STREETPRESS X MARC-AURÈLE VECCHIONE, THE DIRECTOR OF THE FILM ‘STAR’

This evening a movie premiere for the film, Star, will take place at Verdi Cinema. It’s a film directed by Marc-Aurèle Vecchione that narrates the fictional story of a train and metro graffiti writer from Paris.
It’s a good time to retrieve an interview that Street Press did with Orel (aka Marc-Aurèle Vecchione) that was published in March of this year.
If you don’t understand French you’ll have to make due with a few short fragments that we’ve extracted which comment on graffiti, his well known crew, GT, and his vocation for film.

“In the end, graffiti is just that: a search for adventure. There was a time when people in search for adventure got on a boat and explored countries. But we are children of the cities and had to find something else to do.”

“There’s always been writers that are more well known for their scuffles than for their style. There were certain crews that if you bumped into them, you couldn’t back out. But it’s not those people who caused graffiti to move forward.”

“To paint higher up I stood on the third rail in order to reach higher than the door handle. All of a sudden I received a strong blow that made my fly backwards. My body was propelled! My friends have told me the story many times because when I fell to the ground apparently I was laughing a lot. It was a nervous laughter like a type of spasm.”

“At that time, GT meant Gangbang Tonight. It was more like a nocturnal delirium, sparked by our friend Stephen, the singer from the hardcore band, KickBack. Grim Team is the continuation of the of the crew called Underground Kings (UK) that I made together with Oeno and Smoker. Just like with UK, its goal was to unite people from different crews that had one thing in common: the metro.”

“When I finished my most intense period of graffiti I started studying architecture. While I was at school I worked as an editor. At that time I made a ton of videoclips for Assassin, Hardcore de Ideal J, and others. Then I became interested in documentaries.”

“In my movies I speak about Paris, and of the things that the capital is known for. It’s the point of view that I always use.”

“This is the story of a graffiti writer who finds himself trapped because of his problems with the law. It’s the classic story of a guy who paints until he reaches the summit with his art, and then they stop him dead in his tracks. It’s really a bit about a writer’s success: if the police start paying attention to you, then you know you’ve done your job.”