10 A PPENDIX A I NTERVIEWS

10 A

A I

CHAFF

ME: So Chaff, first off tell me a bit about yourself.

CHAFF: I’m 18. I’m a senior high school student. My parents are highly educated people. My mom’s a professor, and my dad works at NTU. They’re pretty cool people. They’ve got a decent income. My dad doesn’t make that much. He’s a research assistant. Mostly it’s my mom. Other than that, I’m a pretty normal teenager I guess. I play video games. I enjoy photography, and I don’t pay that much attention in class.

ME: The first question is how did you get into graffiti?

CHAFF: It’s a funny story. I remember seeing style wars or some documentary and I remember seeing this guy and he was saying that if you interviewed any writer about how he got into graffiti, he’d probably have a really fucked up story. Mine is kinda weird. When I was in the end of 8^th grade, going on 9^th, my brother and I we got into this video game called BROTHERS IN ARMS. It’s a World War 2 video game. In it there was and achievement. You had to get the KILROY WAS HERE graffiti³⁶. And so when I got to this achievement, I thought “Cool, I can do that.” So I got chalk, and I went all over my middle school and I started drawing it everywhere. And I think I’m not the only one who does this because I have a friend in Kaohsiung, and he tells me that he’s a WW2 fan too, and he tells me that he’s done that before too. You know, just go to classrooms and draw it on the black board.

ME: Have you looked into the history of that graffiti?

CHAFF: Yeah, yeah. The shipyard builder guy.

ME: I saw a Kilroy over near Linsen Rd. and I remember pointing it out to my girlfriend, and telling her the history of it. She wasn’t very interested. Was that you?

CHAFF: Yeah. Probably. That was back in 2014. I went there with another friend of mine and I was still in an experimental phase back then, and I didn’t have a very good hand. I couldn’t do can control very well, so that Kilroy was probably very crude. So I remember doing a lot of Kilroy stuff around the school. And I remember I did a clock, and everything was backwards. 12, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5… it was all reversed. I liked doing it, but after a while the teachers caught wind of it, and I got called to the office.

They were like, “This is bad. This is vandalism. What’s the difference between chalk, and spray paint they do outside on walls?” And I thought, “Hmm… that’s a good idea. I can do it with spray paint.” So I went to a hardware store in Xindian, and I bought just one can of black. I went to this abandoned house near my house, and I experimented with spray paint. I thought, “I like this” and after a couple of weeks I bought more paint. I explored more spots around my neighbourhood, and eventually Gongguan. While I was doing that I realised, “I can’t just do Kilroy was here” because it’s not mine. It’s not original. So I thought I should come up with a name. I didn’t really understand what I was doing was graffiti. I was drawing a character with spray paint. I thought I should come up with a name, so I went through the dictionary. My family name starts with a C, and my initials are P.C., so I came up with Picaro Chaff because I liked it. Picaro³⁷ is an outlaw, and chaff as a noun is useless stuff like the outer casing of wheat.

ME: Picaro, is that from the Japanese anime movie?

CHAFF: No, it’s just from the dictionary.

ME: My gamer tag is Kaizoku, which I found in the dictionary. It’s Japanese for pirate, so it’s equally arbitrary.

CHAFF: So at first I did a few throwies³⁸ near my house, but I decided I didn’t like that, so I got into tags. I like tags. I couldn’t get that flow with Picaro, so I just ditched it and I just stuck with Chaff. At first

36 Killroy was here is a famous graffiti image that US soldiers scrawled all over the Pacific and European theatres.

37 Picaro, from Spanish, means a rogue or vagabond according to Dictionary.com

38 Short for throw up, a kind of middle ground graffiti form that’s more complicated than a tag, but less so than a piece. Usually made up of 2 colours. 1 for the fill (background) and 1 for the outline of the text.

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it was just one line and you could expand on it with letters, but it was toy³⁹. It still seems toy to make a line and just write letters through it. So anyway, that’s how I got started. I went Chaff, Chaff, Chaff, and I went to Gongguan… because my mode of transportation. All I had was a bike. So I was kind of limited to Muzha, that’s where I live, Zhengda, Gongguan, and sometimes Taipei main station.

