Herman Cain


When did you get into stickering


Last Week


What makes a good location for a sticker?


Wherever a good photo can be taken


The best graff writers get to paint naked girls, would you consider stickering girls?


Only on really big ones


Any technical tips for aspiring sticker artists?


Take amazing photos and post them to flickr


Is There Room For Humour On Stickers?


Only This One (Respekt IZM - no proper graff was really harmed in the making of this interview)


Is there a hop-hop/graffiti style link between stickers and music?


I listen exclusively to Leonard Cohen


Fine point or chisel tip?


What ever is handy


where did you get your name from?


The logo came first then I needed a name. It was between “Curly” and “really poorly done cursive f”. The logo came about because even a talentless toy could write it.


(yeah – Graffoto had to google cursive too, means “joined up” ). Any views on the absence of stickers from Museums?


What absence? I’m in Art In The Streets in LA


Will museums not truly represent the commoners art until they have a Curly in their collection?


Museums will not truly represent the elite until they have a Curly in their collection


Are you a disciple of Jenny Holzer's Truism-ism?


I’m a post-truist but I’ll always tell the truth


How can we convince Graffoto’s reader that you are the original Curly and not just some kind of wannabe copiest?


My style is unique and impossible to imitate


We conclude this interview with a quaint relic of innocence illustrating Curly’s failure to grasp the dog-fuck-dog nature of the street art “market”, at his request we include this sticker grovelling to someone he’s never met:


He’s not a sticker guy, but this interview concept has been blatantly stolen from Lush, so he probably deserves a shout out


Hunting for suitable spots for “Curlies” resulted in the discovery of ancient and weathered Curlies south of the river and way out West which Curly himself had forgotten. Cap doffed at that level of getting up. Cynics and moaners constantly gripe about street artists prostituting themselves putting up lame commercial shit in the usual art bordello locations. In the process of giving this novel interview, Curly vandalised property on Fed stations, post boxes, tube panels (window down!), HOFs, museums and art galleries. What was most impressive was that Curly went all-city EXCEPT Shoreditch – avoiding the most boringly obvious location for a publicity seeking street art whore to get up, way to go!


Curly In Action, possibly.

Gocco Printing - Malarky at High Roller Society

all photos: NoLionsInEngland



Last Summer High Roller Society did a fascinating and informative trio of workshop demos on print making. Graffoto loved them and scribbled a few words about them here and here.

Current show at the gallery is “Summer Breeze” featuring the flat fantasmagorical pop creatures of Malarky and Billy and Malarky gave a demo of Gocco print making, used to produce editioned prints such as this one from the showhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif




What is a Gocco print? A print made by Gocco printer I suppose, which is one of these kitsch looking gismos from Japan which uses a clam-shell device to force inks through a silk screen. Style-wise everything about a Gocco printer screams retro toy but don’t be fooled, this is both a screen burner and print maker which can produce multi layer prints limited only by your patience. Apparently the Japanese intended it to be used for producing high quality party invitations and wedding invites.




The intrepid demonstrator Malarky took a group of a dozen or so somewhat bashful watchers through the various stages including burning the screen, inking up the screen, fudging the alignment of the paper and then pressing the Gocco to create the print.


Printing off first layer


This light box sits on top of the Gocco and burns the screen from a photocopy of the artwork, the bulbs have a one shot life and they aren’t cheap!


Light source



Burning a screen


Each screen is then subdivided using sticky strips into zones for each colour, no holes in the dyke allowed or colours will bleed into each other


Inked up Gocco silk screen


An un-expected lesson was that when printers, pundits and gallerists apply expressions like “uniqueness”, “charm” and “individuality” to screen printed editions, they mean bits where the ink didn’t come out.


Layer one

The registration process for the second screen was real hit and miss skill and judgement, seems you do a test print, then trim off an edge to correct mis-alignment, push it around abit, try again, eventually you reach a predicament a bit like someone in a barber’s chair staring wistfully at a pile of clippings on the floor and a crew cut mess on the head. If you ever wondered where artist’s proofs came from, there’s your answer.


