Letters, streets and urban culture.
- 2008
- First wall
- 15+
- Years of letters
- 37
- Pieces in this selection
- SMA → BA
- From the mountains to the city
01Work
Work
A selection of walls painted across San Martín de los Andes, Buenos Aires and La Plata. Tap any piece to see it large.
02Biography
Biography
Argentine graffiti writer. Painting since 2008.
I started in San Martín de los Andes, a mountain town with no scene: just a few walls and a lot of drive. In 2012 I moved to Buenos Aires and landed right in one of the most intense eras of local graffiti.
I’m a graphic designer by training, and it seeps into every piece: the layers, the highlights, the movement, the obsession with getting it right. From the street I bring the rest: the side wall, the shutter, the concrete, the orange glow of the streetlights, the noise of the train and the music in the speakers. The adrenaline of painting fast, one eye on the wall and the other on the corner. All of that goes into the letters too.
My style comes from wildstyle, but I always look for the same balance: a writer should find the code, and someone walking by should still be able to read it.
More than 15 years of letters, streets and urban culture.
03Vision
Vision
- 01
Wildstyle was born in New York in the late 70s: letters that bend, cross over and become a code between writers. I take that root and think it from here.
- 02
Because I didn’t invent graffiti. The letters were already there. What you do is represent: take your name and stretch it until it’s unmistakable. Exaggerate a curve, twist a letter, find the gesture that lets someone walk by and know it’s yours without reading the tag.
- 03
And do it right. Clean. With level. This is not a hobby: it’s a craft you train. Every wall is a chance to leave the best you’ve got that day, and if you’re not up to it, the wall tells on you.
- 04
Nobody pays you for it. The paint comes out of your pocket, and so do the hours. The street has its cost, and it isn’t always just money. You do it anyway, for the love of letters and for the people standing next to you while you paint.
Walls get buffed.Friends don’t.
04Path
Path
- 01 / 032008
San Martín de los Andes
First walls in a mountain town with no scene.
- 02 / 032012
Buenos Aires
Moved to the city during one of the most intense eras of local graffiti.
- 03 / 03Now
Argentina
Wildstyle, letters and urban culture. More than 15 years painting.
05Contact
Walls, collaborations and press
To paint together, invite LAION to an event or festival, or pitch an exhibition or a story.
LAION is also a graphic designer and runs AIRON Studio. Meet the studio