After lunch break, we hooked up with the local graffiti crew at Levadia. Always exciting meeting artists with the same passion, spray paint that is. And amazing how we connected straight away; I guess that when graffiti runs through your veins, it’s like a universal language when you meet other “writers” (graffiti artists). With the sun at its highest point we left for our city stroll. For me especially, the hunt for a canvas/wall was on. And there are plenty of great walls in Levadia! The potential for Street Art productions in this compact city is incredible. Lots of huge “blind” walls and all in perfect smooth concrete… “WALLhalla”!
Unfortunately tagging seems popular among Levadian kids. It’s almost everywhere. Sure I’ve got nothing against a well designed, aesthetic tag but mostly this wasn’t the case. Our group discussed this issue while we continued our exploration. “One way to counter illegal tagging is to provide a legal graffiti wall or space,” I suggested. A place where graffiti painters can practise their skills without the fear of being caught, this can result in higher level of artistry and mostly results in outgrowing the phase of simple tagging. It’s a “fight-fire-with-fire” concept, so to speak. Of course the locals were all in favour. Legal graffiti walls are mostly combined or near a local skatepark. Since the two sub-cultures are intertwined. We crossed the street… and there it was… a huge wall, in plain sight, near the riverbank, just outside the old city centre. This concrete surface was just screaming to be painted… I knew I had found… the perfect wall!
– Siegfried Vynck (Belgium)