Friday, August 15, 2008
Downtown Development District partners with graffiti fighter Fred Radtke
Posted by Kevin Allman on Fri, Aug 15, 2008 at 8:01 PM
This morning, the New Orleans Downtown Development District oversaw the removal of some unsightly graffiti at the former Texaco Center on Canal Street. The twist: the cleanup man was none other than Fred Radtke, better known as "The Gray Ghost" for his unique style of graffiti removal on New Orleans streets -- covering up the offending mess with his own offending mess of gray paint. (Gambit profiled the man and his technique in a cover story by Katy Reckdahl several years ago.)
The group that's spent years cleaning up Canal Street and the CBD working with Radtke? Really?
Valerie Robinson, the DDD's director of marketing and special projects, confirmed the partnership, but noted "It was actual removal, not covering over. We don't condone the gray paint."
The tagging, says Robinson, was 17 stories up on the building and had been there for a while, visible to motorists on Canal Street. Normally the DDD uses its own cleanup service, Block-by-Block, to do such things, but Robinson says that Block-by-Block can only plie its tidy trade on public property. That's where Radtke came in.
Robinson said that Radtke had approached the DDD about the project, but that she wasn't sure if they'd be using his services again. "No money exchanged hands," Robinson said. "He wanted to do this as a demonstration that you could remove and restore graffiti without painting over it."
She wasn't sure if the DDD would be using Radtke's services again -- or if the Gray Ghost would be putting down his primer-gray paintbrush permanently in favor of a more aesthetically pleasing approach to eradicating graffiti.
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Allman stalks The Gray One... dogged through the downtown jungles he spies chill evidence of its passing in the pallid spread of The Great Nothing... Gray Everywhere! Fred is a psychopath and living Avatar of the Great Nothing from The Never Ending Story. And armed. No. He cannot be trusted but guess what drives him nuts? Light bulb jokes. Like: how many dumb assholes does it take to paint over a wall mural? And even more he really hates it if you whip out some Rorschach Ink Blots, even homemade ones. No lie. He just goes insane when you ask him, "Fred, what does this picture make you think of?" But if his horrid dangerous maniac visage is just too much to face, Editilla suggests the drive-by water balloon attack. Make sure to hit the wall where he's painting too --or aim just for his work! Then ruuuun like Hell 'cause he really is dark and crazier than a barrel full of voodoo dolls!
