Torontoist: Vandalist: Don Katsu

July 18, 2008

Vandalist: Don Katsu

Once a week, Vandalist features the best street art and graffiti from around Toronto. You should contribute.

By KATSU

NEAR RICHMOND AND McDOUGALL
PHOTO BY POST

By Posterchild in Culture | Link | Comments (16) | Recommend this! (2) |

Tags: art, borden, discovery!, Katsu, McDougall, Richmond, street art, vandalist, vandals!

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Comments (16) [rss]

[1] | 07/18/08 05:09PM
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How is this the best street art and graffiti from around Toronto? Someone used a device to basically pee all over a building to mark their territory. It's like standing outside and yelling your name through a sound-clash sized P.A. C'mon, put some elbow grease into it and find some good looking art. Please.

[2] | 07/18/08 06:00PM
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It's a snapshot of our great culture, I believe future generations will be examining this photo to recreate what was lost.

[3] | 07/18/08 06:01PM
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It's certainly not much to look at, but how it was made (with a fire extinguisher) is pretty awesome.

[4] | 07/18/08 06:15PM
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It's a shame you can only see the end result then. You know, on account of it being all kinds of ugly.

[5] | 07/18/08 06:52PM
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FRAT BROTHER #1: Fire! Holy crap, it's a fire! Quick, where's the extinguisher?!

KATSU: Um...guys...remember that "piece" I threw up last month? Well...I did it entirely with our only fire extinguisher. But on the plus side, now that we're all about to die, my legacy as an artist is bound to live on forever! Right?

FRAT BROTHER #1: (shaking fist to the heavens) Katsuuuu...!

[6] | 07/18/08 08:14PM
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Interesting. I'm living in Williamsburg Brooklyn at the moment and have noticed this same type of graffiti in a few places in the past few months.

In fact, there's a huge piece (I call it a piece, but personally don't respect it as graffiti/art), just as you come off the Williamsburg Bridge into Brooklyn, right on the building that faces the stop light. It's sort of the billboard welcome statement, right on a brand new light-colored brick condo building that has no other tagging/graffiti on it (except on plywood boards covering the first floor windows as the building's still under construction). About 2 stories up on the bldg, the lettering about 10 feet from top to bottom, sprayed on the building in black paint, it says "Katsu Lewy". Parts of letters painted over windows and everything. It's impossible to miss. Most people have commented that it looks like crap (huge tagger/graffiti area and locals have opinions on this stuff).

I've wondered about it. And seeing this post about something similar in Toronto, I'm even more intrigued.

[7] | 07/18/08 08:49PM
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Huh. It reminded me of the "high writer" that was going around a while back, when I googled it, I found the same katsu.
http://www.instructables.com/id/The-High-Writer/

Spraying with a fire-extinguisher seems like a step back.

[8] | 07/18/08 09:36PM
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Katsu is from NY but was up in Toronto at the beginning of the summer. I have noticed a couple more of his tags around town. One at Spadina and College and another around the DVP and King St.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/lletdnawohs/2558290839/

[9] | 07/18/08 10:19PM
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Interesting method with an ugly result.

[10] | 07/18/08 11:07PM
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That looks like Ratsue, a foreign knock-off of Ratatouille, the greatest movie of summer 2007 that everyone forgot about.

[11] | 07/19/08 12:31AM
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Wow this is really REALLY cool. I love the way he just wrote KATSU in big big letters on that person's house. So now that person can go outside and see KATSU in big big letters on his house every single day! Too bad Katsu couldn't make the letters even BIGGER. That would have been so much cooler.

The best part about the giant KATSU is how the owner of the house is going to spend his own money to to clean the wall. Hey - I'd love to help arrange for Katsu to go by the house so the owner can thank him personally. So if any of you guys know how to get a hold of Katsu, please post it on the site. Thanks.

[12] | 07/19/08 09:18AM
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^^ haahaa!!

[13] | 07/19/08 11:00AM
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I don't know much about art, but I sure know what sucks.

(it's this, in case my point wasn't clear).

[14] | 07/20/08 02:20PM
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A glorified tag, not impressive.

[15] | 07/21/08 09:02AM
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Yeah. This technique is growing in popularity. I've noticed a few in London.

[16] | 07/21/08 10:14AM
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Ugly tag. Hope the artist enjoys his jail time.