Katre
When did you start writing?
I started writing in 1993 but I was already influenced by what I could see
in the streets and the subway. I’ve always loved drawing, cartoons and art in general and my parents are both artists. This is why painting was natural and familiar. I started on my bedroom walls then you try the subway and from then on it’s a classical story...
Where are you from and what’s it like to be a writer there?
I am from the 14th arrondissement in south Paris. Paris is the capital city
of France and the graffiti movement spread like wildfire from there. I
remember taking the 13 line with my mum and there were always heaps of tags and panels on it and I remember wondering what it was all about. There was a lot of street writing going on as well. I also managed to go to famous graffiti spots in Paris, sometimes with my parents, such as “Les Frigos” in the 13th or “La Petite Ceinture” – ‘the Little Belt’ – that was an old disused railway track circling inner Paris in the 14th.
Katre is a play on the French word for the number four, ‘quatre’? How did you come up with the name?
I had another name before Katre but at that time I was listening to a lot of
American rap and quite often you would find dedications and shout-outs on the vinyl sleeve such as “4:..” instead of ‘for’. Also, having a ‘q’ in your name or using a number was fairly rare back then. For these reasons and many others, I kept the name.
Tell me about the crews you belong to –SWC, LCF, TER...
My first real Crew was STS then I joined the SWC Crew (Fan, Cispeo, Soaf, Deks, Wedz...) and we painted many walls together. The OMT and TER Crews from Paris, Toulouse and Biarritz with Bore, Twopy, Metro, Taro, Haribo, etc. also welcomed me. Finally, the LCF Crew from Toulouse with Reso, Nes, Ogre and many other French writers team-up for massive productions in different cities in France, Spain and elsewhere. Each crew is made of friends and homeboys, not simply writers. Altogether it is a big family where everyone knows each other.
The FULL interview with KATRE appears in issue 56 of Graphoism magazine - click here to purchase your copy http://www.graphotism.com/subscriptions/
