By JRS
“Once upon a time, long before technology created an online global community, graffiti was a highly localized art form. Be it on the subway or in the street, graffiti was available only to those who crossed its path. Though photographs were shot and circulated amongst those in the know and sometimes even made it out into the world through early books and magazines, the truly exclusive were given to circulating the piecebook, an iconic black sketchbook with heavy stock paper, perfect for showcasing the most personal forms of marker-based artwork.”
Such is our introduction to Piecebook Reloaded, a new book on graffiti that’s just hit shelves. Like its predecessor, Sacha Jenkins and David Villorente’s Piecebook Reloaded recreates the look and feel of those elusive sketchbooks. Featuring the work of more than 50 graffiti legends, Piecebook Reloaded delivers the best of the best in its most confidential expression.
Ghost RIS, 2005
Leafing through the thick pages, you’re surprised that the ink from the pages isn’t running off on your hands. The quality of this book is astounding; the authenticity unparalleled in any comparable titles. Not since Henry Chalfant’s 1988 Subway Art has a graffiti book rang so true. Graffiti aficionado Carlo McCormick chimes in, “Surely the work of fanatical scholars, somewhere between the Holy Grail and the Rosetta Stone for the great secrecy that lurks in public, Piecebook is the definitive distillation of one of contemporary culture’s most enduring folk arts.”
“There’s nothing more honest than a drawing not intended for the world to see,” author Sacha Jenkins astutely observes. “The images culled for this tome have been through fire, having traveled borough to borough, bounding hand to hand, surviving the good and the bad that three-dimensional New York life can offer. Here we are, mustard stains and all.”
Pure and Noah, 1995
