Arty Graffarti

Generally in graffiti, trains are the most respected canvas you can leave your mark on and despite it being a rare sighting in Melbourne [it still goes on though], in other countries across the globe, it is still regularly seen. For a lot of writers, bombing trains isn’t a regular, night to night thing, but Taps and Moses decided to take it that little bit further between 2008 – 2010 and bomb 1000 trains in as many days. With a lot of burners ended up on the internet these days, it’s nice to see that a couple of writers have gone out and decided to publish a book on their travels.

It should be noted that this collection is of nothing but trains, no canvas’, no walls, nothing but trains, that’s nearly 300 pages of all train action. While that may sound limiting, it couldn’t be further from the truth. This is an astounding collection of pieces by both artists and some of their friends, with no two being the same. Opening it up for the first time, I was shocked at how much these two did in that time, I skipped the words and just kept flipping through the pages, just to see what these guys came up with next. At times the volume and range of pieces throughout this book makes it feel like more of a blackbook rather than a collection spread over a few years. While maintaining the fun European style, both writers step outside their comfort zones many times throughout the time period, while even not really doing tradition graffiti also. If you’re ever looking for new ways to push your pieces, this is the book to go through, it will cure your writers block.

But it’s not all in the pictures here, the book has thankfully been translated into English and the stories from page to page are just as interesting as the pieces. They’re funny, insightful and full of all them good things that make you wanna get up and travel. Anything can happen overseas, let along if you’re painting trains religiously, and some of the stories accompanying these pieces are definitely worth the purchase alone. Whether it’s about the Italian parliament publically stating that its cheaper the clean their trains then enhance security or their adventures through some of the Brazilian favela’s, you never really know where these guys went next or what will happen to them. It’s a great mixture of getting a look into graffiti globally and the drive some writers have just to get that photo, a rare find amongst other publications.

I picked this one up for Christmas at Villain, but they’ve since sold out, but having visited This Is It, GIANT and Obese in the passed week [which made me realise I should do a review already!], I’ve seen that it’s available there also ranging from $45 – $50, if you’re a graffiti kind of person, then you probably own or have heard of this book, definately worth the purchase.