Rammellzee is an universal artist, expressing his theory of Gothic Futurism (which is shifting into a new phase which he calls Ikonoklast Panzerism) through many artforms such as aerosol, music and sculpting. From his appearance in Wildstyle, to painting trains alongside Jean-Michel Basquiat, on down to his works shown in New York’s Museum of Modern Arts, he is one of the originators who has, and still influences many worldwide. We got in touch with Rammellzee for some brief questions about Shoe.

- When and where did you cross paths with the artist known as Shoe?
Yaki Kornblit Gallery… Late 1983 with Baz, who’s father I used to play chess with.

- What set his graffiti style apart from so many other talented artists?
Absolutely none… He was a bomber artist. These styles started in NYC. He was told that…. At a lecture I held in Amsterdam. He didn’t like me telling that to an audience and most likely… He won’t like what I’m saying now!

- Are you familiar with his current calligraphy-style work?
Yes I am, but don’t change the subject. Shoe is good at what he does and that’s why I speak to him… Shoe knows it. In my eyes… Shoe is no “Toy”.

- Any personal comments or amusing anecdotes about Shoe? (Like the time you got busted for bombing the Stedelijk Museum haha)
It was great to hit the wall with him… Specially cause it was a Museum. You should ask this same question to Shoe about Dondi. I don’t crack jokes on Shoe… He’s too solid of a man!

Bando discovered Hip Hop and graffiti culture early in New York, got inspired by legends like Futura 2000 and brought these fresh artforms back to France. In turn, he influenced a whole generation of writers and crews in Europe and worldwide with his indisputable talent and style. He was also the instigator of many world renowned crews, among them the Bomb Squad 2, Crime Time Kings and The Chrome Angels, operating alongside other notorious pioneers like Mode2 and Delta. After dropping the cans he kept making noise by producing and releasing dirty raw funk records, many of them highly collectible today. We managed to track down this man of few words via email to do the Q&A about Shoe.

- When and where did you cross paths with the artist known as Shoe?
The first time I met Shoe it was in Paris in ‘86, ‘87 I think…

- What set his graffiti style apart from so many other talented artists?
Letter style, no bullshit decoration like so many others, but simple to the point style, like Seen & Dondi for example.

- Are you familiar with his current calligraphy-style work?
Yes, somewhat.

- Any personal comments or amusing anecdotes about Shoe?
I have to think about that one.

Adam Eeuwens is a close friend of Shoe and co-author of the excellent Dutch design book ‘False Flat’ which documents illustrations, product design, old and new painting, graphic design and advertising from The Netherlands. Furthermore, Adam is a partner in Rebeca Mendez Design, responsible for design strategy, account handling, research and development, copywriting and creating concepts that lead to artistic solutions and pragmatic results. Adam possesses almost 20 years of media industry experience, half in the United States, half of them in Europe, with experience as journalist, editor, publisher, event developer, planner, copy writer and author.

- When and where did you cross paths with the artist known as Shoe?
The first time I crossed paths with Shoe must have been around 1984. I was in a crowded Saturday afternoon tram in Amsterdam, and this group of kids my age jumped on and began bombing the tram floor to ceiling with fat black markers. One of them stood out by finding the craziest spots to apply some mad skill. He was also the most infuriating and soon several aboard were shouting and threatening violence. This kid just stared them down and got out the last possible moment through the closing doors before being lynched. (something I have seen him repeat many times since, with lesser degree of success). ‘That was Shoe,’ a friend next to me remarked, and I knew there and then that I would know this guy.

Quite some years later in 1991 we met in person, somewhere in a subway underpass in De Bijlmer. I was writing a story on graffiti, following Cat22, and that afternoon met Gasp, Angel and Shoe for the first time. I wrote the story in my own magazine Flux. Though I never touched a spray can in my life, after Niels and PJ read the story they bestowed on me the honorary title of writer, with the tag Flux. To date, this is still one of the greatest honors I have received (along with my friend Jorge from Tijuana calling me an honorary mujado, or wetback, after I got deported from the US once).

- What set his graffiti style apart from so many other talented artists?
His deep love of the letter, maybe? The enormous skill that makes the letters flow that one beat more natural? His capacity to continuously produce and amaze? His iron logic? The fact that when he puts pen to paper, brush to canvas, spray can to wall, he is happiest? Because there a very few like him?

- Are you familiar with his current calligraphy-style work?
Yes. I think I was even in the same room when he started calling what he has always done ‘calligraffiti.’

