Chicago’s graffiti scene has grown up from gang tags to organized crews to permission walls – but the motivation’s always the same: bring beauty to the streets

by Tara Kalmanson

Invisible except to Blue Line passengers, a light blue “JOEY” scrawled between white angel wings once covered the rooftop of the Mega Mall in Logan Square. That was 1983, when the O/As, the Stylers, the Disciples and other gangs hung on every street corner.

Joey, a gang member of the Spanish Lords, died in the spring of 1983. He ran into an alley where a gang member was waiting with a shotgun. He died defending his gang’s turf.
	“By 17 I had gone to seven or eight funerals, and I was just like, ‘Wow, is this my future?’” says Flash, who is now 40, and was one of the first to paint in the streets of Chicago. Faced with the opportunity to join a gang in his teens, he chose graffiti.

“At that age I was thinking, ‘When is it my turn?’ That’s why I gravitated toward graffiti so much. There isn’t death in it. You don’t pay dues to anyone. You just paint.” READ THE WHOLE STORY!!!