ILG took a smalltalk with Puzle, one of the authors of Kings Way, an amazing new book about graffiti in Melbourne 1983-1993.

ILG: Please introduce yourself to the worldwide readers of ILG.

Puzle, Co-Author of Kings Way.

ILG: Please tells us about the Kings Way book. How did the idea for it come about?

Puzle: It’s a decade overview (1983–1993) on the beginnings of Melbourne’s graffiti subculture. It came about from the need to show and preserve amazing paintings that only exist in photographs from a bygone era. I might also add that it’s an attempt to show and inform the greater world-wide writer community on the importance and volume of the Melbourne and Australian movement of the time.

ILG: How was the proces of putting it together? The book holds an amazing amount of great documentation from the 80s, how did you gather all that?

Puzle: It was a meticulous process that kept growing with time. We kept on following up people that we knew or had heard of that had great imagery along with our own collections from that period. We collated over 5000 images with only 1200 making the final cut.

ILG: How does it feel to come full circle and end up making a book using the governments money after all they’ve spent cleaning off everything that’s in the book?

Puzle: There is no government money used in the making of Kings Way. There was some irony in the fact we had our launch party at the ACMI (Australian Centre for the Moving Image), this is a government funded body. That was a bit of a ‘full circle’ coup, even though we had full support from the current staff that recognised the artistic merits and socialogical importance of the subculture and our document.

ILG: Have you been a part of any other graffiti publications, like magazines or films?

Puzle: I had a graf focused mag in the early 90s. It was called SUB – Stop Us Baby.

ILG: You have been around for a long time, how was writing different in the 80s vs the 90s vs the 2000s? What was positive or negative?

Puzle: Writers come and go, thats definatley one thing that hasnt changed. Obviously the media and commercialisation of the graffiti subculture have made for very different times, styles are now becoming global and no longer defined by local boundaries, writers are going all-world rather than all-city, and there’s a host of writer/artist cross-breeds themselves. There’s a mass of cross-creativity going on right now, graf, street art or whatever and I really dig that energy regardless. It was a tough, raw, lonesome and crime riddled subculture in the early days.

ILG: Where can we learn more about the book?

Puzle: Here are some links:
Kings Way book blog

Kings Way book Flickr

Puzles personal blog with additional text and photos

ILG: Thanks for taking time to talk to us, good luck with your book.
Below is 3 fresh videos and a few extra images from the book.

Topics: Book News, Featured

Posted: December 28, 2009