By Phoebe Reilly

 

Graffiti artist Claw

The most talented creators of American graffiti paint the town red (and other colors) in Autograf

Most graffiti artists aren’t interested in seeing their efforts preserved in coffee-table books—they just want to finish spray painting before the cops arrive. “Graffiti is a victimless crime that is for the people, by the people,” says the pseudonymous Claw, a 35-year-old fashion designer who’s been tagging New York with her claw emblem since 1989. “I don’t want to seem like I’m baiting the police, but I go to great lengths for my art.”

 

She’s one of the creative scofflaws immortalized in photographer Peter Sutherland’s Autograf: New York City’s Graffiti Writers (powerHouse Books), a tribute to the daring men and women who risk fines and even jail time to create their guerrilla art. Sutherland, 27, first got the idea for the project while filming his 1998 bike-messenger documentary, Pedal, when he noticed that one of his subjects was tagging phone booths and subway stairwells with the alias PEZ. “Graffiti is very anonymous,” says Sutherland, “and I really wanted to put a face to the name.” Though most of his Autograf subjects preferred to pose with their wanted mugs obscured, more than 50 members of the city’s “graffiti grapevine” agreed to participate. “It’s a secret culture,” says Claw, “but once you know one writer, you know them all.”

 

And thou shalt call him Since

That same circuit ultimately led Sutherland to the legendary Revs, who’s been covering New York with his massive blocky tag for three decades, and whose handwritten musings in Autograf offer rare insights into the subculture’s evolution into a fixture of the urban landscape. Despite the air of mystery, the author assures us there is one person behind the Revs name. “I was geeked when I met him,” says Sutherland. “There are only a few people I look up to. Revs is one. Perhaps Axl Rose is another.”