Riff 170

Graffiti pioneer from New York. Riff 170 started writing in the early 1970's. He pushed writing styles forward and adapted themes from comic books and commercials to take letters and train pieces to another level. Using numerous aliases, he eschewed fame in favor of style, and left the competitive street art scene in 1976, just as the commercial opportunities for artists began to materialize. For graf afficionados, Riff 170’s contributions read like a style manual; cracking and crunched letters, interconnected arrows, metallic imaging. As a young African-American in a hostile New York City just a few years after the civil rights movement, Riff used art and his love of comic books to respond to the society he found himself in. Many of his aliases co-opted phrases from the mainstream, reinterpreting them through color, lettering and context. Aliases: Worm 161 In Groups: Independents (INDS)