- Any personal comments or amusing anecdotes about Shoe?
As I turn 40 a few weeks after Shoe I trust I will be forgiven for being slightly sentimental and melodramatic here. Working with Niels has been one of the great pleasures and privileges of my life. It was never work, it was play, with no qualm that it was often way past midnight. And I always felt that combining my talents and skills with his resulted in an equation where 1 plus 1 makes 3. We made beautiful things with a sense of mission, convinced we were making an important contribution to the wellbeing of our generation and society; never did we demand less of ourselves and each other. Some of the work we did together is certainly for me some of the best I ever did and best fun I ever had, and formed the person I am today. There is now an ocean and a continent between us but throughout the years we have managed to stay in touch, even deepen our friendship in meaningful exchanges. The man is a treasure, not only to me, but to mankind. Seriously.

Talk about graffiti and you’re bound to come across the name Mode 2. From worldwide walls to the pages in Spraycan Art, Mode 2 done made his mark in the aerosol artform… and far beyond. Soaking up influences from his travels and various surroundings he developed his very own unique style of lettering and characters, which he is probably most well known for. And not only does his work look good: Mode 2 analyzes and utilizes his artistic expression to comment on society, communicates through culture and inspires people. We caught up with this Chrome Angel for some words about Shoe.

- When and where did you cross paths with the artist known as Shoe?
We met at the end of July ‘85, on the river banks of Paris, where he had done some pieces with Jan and Jaz, and with Bando, Pride, Scribla, Zaki, and Eskimo. We were wondering who were these new dudes in town… I think they were just on vacation… He showed us some photos from Amsterdam, pretty impressive stuff with regards to the standards of then, so we clicked quite well from the get-go…
Bando had created a new crew called Crime Time Kings earlier that summer, a fusion of Bomb Squad 2 from Paris and The Chrome Angelz from London. Shoe became Amsterdam “president” and ran the “chapter” from that city.

- What set his graffiti style apart from so many other talented artists?
I think the fact that he was mentored by Dondi gave him as good a starting point as any would wish or die for, and Shoe himself had really sound instinctive knowledge of how to make letters look good; hence the perfect balance of letters in his short and unforgettable name, for instance…
This grasp of what impacts best graphically made him stand out from the rest, but I also think that the rich and diverse graffiti culture of Amsterdam, as well as a very good rapport between Bando and himself, also played its part in inspiring him, and helping him evolve…

- Are you familiar with his current calligraphy-style work?
I’ve only been on and off acquainted up to date with what Shoe’s been doing on the calligraphy tip. I remember what he was doing with Sunday Violence back in the nineties, but my trips to Amsterdam were few and far between then. It’s only by doing things more frequently with Delta that I started to run into Shoe again, as he had been a bit more away from the scene.
Recently I saw his work with scarves, which is probably just the tip of the iceberg, as to what he’s been doing in that direction…

- Any personal comments or amusing anecdotes about Shoe?
At the after-party of the Backjumps Live Issue2, he must have told us he was leaving about four times, but after each and every departure, he would come bouncing through the crowds fifteen to twenty minutes later, as if he was just getting into the party; a bit kind of Groundhog Day!

Rebeca Méndez is an artist living in Los Angeles working with various media to explore the forces of nature modulated through technology. Méndez travels to the edges of the world, from Patagonia, to Iceland and the Sahara desert, in pursuit of images of an ideal and sublime nature and her works continue to explore issues of media representation. Her photography studies the everyday, stillness and emptiness, as well as the isolation of the temporal in phenomena. Her video installations are intense immersive environments of ‘impossible landscapes’ that envelop the viewer in image and sound. In 2004 she invited Shoe for a series of lectures and workshops at UCLA. We got in touch with her for some words on Shoe.

- When and where did you cross paths with the artist known as Shoe?
I fell in love with Adam Eeuwens in November 1995 in Amsterdam. Adam came to visit me in Los Angeles (my home), and he arrived with Shoe. That was the first time I met Shoe. Late that night, we all strolled down muscle beach, in Venice, California. But it was Shoe and I who, like ten-year-olds, were playing (and showing off to each other) all the ‘muscle’ tricks we could do on the rings and monkey bars. The next days, we talked design (and showed off to each other) the design and typographic work that we so passionately make. I was (and still am) most impressed.

