A PIECE FOR REVOK

This is a piece I’ve worked on over the past 3 (maybe 4) weekends for my good friend Revok. I need to be honest – after the really killer pieces Berst pulled out for Revok last month I found myself motivated to bring my A-game and rock something super detailed too (feeling left out haha). I haven’t really painted many other peoples names during my time writing but this is actually the 3rd Revok piece I’ve done. When you meet an artist that you really admire and they give you the time of day – it’s truly humbling and inspiring thing. When that artist becomes a friend who time and time again goes out on a limb for you – sticks up for you and just seems to be staunchly in your corner – there’s no way to explain that feeling. I’ve never asked or expected that type of support from anyone – not even my crew. I’ve always allowed the people around me to be as neutral as they want when it comes to me because I am a fairly polarizing person and I know that about myself. This is the best way for me to express my gratitude – through a painting I had a lot of fun as well as challenges creating.

I’m not sure if people have noticed I have a particular style of shading that I have been doing for the last year or so – it generally involves using the Astro cap half pressure – creating a dissipated splatter, almost like a half tone effect when you look at it up close. It was a slow process but fulfilling for me when viewed up close. That’s the thing – it was completely redundant in a photo and was really becoming an exercise in absolute futility. Even still I was fixated with it as a technique and not ready to let it go. I was always a fast painter so people around me were getting vexed as to why I was becoming the slowest on the wall.

June last year Rime (the next person due a really nice piece I think!) randomly gave me a blaster cap to play around with. I put it in my jacket pocket and forgot about it completely until about a month ago. It was funny – I pulled it out at our studio and explained what it was, everyone gathered around marveling over it like it was the holy grail. We went outside and I did that ‘A’ you can see off to the side of my piece. We all got really excited – I did a second ‘A’. Berst told Snek to turn it into a ‘LA’ and he crossed the line too high, we all were giving him shit. I did some random splatter and then Berst was like “You could do that shading you’ve been doing with this”. It was a total lightening bolt moment.

So this Revok piece is almost completely shaded with a blaster cap. It’s the only one I know of here in NZ – it’s looking a little used and abused right now but I am addicted to this technique. It has so much substance, grit and texture. You can literally run your hand across this wall and feel the paint. I love it.

So yeah. I’ve uploaded this nice and big, download it and have a look up close at the details!