He straps on his mask, tugs at the rubber gloves and gets back to work. Mode 2 is pacing the extremities of the gable wall, priming himself for a series of moves that will enthrall his audience. Already, his arm is up in an arc, like a dancer limbering up on a bar. Presently, there s a delicate hissing sound and the outline of a figure appears on the plasterwork. Easy as. The graffitti man is in business.
Mode 2 was born in Mauritius and schooled in London. He currently lives in Paris, but his trade is international and therefore Belfast is also part of his manor. That s how he felt when he arrived in 94 and again in 97. Already, a series of murals, in interesting contexts like the Lower Ormeau, pay testimony to his presence here. He s currently working by College Square North, just around the corner from the Old Musuem Arts Centre, where some of his pieces are exhibited. And on this warm Sunday evening, the al fresco work is the best opportunity to witness his developing art.
This one is titled Shades Of Living . It s based on a vintage Latin dance soul record of the same name by Idle Hands, which traces the injustices of the big city, from penthouse to pavement. Initially, you d suppose that there s little relevance between New York and Belfast, but you d be wrong. Because Mode 2 has been hanging out here for the past week, chewing on the native culture, and he s about to make his feelings felt.
So, the right hand side of his piece portrays the developing side of Belfast. The Waterfront Hall is stylised to the extent that it ressembles an alien space ship. Around it, the new apartment blocks and frenzied engineering works picture a city on the rise. But that s only part of the scheme. As the chic boulevards take us into the foreground, the scene isn t so cute. The cars on the left hand side are cheap and beaten up. The young lovers have assumed funky poses, seemingly in response to the dereliction around them. In short, it s not the kind of mural you d normally see around this town.
This city is promoting itself internationally, Mode explains later. It s trying to profit from the ceasefire, and there s office and retail development everywhere. But there s nothing for the people who live a stone s throw away.
Sure enough, there s a gang of young kids standing by the wall, watching the artist with a mixture of mistrust and grudging respect. They re all carrying sticks and wooden bats. They might be local, from one of the terraced streets that lead from here to the Divis area. Whatever, you get the feeling that Mode is expressing some of their own sentiments. And perhaps he s also showing them that anger, allied to a sharp artistic sensibility, is one of the best retorts to your situation.
I ve learnt to paint with a can, he figures. My whole life s been about building up my way of reflecting on the world and then you pit it against other people s views and see if it has enough relevance. Then you have to be humble enough to back down sometimes. You can let things change and mould you, but you should also stand by your principles.
Mode 2 is perpetually alert, open to ideas. A simple journey to Lavery s on Shaftesbury Square is documented every few minutes on a pocket-sized Minolta camera. Same thing on Saturday night when he s at the Beat Suite club, upstairs in Morrisons. He s pulling out a fat journal and making sketches. He snaps the B-boys and fly girls, without anyone noticing. When he sees a drunken couple making their way down the exit stairs, he leans over the balcony and captures their squiffy passage on film. He says that he s got over 5000 such shots, all stored away in boxes. Many of them don t appear again, but he ll remember the pose, the expression, the unique style of an individual.
Some of these may be reflected on his large scale works like Global Warming, in which the various funky tribes take to the streets, stirring it up. Some of the local graffitti teams like Blaze FX, have been watching him in action, and he s been generous with his advice. He s spent much of his time at the Apache clothing store by Wellington Street, where many of Ulster s subcultures hang out. He s painted a piece on the the shutters outside, and Mode 2 has been bonding with Chris and Lyndon who work there.
Places where people socialise is what interests me, He says. The socialising for me is perhaps even more important than the work. What I worry about is that people who come from outside will be coming to take over the culture locally. The people here have to keep the initiative, and they re welcome to any kind of advice I can give about that. I don t like to see people with formatted clubbing or social lives. There s no point having the money if there s a lack of imagination.
He has a good sense of the zeitgeist, and Mode 2 knows that hip hop culture in Northern Ireland is set to become massive. All of the allied arts, from painting to DJing and breakdancing are moving at a furous rate. And it s no exaggeration to say that the presence of Mode 2, his mentorship, his art and his advice, have been highly influential.
Some day, our walls will be cool again. n