This is what happens when you are living in a massive budget. Student life is cruel. No treats. Make it or break it in your relationship with the city you live in.
London gave some light at the beginning, so that it woke up my ingeniosity. I developed the skill for doing and finding interesting things to do for free, although it didn't prove easy.
A very awkward class timetable did not allow me enough hours to have a part-time job but at the same time I had enormous gaps of free time. It just happened very organically to carry my camera with me at all times. War companion on the good times and bad times, I started capturing and collecting.
I walked for miles, got lost and found myself again. And I learnt to look up, to observe, not just walk. One thing that engineering taught me was to optimise actions, and so did I. I developed an extreme eye for detail while walking that sometimes people think it is going to far. But it is in those little things invisible to the eyes of all the very busy pedestrians: a hint of colour, volume or shape. All those things that makes it worth to spend a couple of seconds observing it and capturing the moment. Because as it happens with most of the good things in life, they don't last forever.
And I ended up with a fair collection of those insignificant (or not) details that I have come across during my inexpensive hikes around the city. One day I decided to find the things that they had in common with each other. It worked out like one of those IQ test that require to find the next item in the geometric series. I happened to find a lot of things that I liked, and I began to recognise them, to give them name, to relate them with a name and to find out even more about their authors.
And that's how my collection of street art begun.
Malarky (@TastyMalark). I noticed it because of the colour, high intensity hues. With sort of a reminiscence to as how egyptians used to paint their portraits in two dimensions. Funny smiley criatures. A hint of childhood dreams represented by an adult. And definitely different. I loved it ever since.
And if Malarky was all about explosions of colour and imaginary creatures, Roa happened to represent the real animal creatures amongst us. Rats, porks, birds. Just black and white. Just traces, like painted with charcoal in a brand new white canvas. But what makes all those pieces unforgettable is their huge dimensions, normally painted on empty and lonely walls, but turns them beautiful again.
I still remember those times in which graffiti was just all about tagging and making walls filthy.
Now, seriously. Don't just walk. Observe. Those little things.
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