36 hours in Amsterdam: Part two
King Adz hits the ’Dam for the launch of Laser 3.14’s new book.
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‘Street art has come a long way since it split from the graffiti scene in the late 1980s. I’ve been watching it carefully since the beginning and have seen it grow into a global movement. Artists come and go. Some stay around and I’ve had the honour of getting down with old school talents such as Banksy, The London Police, Hugo Kaagman and Shepard Fairey. These are the founding fathers.
The new school, the next generations as it were are snapping at their heels, hungry to get up and make their names. Some have chosen it for a short route to fame but a few are seriously talented and offer some original ideas. Laser 3.14 is one of these. He brings something completely new, something that no-one else is currently doing anywhere in the world. Word of his talent is rapidly spreading and soon he will have imitators trying to jump his game, jump on his style. This book shows the first vital part of his journey. It is important for artists to be acknowledged by the media and most importantly to go down in history books. Oscar at Lebowski publishers has certainly put his money where his mouth is and published a future classic.’
So I rock up and find I have to give a speech (see above) – which I hastily cobble together in the stockroom of the bookshop. Then I find out that I have to get up on a mezzanine and shout the words down to the masses, almost like a sermon. I’m introduced as “the world’s #1 street art writer”, which is exactly why my next book is about LA and the Hollywood film system.
Michel van Rijn and King Adz under the red, red lights...
The speech goes down well – I think the Dutch are very polite and kind – and then I’m outside schmoozing and shooting the breeze (filming an interview with a documentary crew who are – rather foolishly – making yet another doc about street art). This is when my old pal Michel van Rijn strolls up looking like the rude boy he is. We go way back and are mad tight and Michel is one of the world’s last true adventurers: art smuggler, forger, stolen antiquities hunter, multi-millionaire playboy. He’s a larger-than life character with a heart of gold, and I’m truly happy to see him.
We mooch off to a pavement bar where Michel begins to tackle a long line of double Bloody Mary’s without any visible effect. He fills me in on his latest accomplishments, none of which I can speak about, let alone write about here. Let’s just say that he’s got his fingers in a lot of pies and one of the biggest and most complete collections of religious art in the world. He also has his only private jet and chauffeur driven Bentley, which is now completely at my disposal.
Then half of the people from the book launch rock up and we’ve got it all going on. Michel holds court and regales his (now considerable) audience with his swashbuckling tales: a writer’s dreamtime.
The London Police working miracles in their varshtat...
The Bentley drops me off and I’m tucked up in bed by midnight. I’m up and about for a visit to The London Police, the now legendary Amsterdam-based street artists, known as Chaz and Bob to their mums. They are so relaxed and laidback that they let me shoot some film of them working together on a single canvas. Time flies and I have to shoot off for afternoon tea with Michel who is entertaining some Russian billionaires in the Golden Tulip Hotel terrace on the Apollo canal. The sun is shining and I pass a few hours being looked after completely, hanging with some unusual, but very interesting company. If I ever go to Moscow, let’s say I’m sorted!
Quote of the day:
‘I’m a good friend of the Peruvian minister of justice,’ Michel van Rijn
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Unless of course you count the 1960 civil unrest in Paris as the breeding ground for street art, ask Blek THE founding father of stencil graffiti.