"...You try to get out there as fast as you can and
you know immediately the next day if it was a good idea
or not."
"I always like that quality of it—the artist actually
being there in the space. You could see someone's show,
and then it could be in Berlin the next month and it's the
same show, but the artist may have never even been there.
But I like that personal touch where it's a lot like graffiti."
"I think there's this need to like do things with their
hands and create things a lot with kids. So it comes as
no surprise that kids are going to gravitate towards things
where they're doing things, painting things."
What is the difference for you
in working at a gallery, in a museum, or on the street?
MCGEE:
I think the method is the most
interesting thing to me. I think in traditional art making,
you come up with a good idea and you hide it and it's like,
"Oh, this is a good idea, I got to really work on this." Really
push this and you're like, "Oh, this is going to be good,"
and you prepare carefully for a gallery space which is a pretty
neutral setting. But with a lot of people that do street work,
if you have a good idea, you're just like, "Oh, this is a
great idea, I'm putting it out on the street tonight!" And
you try to get out there as fast as you can and you know immediately
the next day if it was a good idea or not. People are just
like, "Oh, I saw that thing you did and..." Or it's just like
someone will go over it and maybe it wasn't such a good idea.
So it's that environment that I think is vastly different
than a studio
artist who is in this nice space with light, or just like
this studio space which I have.
ART:21:
If people see it and then it
disappears.
MCGEE:
I always like that quality of
it - the artist actually being there in the space. You could
see someone's show, and then it could be in Berlin the next
month and it's the same show, but the artist may have never
even been there. But I like that personal touch where it's
a lot like graffiti.
If an artist, a New York [graffiti] artist, comes to visit
San Francisco, you know immediately when the artist is in
town. It's just like, "Oh, look who's in town." And it's like
that everywhere now. Immediately you know when someone's been
there.
ART:21:
Have you done something on the
street while visiting in New York?
MCGEE:
Sure.
ART:21:
Give me a clue, so I can look.
MCGEE:
It just looks like garbage. It
just looks like all other graffiti in New York that everyone
hates. That's what I do now, that's all I do is this stuff
that people hate, because supposedly I do stuff that's different
than what other graffiti artists do. So I think I've gone
back to doing what people traditionally like hate, you know...which
is just like the scribbling graffiti. But at the same time
I'll walk three blocks and inside the gallery and be doing
what I do with the same hand and people are saying, "Oh, art,
this is great, this is so superb, I love this stuff." And
then walk back out on the street and it's like"I wish they'd
get rid of this stuff though..." and it'd be my tag. I like
that; that's funny to me.
ART:21:
I know that Margaret Kilgallen
is a big influence for your work and that the two of you often
go out and do things together, or near one another. Isn't
that somewhat of a graffiti tradition, being competitive and
going out tagging
with other people?
MCGEE:
Yeah, there's always a push.
You're always highly aware of what your counterparts are doing.
At any given point you can walk down the street and you're
like "Wow, these kids have like amazing penmanship." That's
what I'm always aware of here now - amazing penmanship and
fearlessness also, in spite of the current climate against
it. These kids are crazy now. I used to think we got crazy,
but they're just literally.... You know you can do time now
for your little markings on the street these days. It's no
more like Keith Haring...[yelps]..."Graffiti, come on, everyone
let's do graffiti!" It's not that way anymore. It's a whole
different climate.
ART:21:
Did your parents know about you
doing graffiti out on the streets when you were younger?
MCGEE:
I think they knew of it, but
I don't think they realized the extent of it maybe because
I was out of the house already by then. I started late. I
started (at) eighteen or nineteen.
ART:21:
Marking on the street?
MCGEE:
Yeah, that's pretty late.
ART:21:
I thought you were younger.
MCGEE:
No, I'm pretty late. I was pretty
late in the game.
ART:21:
So at the end of high school...
MCGEE:
Yeah, right, at the end of high
school. Art school came much later. Did it pop your bubble?
ART:21:
No, I guess not, I just thought
you were younger when you started. So what made you go to
the street at eighteen?
MCGEE:
It was probably through music
and stuff. It was a lot of punk
rock shows and stuff like that. There was always graffiti
in these places and I was just like, "Who is this guy? I keep
on seeing this guy." There was this one guy, Cuba, he wrote
"Cuba" and it was at all the same hardcore shows in the bathroom,
on the door, and on the street. And then I was like "What,
who's doing this?" It was different than my idea of what graffiti
was before that. I've told you before there were a bunch of
people that were all interested. We all used to ride scooters
and stuff around. And there was this one guy that - this is
dumb - we used to go ride our scooters around, like Vespas
and Lambrettas. And there was this one guy, he would always
carry spray paint in his side panel and at every stop, why
he'd just get off and he'd do this huge like....he wrote "Zotz"
or something, and the "O" was this big cowboy thing, like
the "O" was a big cowboy face. And I was "Say, what the hell
are you doing you know?" And he was like, "I'm doing graffiti,
they're doing this in New York right now." It was '84 or '85,
right around there. And he was like "Yeah, everyone's doing
this stuff in New York and you should try it too. You want
to try it or something?" And I was like "Yeah, I'll give it
a try." And he goes, "You have to come up with a name first."
There's probably some dumb scooter magazine at the time that
was called Twist or something - I think that's how I got it.
But I've been stuck with that dumb name ever since. I wish
I started earlier, like you said. Thirteen or fourteen evokes
the whole different idea of doing graffiti than it does at
eighteen, because there was like this kind of hipness or coolness
that you're aware of at that point. You know what I mean?
Does that make sense?
ART:21:
It's more deliberate.
MCGEE:
Yeah.
ART:21:
So what were you doing in high
school?
MCGEE:
I was doing art and drawing stuff,
but I feel like I was the last generation that actually even
had art classes, because the schools in California are not
so good anymore. Not that it was good when I was there, but
I go speak at schools in Oakland and San Francisco and there's
no art programs there. There's one teacher and there's no
drama, there's no music, there's nothing. There's just one
art teacher that takes kids in after school, or there's one
class on Friday that introduces art, drama, music, everything
to kids. And then they wonder why kids are painting all over
the street, you know? I think there's this need to like do
things with their hands and create things a lot with kids.
So it comes as no surprise that kids are going to gravitate
towards things where they're doing things, painting things.
It's just where it's at. How it's done now, the legalities,
is the issue at stake now with most urban cities.
