Gazette cover Taunton Graffiti by Korben Dallas

So the Somerset County Gazette have included my artwork in this week's issue. The photos, taken by local Val Budd were sent in to the paper as a public thank you message to the artist.  Thanks Val!  That's proper nice that is.

I've got some really good ideas for paintings still to come, as well as plans to repaint that picture of Deckchair Eddie - the dog-faced boy, which you can see in the left hand side of the bottom photo.  As I've said in previous posts, before I started painting this wall it had been a good 6 years since I last touched a can of spray paint.  These past few weeks have been a steep re-learning curve and I'm looking forward to replacing my slightly shabby earlier pictures with better versions.  By the middle of the summer that wall is going to be looking sweet!

I have been touched by the support received from my community. While I'm painting, people comment as they walk by. The most common message is simply to let me know that they welcome the arrival of some more considered artwork in place of what was there before.  Two people have confronted me in a negative context, saying that what I am doing is "disgusting" and that it "brings down the area". They're entitled to their opinion.

I have also had the police called on me a couple of times which is a total waste of an officer's time. I do have permission to paint on that wall so it's not vandalism.  The officers usually tell you how a crime was reported. Apparently one person described me as "totally destroying the wall" and another reported it as "two guys with their shirts off, spray painting". Funny how the offending act was specifically described as spray painting as if the fact that it was in an aerosol can makes it implicitly illegal. (Or maybe it was my shirtless upper body that caused horror.  Note to self:  Do more push-ups!) My friend recently commented that, were I to use a pot of acrylic and a brush to do my paintings, I wouldn't get quite so much negative interest from those suspecting me of wrong doing. Incidentally, the reason painters may choose to use cans rather than brushes is that long continuous lines with a smooth surface are practically unachievable with a brushed medium like acrylics or oils.

But on a serious note, it saddens me more that whoever called the police didn't feel able to simply ask me if I was breaking the law. Is that same lack of a sense of empowerment the very reason the wall stood graffiti'd for 5 years before I decided to put my own artwork on it? The wall was plain grey when it was first built and stayed that way for a bit.  Then, 5 years ago, all the swear words, crap attempts at tags and rudimentary diagrams of genitals appeared in a short space of time and then suddenly stopped. The wall then stayed that way for years, the perpetrators apparently no longer interested in graffiti, the locals just as enthused about removing it.  Hundreds of people use that lane every day and any one of them could have decided to clean it up. Am I right in saying that if you don't like something in your neighbourhood, you can do three things: 1) Complain to the owners, 2) Live with it, or 3) Offer to help the owners fix it with a neat solution? I hope people feel that me having a little paint now and then is a neat solution.

Finally, on the subject of anonymity. I think part of the appeal of street artists is their mystery. The majority of people can relate to someone's desire for privacy, particularly in our new massively interconnected world. Although I sign my paintings with a pseudonym I have actually made no attempt to stop people discovering my real name. I used a moniker at first for tradition. But having lived with the alias, Korben Dallas, for a few weeks I can see it goes deeper than a nostalgic nod at graffiti's heritage. A heritage full of denied freedom of speech and angry protest.  But I am not in a position of repression, nor am I in breach of the law. So what's the use of a disguise?

A character persona is not necessarily for the benefit of the actor, it can be the audience who gain the most from it. Most people seem to be choosing to use my character name when they could reveal my birth name and I appreciate that. They gain enjoyment from maintaining the mystery that surrounds the image, even though they hold the power to destroy it. Banksy's real name was revealed ages ago yet people still talk about who he really is. They talk about the desire to know but have they really attempted to research it? It seems to me that people are subconsciously programmed to maintain an illusion.  They'd rather revel in the question than seek the answer, like the fat person forever asking how to loose weight when they clearly know the answer is to eat less and exercise more.  They consume the blurred confusion around something because that confusion is important to them. Like the defocussed background of a masterful photo portrait, it holds the viewer's attention toward the subject, toward the bit that is in focus. And that is the subject that the creator wants you to look at. Enjoy my paintings and once again, thanks!