Just that area of town.

ME: Wherever you can get to on a bike.

CHAFF: Yeah, wherever I can get to on a bike.

ME: I was interviewing an American graffiti writer the other day, and he said he does the same thing. Just goes all over town on his bike. You’ve probably seen his work, FACE.

CHAFF: FACE, yeah I know him. Not personally, but as an internet presence.

ME: He’s a nice guy. Quite approachable. He just does everything on his bike. He makes it a point to go on massive bike adventures.

CHAFF: I know.

ME: He has stuff everywhere.

CHAFF: I’ve seen.

ME: OK. So to you, what is graffiti? I mean what makes it graffiti and not art, and what makes it graffiti and not vandalism?

CHAFF: I’ve asked myself that question a lot. It is vandalism. I don’t know. It’s… You know the bus terminal in Gongguan? I wrote a line there once. “It’s not art. It’s not vandalism. It’s just words from a can.”

Cos I feel like that’s what I do. It’s just words from a can. That’s why I focus on the tag style so much because I don’t have an artistic background. I just write words. Lettering.

ME: You know I spoke to a guy the other day, ITA – works with BOUNCE. He said he didn’t come from a particularly artistic background. He said he started with tagging, and just gradually realised he had a talent for it. Now he runs Houjie (Backstreet) in Nanshijiao.

CHAFF: Yeah. I know it.

ME: And another writer, DEBE, said pretty much the same thing. Artistic background doesn’t really seem to matter. You just kind of develop it as you go.

CHAFF: Do you know the school over there? Fuxingmeigong, the school of arts and business. They have a whole different mode there. They’re art students so they know a lot about this kinds of stuff. They can easily develop stuff in just one or two months. Some of them have only been doing this stuff a year, and they already have fresher stuff than mine. It’s impressive.

ME: OK. Then what about legal graffiti, and illegal graffiti? What makes them different?

CHAFF: Well you can still call it graffiti… can we go back to the previous question? Because I don’t feel that I really got to that?

ME: Yeah, sure. That’s fine.

CHAFF: What I think graffiti is? Self-expression. Definitely self-expression.

ME: Do I consider legal graffiti real graffiti? Yeah. I guess. It’s still graffiti.

CHAFF: So what’s the difference between street art and graffiti?

ME: You have the leisure. You have the free time to do it. Have breakfast then do part of your piece.

Have lunch and do part of your piece. Have a smoke and do some. People pay you money for it.

People take pictures of it. And you’re known as an artist. You’re not a vandal any more. I think I can’t accept that aspect of legal stuff.

CHAFF: OK. So what about graffiti writers we’ve mentioned? DEBE, Jimmy and those guys who started out illegally and have progressed to legal graffiti or get paid for it. Are they still graffiti writers?

39 Toy is a graffiti term for a novice writer who lacks skills. It can be used to describe the work of a writer if it looks bad or lacks style in the eyes of other graffiti writers.

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ME: Yeah. Well… I think as long as they still go out and do illegal stuff once and then they’re still writers.

They’re still in the game except they’ve moved on to more business angles.

CHAFF: Do you think that’s legitimate? You know if you went straight from legal walls to getting paid for graffiti, nobody would respect you as a graffiti writers, but if you’ve spent 20 years in graffiti and now you make a living from it…

ME: Yeah. That’s your way of getting up⁴⁰. You’ve earned it.

CHAFF: So I wanted to ask you more about self-expression. A lot of the Taiwanese guys I’ve talked to have said that they felt a lot of pressure when they were in high school and middle school. English, Chinese, and maths are pushed so strongly.

ME: Yeah. All that stuff.

CHAFF: And they either didn’t have art class, or it was sacrificed for the core subjects. And they’ve talked a lot about how graffiti for them has been an opportunity to do stuff without anyone telling them they’re wrong or telling them how to do it. What are your thoughts about that?

