Magnet Mafia Interview
originally posted on
Japanimplosion.com

Magnet Mafia

by Matthew

I know this question is a little lame and over used but I still feel it is valid, why did you decide to start magnet mafia?

M: You start Harrison.

H: Actually, the seed was planted about a year ago when I was making magnets to advertise my own company for a tradeshow I was attending. Somehow I missed the tradeshow and I went to get a bite at Wahoo’s on Blake. For anybody that hasn’t been there, it’s canvassed with stickers and skateboard decks. There’s some cool stuff in there, but the exposed air ducts were completely bare, until I had an idea…

Fast forward to earlier this year, around January or February. I was brainstorming with my partner, Matt, we were discussing ideas for art installations that we wanted to put in the streets. We had come up with a bunch of ideas for things that we haven’t seen done in Denver, but most of them had some destructive aspect to them. We were worried about the consequences if we ever got caught in the act, because we want to make a name for ourselves in the design and art world beyond street art. Suddenly, I remembered my experience with magnets from last year and entertained the thought with Matt. We marinated on the discussion and went about our normal routines.

Another month went by and the conversation came up again on our way to eat at Rosalinda’s (which is really good Mexican food). I brought up the magnets again as we parked and right then it clicked. We decided that magnets were it. We discussed the possibilities as we munched on fresh chips and salsa. They aren’t permanent, they can get places other art can’t always get, and they can be collectible. Who could ask for anything more?! The more we talked, the more excited we were to start. The Magnet Mafia was born (a name that Matt came up with before our food even got to the table).

M: On top of Harrison’s earlier exposure to magnets in making signage, I have always had a fascination with using magnets to hold up artwork, pictures, scraps and trinkets. I have designed many accessories/furniture that use large areas of metal specifically designed to use magnets, before Magnet Mafia ever existed.

How has the response been to what you have been doing?

H: It has been 99.9% positive, nothing is ever 100%. People we have talked to have been very intrigued by the idea. They have told us that they see our work around town and they have started looking out for magnets now. One of our goals was to get people involved with their surroundings more, to make them pay attention to details. People in other states and countries have shown great interest in us also, so we have been sending magnets that we have made to other places to get other people to participate in our movement. The ones that aren’t into the magnets are really hard to describe, probably because they are so few and far between, but some people are just set in their ways.

M: The response has been overwhelming. Besides peoples’ enthusiasm about the whole idea in general, the artists’ response to the actual material and its diversity has been awesome. The magnet stock that we are using is responsive to oodles of mediums and it can be worked just like canvass. The big difference is you can stick it to many things!

How many different artist do you have magneting? (sp, I hope I can call it that)

H: Just say making magnets I guess. If you mean the act of putting art on magnets, 25 plus, but some artists have multiple personalities, so probably closer to 35. If you mean the act of putting magnets in the streets, it is significantly less, but that’s okay, we do a lot of the placing ourselves. Matt and I try to collect a few magnets from the artists to build an inventory, mainly so we have a variety of art to send to other places when someone shows interest.

M: Hopefully tons more to come!

How far do you want this to go?

M/H: We want this to be recognized as another genre of street art. We also want this to be recognized a collectible niche, such as sneakers or vinyl toys.

Which magnet placing are you most proud of?

H: I’d have to say one of my first. I was walking back to my car with a magnet when I found a good spot. I gave a bottle of water and a powerbar to a homeless guy and told him, “Check this out. Watch my back.” I climbed up a wire mesh fence and placed my ‘wrench and bolt’ magnet. The homeless guy looked at it and said, “I ain’t never seen anything like that before!”

M: This is a hard question. I guess right now it would be my 6 ft monster gun.

Do you find it important that this form of graffiti becomes a valid form of street art, if yes why?

H: Well, we prefer not to refer to it as graffiti, simply just because we don’t limit the art to just graffiti art or artists. To answer the question, yes. Why? Because it’s hard to find a niche that is completely untapped, and it looks like we found it. And also because we don’t limit the magnets to a certain type of art, it’s up to the creator.

M: Ditto on the graffiti part. I think that it already is a valid form of street art. You can put art on it, and put it in the streets (lol) – really the big thing is that it opens up countless areas to be enhanced with art that couldn’t be reached before, plus the observer can technically take it with them (that is, if they have the right paperwork, licensing, and valid permits)!

What exactly is the scattered art collective and how has magnet mafia partnered with them?

H: The Scattered Arts Collective is a group of artists that want to work together simply for the cause of getting known and unknown artists more exposure. The only thing the collective asks of an artist is time and effort, no money is required to be a part of the Collective. They/We have large shows generally every 6-8 weeks at a different venue every time, and individuals showcase their own works when and where they can.

The Mafia got involved simply because I was already part of the Collective. I paint and I also attend meetings to discuss ideas and themes for future shows. It has become a good way to get more artists interested in the magnetic art, so be on the lookout for work from them soon.

M: I love the scattered arts shows. I get to check out awesome work by local artists, Harrison and I get to do cool magnet stuff with people, there are always hot chicks at the shows. The drinks are nice too.

I know that you have been taken to court over some magnet placing. Why did you get taken and how did it turn out? (if you dont feel like answering this thats fine)

H: Okay, this one is for the record. First I want to say, don’t trust the bums.

