2008 Woodie Awards
Q&A: Give Up
Danielle Stillman
Issue date: 8/28/07 Section: A & E
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A: I've been told it's dark, moody, apathetic. It's important to me that I mention all the work is from my photos and my reference. A lot of 'street artists' cop stuff out of magazines and the internet and try to collage it into something new. I could just read the magazine if I wanted to see someone else's art or photos.
Q: Do you have any formal artistic training?
A: I took a couple of art classes in high school. Pretty much all I took away from it was the unit we did on screen-printing though. Kind of took what they taught us, did some more experimenting and ran with it. I don't have any college or art school background.
Q: What inspired you to get into street art, and why did you start?
A: I came up with the 'give up' razor blade image almost on accident while working on something else in 2000 or 2001. I thought it was kind of clever and had the potential to really piss some people off. I ran off some stickers and started putting them up around town.
Q: With all the questions of legality surrounding street art, why did you make the decision to become involved, even with the risks of getting caught?
A: I don't really consider myself a street artist or associate with street artists. I'm just an artist who sometimes puts stuff on the street. I don't really think about the legality while I'm doing it. Just try to keep my art high and my profile low. I try to have some respect. Stay away from independent businesses and elementary schools. No houses or cars. But call boxes and dumpsters and billboards and boarded up buildings are fair game.
Q: What other forms of art do you do, and in what medium?
A: I pretty much only do the poster printing. Sometimes some really crappy photography on the side. I used to try to paint with watercolors and acrylics. But I really sucked and wasn't getting any better so I gave that up a several years ago. It would be nice to know how, though.
Q: Where can our readers check out your work, in the Houston area and beyond?
A: I don't have a full time Houston gallery or dealer. But I just had a show at Domy, and they still have some prints. I also put stuff online from time to time at http://ingivingup.blogspot.com. Or you can just look around the streets.
Q: Do you like or dislike the fact that your art can be very temporary?
A: Everything is temporary, and I think that's a big underlying message in my art. So I like that the art itself doesn't last forever. Plus, if something gets taken down it means that someone either really liked it or really hated it. Either way, I'm doing good.
Q: Can you give us any sort of a preview of upcoming projects, if you have any?
A: I have a large scale legal street installation coming up in Austin that I should start work on next month.