ME: Well the art programme at school. It’s really good. We learn a lot of stuff, not just art history. Last semester we were doing carvings, printing, and photography. I think that’s acceptable. Sorry, what was your question again?

CHAFF: They really emphasised that graffiti for them was an outlet.

ME: A way to not follow the system.

CHAFF: Yeah. They often talked about releasing stress or emotions. So do you think there’s a difference, being Taiwanese and studying in Taiwan? You know because they’re all a lot older, so is it possible the education system has changed since they were in school. Is it less restrictive now? Do you feel that kind of pressure?

CHAFF: Personally there’s pressure, but I’m the kind of person who doesn’t really give a shit about that, so that kind of pressure doesn’t make me want to do graff⁴¹. Well, occasionally. Rarely. There’s this tunnel near my school, and there’s a wall of tags. Sometimes after school I go there and just write little messages. Like if I had a spat with a classmate, or if some asshole teacher. Yeah. I vent there like fuck this guy or more poetic stuff like the emptiness is overwhelming. Or sometimes still at large mother fuckers. You know, that kind of stuff.

ME: So do you write that in Chinese or English?

CHAFF: English. But mostly to me, though, it’s not a way to vent. But mostly it’s about self-expression. I like going past a place and seeing my stuff and saying, “Hey, I did that. I was here.” So other than self-expression it would be a way of proving that I exist. I tag, therefore I am.

ME: As far as that’s concerned, whose opinion about your graffiti matters?

CHAFF: Nobody. I mean, I’ve been doing graffiti for 3 years, and for the first 2 years all my stuff was really toy. I mean it’s still really whack⁴², it’s not cool, but I don’t care. Sometimes I go back and I cringe, but who cares what other people think. No matter what you think, like “That’s cool, or that’s some really bad vandalism.” Like my parents know I do it, and they don’t like it at all. My dad’s like, “If you keep doing it, I’m not going to give you any allowance at all.”

ME: That’s definitely a question I’d wanted to ask you. Whether your parents knew about it, and whether they had any feelings on the subject.

CHAFF: My dad, at first he was like, “That’s good.” But after the first few months he became really against it. He’ll just come home all fuming, and he’ll be like, “I saw another one of your horrible, what you call art, again today.” And I’m like, “Where?” Because I’ve done so much stuff, so I can’t really remember doing it.

ME: You don’t remember just doing one?

40 Getting up is a graffiti term that means to put pieces on walls, but also to be seen. If you ‘get up’ a lot, then you will be seen and recognised for the time you’ve invested in putting graffiti all over the place.

41 Graff is short for graffiti.

42 A slang term commonly used in graffiti or Hip Hop that means uncool and lacking in style.

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ME: So how do you justify it to your dad? Do you justify it?

CHAFF: I like doing it. He can’t stop me from doing it, and I make a big show of giving him all my empty cans. I stash all of my remaining cans in my closet or somewhere where he can’t find them. I sometimes still test my paint in my room. You know in Style Wars⁴³, SKEME? My parents are definitely like his mum. His mum’s all against it. She’s like, “He’s trashed his room.” I don’t really do that, but my dad he doesn’t like the paint fumes. Sometimes I use these⁴⁴, but the paint inside I mix myself. My dad’s always nagging me to do it outside, but I always just do it in my room because I feel like it.

ME: Do you ever wear a mask when you do it?

CHAFF: No.

ME: How did you learn to mix your own paint?

CHAFF: The internet. After about one year. My personality is… I’m not really an outgoing person. I’m pretty shy…

ME: Except when you’re talking about graffiti.

CHAFF: Yeah, but even then. Like, I’ve passed a couple of writers at the legal walls in Jingmei before and I’ve never bothered to stop and talk to them because I’m just shy. It’s like, “You do graff. I do graff, too.” I just can’t start that kind of stuff.

ME: I can totally sympathise with you there. I was always quite shy when I was younger, but I think it’s something that comes with age. Like, I’ve lived abroad for a long time, and you always find yourself in situations where you either make friends or be by yourself, so you just learn. You’re 18, you’ve got plenty of time.