- What set his graffiti style apart from so many other talented artists?
Niels is a perfectionist who understands that mastery is achieved through observation, experimentation, dedication and play, and as such, his graffiti style emanates a formal rigour and elegance, an almost violent vitality through the complexity of its value, contrast and colour, and a graceful flow that makes the work seem to appear easy—an effortless beauty. But what makes his work so unique is his brilliant play of word and image—something he truly masters.

- Are you familiar with his current calligraphy-style work?
Very much so, and love it. It is this relationship between word and image that has for long captivated Niels ‘Shoe’ Meulman, but specifically the calligram, which is the compression of image, text and information. In his work, Niels points to the gaps, ambiguities, and possibilities of language as well as challenges the hierarchy and relationship between reading and perception—the visual versus the verbal.

- Any personal comments or amusing anecdotes about Shoe?
In spring 2004, I invited Shoe to give a lecture and workshop to our students at UCLA, Design | Media Arts. His workshops focus was on the “Calligram.” Towards the end of the three-day workshop, we assigned a wall for the students’ ‘graffiti.’ Amongst 30 students and professors, without anyone noticing, suddenly there was Shoe’s tag all over the mural. He came like a ghost, acted so quickly and gracefully, and stunned an already impressed group of students and professors. He became a myth in our department, and you still hear students talk about him.

Méndez was born and raised in México City and received her BFA (1984) in Communication Design and her MFA (1996) in Media Art and Design from Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California.

Born and raised in New York City, Eric Haze has been making his impact felt in the worlds of art, product and graphic design for over 30 years. After spending the 70’s and early 80’s on the front lines of the graffiti movement, Haze opened his design studio in 1986, becoming one of the first visual artists to define the look and graphic language of Hip Hop during its golden years. Some of his most classic works include designs for Public Enemy, EPMD, LL Cool J, and the Beastie Boys. Haze founded his own clothing line in 1993, which remains recognized worldwide as one of the original brands that helped create the blueprint for streetwear as we know it today. Over the last 10 years, Haze has also produced a diverse range of client work and collaborations with industry leaders such as Nike, Casio, Honda, and Apple. Recently relocated to back to NY after over a decade based in LA, Haze now directs his company out of their new Brooklyn headquarters. Haze will also be present at the Calligraffiti exhibition showcasing some of his latest works, which are also the graphic basis for parts of his upcoming fall ‘07 collection and serve as an organic preview of how these styles have been developed. Read on!

- When and where did you cross paths with the artist known as Shoe?
I first met Niels in about 1987, when Revolt and I came to Holland to suprise Quik by showing up at an exhibition he was having in Haarlem… I started coming to Amsterdam a lot in the 90’s, both for work and personal reasons, and we grew to become family and the best of friends over the years…

- What set his graffiti style apart from so many other talented artists?
Even though we are from different backgrounds and somewhat different generations, one of the things Shoe and I always shared was a sort of parallel experience of being graffiti artists who branched out into graphic arts as both designers and art directors of our own companies… Like myself, while Niels’s work and aesthetic is rooted in his graff styles and original letterforms, he also rings a greater versatility to it with different techniques and applications from his other commercial experiences. Niels also has a very conceptual mind, where he often uses wordplay and subtle copy writing as part of his style, which gives the work another dimension beyond just shape and form. Ultimately, in a design world increasingly dominated by the computer and technology, it’s the artists like Shoe who can flex both organic handstyles AND compliment it with other techniques who can really take things to the next level…

- Are you familiar with his current calligraphy-style work?
Very much… It’s always been part of what he does, and I think we recently rediscovered some of this new flow together while he was staying with me in NY last season… I had just set up a extra part of my studio to get a lot more wild and sloppy in and we went out and bought a lot of different brushes, inks, paper, paint and materials to experiment with together… since we only had a few days left, I let Niels use most of the time to get is groove on… (while I shot pics of him working for a piece I wrote about it on my blog). I believe these sessions sparked the new wave of drawings and freestyle typographic artwork for both of us, and this show reflects some of the different directions we have taken with the momentum we gained from it at the time…

- Any personal comments or amusing anecdotes about Shoe?
Many really… Besides Holland, New York and Los Angeles, we have travelled together to places like Copenhagen and Tokyo, where we have definitely wilded out more than a few times… One of the funniest memories I have is when we came back to our hotel in Tokyo mad drunk one night (after painting a G-Shock mural for Casio) and the door was open to another empty room on our floor… So we snuck in, raided the mini bar, trashed the hell out of the room, and made a bunch of international phone calls back home to our peeps on someone else’s bill… Definitely classic.