The whole thing happened like this… Around 2am we received an email on our myspace page saying that someone had spotted a magnet on 10th and Logan. Matt and I had been painting magnets all night and he was passed out, so I decided to seek it out myself. I took Matt’s digital camera with me plus a few magnets to photograph. I was really excited to find this mystery magnet. I have never had to look for a magnet before and I didn’t know what I was going to find and I was determined to succeed. I canvassed the whole block multiple times to no avail, so I put up two of the magnets I brought with me and shot flicks. The other magnets I had with me were getting sent to San Jose. I put that set up in different places, took flicks and removed them. We were planning on and are still planning on burning a disc with photos from making these magnets.

Apparently at one point or another, this mystery bum started watching me, I call him Narc Nolte because of his celebrity resemblance. Narc Nolte was actually an undercover sergeant on a anti-graffiti patrol. It was the perfect disguise. I mean who would take a man seriously that looks like the drunken mug-shot of Nick Nolte? Anyway, he watched me for a bit, rummaged through trash while I looked high and low for the phantom magnet. Then all of the sudden a squad car rolls up as I was walking out of a parking lot. I figured they were rolling through routinely or picking the bum up. Nope, they were all against me.

So the officers jump out of the car, calm and collected, they ask what I’m doing. I tell them I’m on a scavenger hunt. Narc Nolte runs down the list of things he claims he saw me do, the officers look at my magnets and take my camera, and I was handcuffed (hand cuffs suck because they purposely squeeze them tight to the point where they separate your hands from your wrist, ouch!). I was written a ticket of my offenses: Trespassing and Posting on Private Property. I made it a point to ask if the posting was a graffiti charge, which it wasn’t, but you can never be too sure until you ask. The officers asked the sergeant if I was free to go, he said no, and I was loaded up and taken to the Denver City Jail.

I have a couple theories as to why I was arrested, and unfortunately, the one people commonly conclude to me is “being black after midnight.” Yeah it’s pretty shitty (crappy), but that’s how those I have told chose to make sense of the whole thing.

The way I see it, racial or not, Narc Nolte was doing his job looking to bust kids painting graffiti and he found me. He had wasted so much time (i.e. taxpayer’s money) watching me that he had to get me for something. Plus he was taking the chance hoping that I had a police record that might get me caught up on some other stuff. They didn’t even run my I.D. before they arrested me.

After all of that, 32 hours later, I was out of jail on a $50 bond that I think they considered as time served (I had enough time in the main holding cell to scribe Magnet Mafia! into one of the benches!!!). My court date was scheduled for the next week and I wasn’t sure what to expect. Matt and I took down all of the pictures off of our myspace page, just in case the authorities wanted to take a look, and I planned my defense. The public defender dropped the Posting charge because she saw the magnets as a non-threatening and an invalid charge. The Trespassing charge stuck with a $50 fine (trespassing is a petty offense). Matt and I were completely relieved to be done with it so we could continue with the movement. We had bratwursts for lunch.

M: I love bratwursts.

I was telling someone about what magnet mafia was doing and they brought up an interesting observation: the lack of ownership. This art has no owner. It has a maker but no owner. In a world were every little thing is owned or has been claimed by someone this art creates a stark difference. Did you mean for any of this or am I just digging too deep.

H: Maybe you’re digging too deep, but not really I suppose. Activists post things in public places for a cause and to convey a message, graff writers tag to get a rep or show presence, graff artists paint murals to display their talents and techniques, and companies advertise a product they want you to buy.

We want to put art out that can be interpreted like it would be in an art gallery, but our gallery consists of iron and steel and it happens to be the skeleton of the world. And really, to me, all art is really owned by its creator. No other human being could ever fully understand everything that influenced a completed piece of art. That understanding is for the creators of that art. All others just enjoy it and see what they want to see.

Sticking to the subject, that observation is just a by-product of the big idea, but we may have realized it subconsciously.

M: What we did intend is to create a unique circumstance where a piece could be created, placed, and then removed by any number of things: an observer or collector, by the anti-graff patrol, or by nature. It’s kind of a mystery until someone posts on the website. The true meaning of the piece is owned by the artists, but the physical owning of the magnets is up for interpretation. Maybe when we first buy the material we own it, then when a piece is created the artists as a whole own it, or maybe the artists as a whole plus the magnet mafia own it and it’s a weird sort of duo-force thingy, and then maybe if we take that piece to a huge steel bridge and put it up, maybe that steel owns it, or maybe the owners of that steel own it, or if the steel is city property, then the tax-payers in that city own it, and then maybe some bad-ass snags it for themselves cause they like it and its tight, and then they own it, then they take is to their house, and later have a ragin’ house party with 11 dj’s and 13 kegs and belly-dancers, and then some person at the party snatches it up cause they think it’s hella fresh, and then they own it, but that person had someone watch their back as they snaked it, so then technically a part of it belongs to the homie, and then the both of those people take the magnet to the woods for some weird reason and go on a psychedelic journey with the magnet as their guide, and then when they come back to reality they remember the magnet flowering into a magnetic super-being that explained to them that its mighty magnetic greatness was owned by everyone and no-one all at the same time, and then the magnetic super-being exploded itself into a million magnetic super-spores and disappeared into the earth to fully prove its point, and as they remember all of this the two of them look at each other and exclaim at the exact same time, “Magnets are neat”!