Cholo Writing 

• 2009 
• Chastanet, François 
• Miscellaneous 
• Dokument Press 

3362565

Books

Cholo Writing

Latino Gang Graffiti in Los Angeles

2009

Art, Cultural heritage, Graffiti

First edition

136

 x  cm

978-91-85639-21-2

Cholo writing is the oldest form of graffiti in the 20th century, evident in Los Angeles long before the appearance of tags and pieces in the early 1970s New York. It is a Mexican American phenomenom with a unique aesthetic based on blackletter typography, used for street bombing by the latino gangs. In the 1970s, Californian citizen Howard Gribble photographed examples of Latino gang graffiti over a wide geographic area in order to encompass a larger variety of styles, with the simultaneous idea of portraying Los Angeles. More than 30 years later, French typographer Francois Chastanet travelled to the same neighborhoods to photograph the inscriptions of today.