Urbanbuzzmag.com
By Nigeria Anderson
The Writing Is On The Wall
AL DÍAZ is best known for his friendship with Jean-Michel Basquiat and collaboration on SAMO© a well-known graffiti project appearing in lower Manhattan from 1978 to 1980. Al Díaz’s career spans five decades. Born and raised Puerto Rican in New York City, he was known by age 15 as a prolific and influential, first-generation subway graffiti artist. During the early 70s, his popular and recognized name was BOMB-1. Currently, Díaz works with WET PAINT and other signage used throughout the NYC MTA subway system. After cutting out individual letters to create clever-sounding, surreal and poignant anagrams, he hangs the finished messages in City subway stations. In 2018, Díaz authored SAMO© 1978, a book meant to clarify, elaborate and illustrate the history and meaning behind the historical SAMO© writings.
You can see Al Diaz, Saturday February 23 2019 at Destination Bed Stuy: Art, Hip-Hop & Murals, FREE event 1pm & 3pm @ Brooklyn Commons Working Space, 7 Marcus Garvey, Brooklyn, NY. I had the honor of speaking with Graffiti legend Al Diaz who really broke down the history of Graffiti the first 3D printing. Listen to our interview as Al Diaz speaks on culture transformation, vandal squad, gangs taking on Graffitti and how Graffitti’s offensive, artistic, rebellious writings and delinquent behavior have crossed over into so many cultures globally. Welcome our new KeyPlayer Al Diaz you can reach him at https://al-diaz.com/ and on IG @Albert_Diaz1. PRESS PLAY
