To engage with VFR necessarily takes us back to the recent history of graffiti in New York and beyond and should bring us closer to this legendary writer who has been spreading his work worldwide since the eighties. For VFR has obtained that notorious status that all graffiti writers seek to attain during their life and career.
Recognized and praised in America and Europe, he has been working for more than 30 years under tags such as VFR, VEEFER, or VFRESH, renowned among all graffiti groups and insiders. Since the early age of 11 years old, VFR has embarked in a creative process, unschooled from the beginning and without influences, continu-ously evolving, with his mantric commitment to “The best is yet to come”. We could say that he already has gained an authoritative position by letting his work do the talking, as historian Kevin Monaghan points out. He is known for placing his works in the areas of shadow cast by the architectural features of building facades. His makes use of a combative political critique aimed at the mainstream world of “Art".
In 1998 VFR had his first gallery show at Martinez Gallery, previously in Chelsea, New York. By then, when the trains’ writers ceased to exist, and a new generation was knocking at the doors, graffiti was radically changing with a new understanding of its own transgressive conventions and traditions. For VFR, this generation “lacked the structure, what it took to be a hardcore writer.” Computers could spread visuals and text much faster and many of the new writers devoted most of their time to the keyboard graffiti. Advances in technology made communications different.
VFR never set himself towards the trends or whatever the masses were doing. “It really didn’t matter what was going on around him,” corroborates Monaghan. Always a private, mostly work-alone artist, VFR has made known his presence for years, always evolving, always beyond the trends. “Don’t think about it,” he says, “be about it, always taking it to the next level at all times”.
With the new exhibition at Martinez Gallery in Inwood we will have a much-needed opportunity to assess his work and celebrate his prolific career.