CHAFF: Haha. Thanks.

ME: So you were talking about mixing your own paint. What paint do you use?

CHAFF: PP⁴⁵. I was buying dinosaur (恐龍) paint before that. I was on a budget, so I went to B&Q and I bought their brand and it was really crap. Their mixture is really bad. After 2 years a lot of my stuff is flaking off. After I got to high school… this is when I was in sophomore (2^nd year of high school), I realised that the Fuxing art school was close by, and they had art supply shops all round. I could just go and check out whether they sold spray paint, and they did. They had PP, and I thought, “I know PP.” It’s what writers use in Taiwan. Hell yeah. And it’s cheap.

ME: Yeah. It’s interesting that PP seems to be better, and it’s cheaper than dinosaur or the others.

CHAFF: Yeah. The main point that I like about it is that it’s not just the paint texture, but also because of the caps⁴⁶. The caps are compatible. The old cans I used they’re all male. I’ve tried making converters, and I’ve tried tweaking the female caps you get with them, but it’s not very good.

ME: You know I only learned about PP when I spoke to FACE because all of the other guys, they use Montana… because they’re at that level.

CHAFF: Haha. Yeah.

ME: So did you start writing before you went to the US, or after?

CHAFF: After. I was 13 when I was in the US, so I was just a kid. Really? Your English is this good after just one year?

43 Style Wars is a 1983 American documentary on hip hop culture with a strong emphasis on graffiti.

44 Shows me a fat graffiti marker used for tagging.

45 Brand of Taiwanese spray paint favoured by graffiti writers here. It’s cheap, and apparently the best alternative to the specialised graffiti brands, such as Montana, which are imported from abroad. Also, PP cans are female like many of the US graffiti brands, which means their caps (spray nozzles) can be swapped for specialised caps to alter their spray shape and diameter to create different lines and effects for graffiti.

46 Caps refers to the spray nozzles on spray cans.

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CHAFF: Yeah, well the first 4 months were isolation because I didn’t speak anything, but after that it just clicked. You have to go out and speak to people otherwise… so it just kinda took off from there.

ME: That’s great. How did you enjoy living in the States?

CHAFF: It was OK. I was in Wisconsin, so it was the middle of nowhere, you know, white people country.

ME: Yeah. I’m familiar with Wisconsin. When I was living in Japan, I was at a really progressive university in Japan where all of the Japanese students have to study abroad. A huge percentage of my Japanese classmates went to Wisconsin because they were willing to take that many and nobody else wanted to go there.

ME: Where I’m going with all this is, as I mentioned, family pressure and all of that, but it doesn’t seem to be a big factor for you.

CHAFF: Well, I can elaborate more on that if you want.

ME: Well then, let me ask you about your family. Would your parents be considered traditional or more open minded?

CHAFF: No, my parents, it’s their education. They’re a bit more open minded about this kind of stuff. They’re not open minded about gay marriage or that kind of stuff, but I guess they can accept subcultures, and that kind of stuff.

ME: So because your graffiti is tag based, how do they feel about really big graffiti pieces and stuff like that?

CHAFF: They say, “Why can’t you do stuff like that?” And I say, “I can’t. That’s just not how I operate.”

Yeah, they think that’s art. They think that’s good stuff, and they wonder why I can’t just do stuff like that.

ME: Can you do stuff like that?

CHAFF: No.

ME: Have you ever tried?

CHAFF: Well, I can do sketches. Just barebones. I can’t really figure out backgrounds and that kind of stuff.

I can do sketches of the letters, but I can’t do pieces.

ME: What about throw ups? You said you don’t really like doing throw ups.

CHAFF: Yeah, I can do throwies, but I haven’t really mastered can handling just yet, so speed is a concern for me. Otherwise I would definitely bomb⁴⁷ throw ups.

ME: So how long does it take you to do a tag?

CHAFF: With spray paint. Around 5 seconds.

CHAFF: With spray paint. Around 5 seconds.