Photographer Gusmano Cesaretti, and graffiti artist Chaz Bojórquez

Bullseye with Jesse Thorn

The photography book Street Writers: A Guided Tour Of Chicano Graffiti was first published in 1975. To the extent that a photography book can be a cult classic, Street Writers is one. The book featured black and white photographs, mostly portraits, all shot in and around Los Angeles' East side. In Street Writers, you see a lot of young people – teenagers, children, young adults. They're sitting on bleachers, playing in the storm drain, jogging past a liquor store. It was all shot by this young Italian photographer – Gusmano Cesaretti. And pretty much all of Gusmano's photos have one thing in common: graffiti. Street Writers was re-published earlier this year for the first time in decades. Jesse Thorn talked with Gusmano, and Chaz Bojórquez , a veteran street artist and one of the book's original subjects. They'll talk about how the Los Angeles neighborhoods Gusmano photographed have changed. Plus, Chaz on his decades long career as a graffiti artist, and the thrill he gets knowing he's never been caught doing graffiti.
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