Artist Proofs!

The gallerist’s husband (congratulations!) kept the information flowing with suitable questions and un-suitable banter. Malarky produced a two layer 3 colour print in the two hours of the workshop, we all had a go at printing a few sheets. And we all had the chance to come away with a copy of the fruits of Malarky's labours produced before our very eyes.




For an office slave caged in a totally non arty/media environment, these insight into the craftsman’s side of the creative arts are supremely fascinating. High Roller Society deserves huge applause for taking the trouble to host events like this and Malarky is a star for allowing us to watch the artist at work, those working inside the arts world may not appreciate how intriguing and fascinating that is for us civvies. We hope there will be more!

New Ron English/NoLionsInEngland Collab Revealed

all photos: NoLionsInEngland

I have always been repelled by Ron English’s udder-rich pop coloured studio work, few exceptions barely worth mentioning. Moving that studio art out onto the streets doesn’t change my mind – see Camo boy from 2008. Even his inclusion in CANS with what looked like paste ups seemed a bit odd.


Ron English Camo Boy, London, (this was spot jockeying, not a collab!)


The billboard campaign stabs corporate and western imperialism nicely where it hurts, in the blind eye it turns on its own hypocrisy


NABKA60 - 60 Years of Palestinian Occupation
Ron English, SHepherds Bush, London 2008


This week I have collected a large series of sightings of speech bubbles and thought bubbles containing wistful bon mots, semi lucid sound bites and snippits of a private inner monologue best not brought out into the open. A bit of flickr research confirms Vandalog to be the first to attribute these to Ron English and for artists of such stature, RJ’s attribution is a good as law, in fact if it wasn’t Ron English I suggest he knock a few of these out sharpish.




At first glance these captions were puzzling and seemingly un-satisfying. What was their point, and why was their placement so damn careless. Not one of them seemed to relate in any meaningful way to its environment. London’s walls are heaving with graffiti characters, rich singers masquerading as teen sluts on illegal flyers or marketer’s perfect families on advertising hoardings, these captions could surely have been better placed so that they looked like they were coming from those flat characters?




Perhaps you might think the walls as well as having ears also have thoughts, complexes and wise words to share.




We know this artist grafts ruminants' udders onto Disney characters but what are these ruminations about? Then the penny drops. What English has put up is a series of incomplete installations, the pieces only make sense when YOU come along to actually say or think them. That placement - he was wilfully avoiding those characters on the wall. Every single one of these pieces works brilliantly when a member of the public passes by and momentarily the captions belong to them.


(In one block I will be run down by a bus....if I walk in the gutter)

Even more intriguingly, the person who fleetingly becomes part of the installation is probably not aware of the significance of his role. The art exists only for a tantalising moment and really is best appreciated from the third party perspective.




You can only conclude that this art needs you there to complete it and in the case of the various art pieces illustrating this web page, the art existed only when I the photographer was present to observe and record its transient existence. I am honoured to be able to share with you this street work that Ron and I put together.


(clothes and gait - model's own)


I would like to thank Ron English for his vital contribution to our collaboration, I really couldn’t have done it without him. Thank you also to his assistants, drivers, ladder bearers, make-up artists and anyone else who knows him.




If you think this insight is rubbish (congratulations) I believe Ron English makes his intention quite clear with this particular caption for those of a more Liliputian stature.




This Ron English campaign is the conceptual opposite of my single all time favourite street art installation – Jimmy Cauty’s street mirror under Old Street Bridge which makes the observer disappear. Here English requires you to appear. You can’t knock the genius of a guy who can come up level but opposed to Cauty’s finest (street) hour, this is why Ron English actually is deservedly the legend he is.


Jimmy Cauty, London, 2008

That said, in a period where an artist is taking art placed in the bottom 5 inches of London walls to new heights (no – really, boom boom), Ron manages to sully that hem of public space with a small paste up of an excessively pneumatic Mini Mouse. Oh dear.



Additional photos here