DAME

Frank151: We’re here at your place. You got a lot of really cool stuff around the house.  How did your collection start? 
DAME: The collection started from me being a thief, I guess.  And not having parental supervision.  I used to always stash stuff, and it just piled up. When I got into art and graffiti, I’d have to stash my spray paint. It really became like an obsession. I wanted to get every color of spray paint when I started painting with acrylics or whatever. When I started getting  graffiti magazines, I wanted them all. I needed everything, you know? But at this point, it’s almost a hoarder syndrome,  but not really.  It’s still really cool stuff.
F151: What part of Los Angeles is this? 
D: This is considered east Hollywood. It’s close to the 101, so I’m real centralized. Ten minutes downtown, ten minutes to major Hollywood.  But east Hollywood, it’s basically just LA.

Graffiti in Hollywood is a little different than downtown graffiti.  It’s a lot cleaner up here. There’s a lot more buffing going on in Hollywood.


F151: SEVER mentioned that this house has a lot of history to it. 
D: Yeah. I’ve been here for, I’d say, almost ten years.  And I’m 34 years old right now.  So I got this house when I was conceivably young. Like I said, it was coined the Holidame Inn, because everyone would stay here.  DIME from Germany…all the writers from out of town. All the Japanese cats have stayed here. Anyone who didn’t have a place, I would open it up, and it would be a place for people to get on their feet, to get their shit together. It’s cool. It’s not as much the Holidame Inn now because my dad’s here. 
F151: SEVER mentioned that FATE was here at one point, and REVOK. 
D: FATE used to live in this room.  REVOK used to live in this room.  RIME’s lived here.  RETNA’s lived here,  my homeboy, JROCK from LTS has lived here. REVOK’s lived here twice, actually, pre-beard.  I think SEVER stayed here for a while when he first came back to LA.

F151: Speak a little bit on your history with AWR MSK.
D: I’ve been in MSK since 1995. I met TYKE and I met FATE a little bit prior to that. I’m thinking ’94, maybe. I was writing graffiti before then, but it wasn’t the same feeling. Basically they’ve been a family to me.

It’s amazing that I’m still like able to do art. The whole thing for me is hard to put into words, because it’s not just a graffiti crew.  It’s not just an art collective.  It’s just something that happened to me. It’s like my fate, and I’m just blessed to be a part of it. 


F151: Aside from graffiti, do you do much studio art?  
D: That’s the hardest part, I think, is trying to figure out what you want to do on canvas, or doing something that’s more feasible to sell versus…I’ll still do graph probably hopefully until I die. 

I’m working on some canvases.  I do a little bit of digital stuff, just for income.  I do a little bit of photography.  I work with RETNA a little bit…more fashion oriented. I would like to get more of that, making textiles and stuff. 

But like I always say, “My conclusion is no conclusion.”  It’s always open ended.  I’m always finding inspiration with new stuff.  I’m always trying to experiment.  I’m always trying to like do research on what’s out there, and be current. But at the same time, just go with what I’m feeling, you know? 

It would be great to rock burners all day and have a graffiti life.  But it’s also important to evolve and become acceptable in a mansion, versus a burner on the street, you know?  Have a painting hanging in a mansion or a painting hanging in an established restaurant. 
F151: Do you currently have pieces up at KNOWN Gallery? 
D: I have two pieces up at the gallery right now. We’re gonna have more shows. And I have a few other shows coming up too that I have pieces in. 


F151: Is there anything else you want to speak on, or that you want people to know about you or the crew? 
D: It’s a pleasure to be a part of a great, established crew. 
There are a lot of cats in our crew, and there’s a lot of different stuff going on besides graff. We’ve all grown from street tagger, graffiti-artist kids. Now we’re men, and we’ve developed in all different areas. We have a jewelry maker now, we have photographers, and we still smash graffiti.