I find this idea completely amazing. I would never think to do something like this. I know that you have been involved with graffiti. What’s your story?

Haha, yeah what we do actually makes zero sense. We hang off the sides of buildings for way too many hours for way too many days in all weather conditions but we all really love what do. I was into graffiti for a while and what I liked most about it was doing what I wanted on my own terms and being totally responsible for the outcome. That's what's cool about what we do at Colossal, to this day that's were the roots of the company are at.

I got into painting walls in the mid 90's in Portland Oregon, there was a company there who did really prolific work all up and down the west coast and at some point I got lucky and made friends with one of the painters who got me in the door, his names Patrick Mcgregor who is one of the industry's best walldogs ever and also happens still to be one of my greatest friends. I made a mess there, was late all the time cause I was out late being a dummy. I was a general thorn in my bosses side for a few years before he got tired of putting up with my BS and shit canned me. (In my defense I was doing a great job;)

After that I moved around the US for about 10 years working for as many different company's as I could for as long as there was work. One place I always remember working was in SF, the whole crew were Mexican dudes who only spoke Spanish and one 70 year old Mormon guy who's greatest achievement in life would have been to convert me to his religion. That whole sideshow made for a lot of fun days working in shitty weather learning and trying to get it done.

In 2004 I moved to NY and started Colossal Media with my 2 friends and partners Adrian Moeller and Patrick Elasick.

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I read that you had some inspiration from the wall dogs of the 1920-40’s. Who were they and how else did this idea come about? ‍

Well were all kinda the same guy. Walldogs the generic term that's used for someone who paints billboards all day. It comes from the idea that you get chained to a wall and never come down.

What's really cool about our team is that we've got a direct lineage dating back to the mid 1960's all working in the shop today. To give that more perspective our oldest painter is pushing 75 and can still keep up with the 6 generations of painters that are at the youngest 20 years old and just getting started.

How does one of your amazing artists even begin this process and how long does it usually take to complete?

Well first I gotta say that none of what you see gets done without the crew that we have here. These guys are without a doubt the most versatile and skilled walldogs the industry has ever seen. There's nothing that they can't do and that makes the rest way easier to manage.

Our projects on average take 4 days to complete, the complicated part is coordinating all of those projects. We do more than 300 murals in 18 different cities across the US with 16 painters. Every projects got a reason why it can't happen so we rely on guys who have an "us against everything" mentality. Were also real good at planning for everything but there's no way around the fact that we're at mercy of our environment.

Personally we think painted outdoor advertising making a huge resurgence. We think it’s an amazing concept. What do you have to say to people who think painted outdoor advertising is a dying art?‍

Thanks to you and look around.

Also, what do you have to say to all the other artists who think they could do it “better.” (We totally don’t think they can. This work looks HARD.)

Send them our way, we're always looking for more talent. A day in the life kinda looks like this.. Show up at 5:30am, carry 5,000 pounds of scaffolding to the roof of a 12 story building, install said scaffolding in 40 mile an hour wind, 2 feet of snow, rain storm or 100 degree weather. Make photorealistic replication of artwork provided on wall facade that looks more like the surface of the moon than a wall while standing on a manually operated scaffolding that's 28 inches wide. Fit that into not enough time while teaching an apprentice to be able to do the same as you (hopefully sooner than later) and repeat 300 times for the duration of your 30+ career with Colossal. Our address is 85 wythe, see you in the morning:)

We see that you’ve done work for big names like IFC, Vans, BBC, Blue Moon etc. (your list goes on and on!) Who are your favorite clients to work for?

I love anyone who loves hand paint and your right this could be like one of those drawn out acceptance speeches a if I had to name everyone but the projects I like best come from the guys who push the limits, its fun to work with people who get it.

What is it like to be suspended sky high, let alone working up that high? Must be an adrenaline rush for sure!

That's part of what we love, being in places that no one else gets to see, roof tops, stairwells, decrepit fire escapes. That's our office, we're still working on getting the climate control set up though.

This doesn’t look like work that any artist can do. What kind of training do your artists have? (They’re fucking awesome at what they do).

Ya totally, it takes a special skill set. First you have to kiss your personally life good bye. We joke at the shop that once your boyfriend or girlfriend leaves you because your never around then your one of us.

We do have a rigorous apprenticeship program to help keep up with the companies growth. We started 10 years ago with 3 people and now there's 35, we're also working on tripling in size over the next 5 years.

Apprentices are typically people who have a variety of life experiences personal or professional that define them as being the persistent type. We've got all different kinda guys marines, brick layers, art students (and our first gal) who is the ultimate badass going through the program. The program takes a year to complete, at that point an apprentice should know if they are ready to sell their soul to hand paint and then it takes 4 or 5 more years to get them up to speed and capable of taking any project on. ‍

I've seen some pretty big work that you've done around NYC. What is the biggest project an artist has ever done? Like literally the size?

We painted a 50,000 square foot ceiling for the artist Sarah Morris a while back. It took us 2 weeks working 24 hour shifts to complete. I actually sideswiped a Keith herring sculpture accidentally with the equipment I was using. Not sure why I'm noting this, I suppose it suggests the additional layer of stress that typically shows up unannounced to the party. One summer we were hired to replicate 40 Dennis hopper photographs on 8 foot by 12 foot canvases. It took 5 of us working no less than 20 hour shifts (36 hours was the record) 6 days a week for 3 months to complete. We literally closed the shop door at the beginning of summer and came out in the fall. Size matters but its the shear undertaking that makes who we are special.

You probably knew this one was coming...What was it like working with Banksy?

I'm like the rest of the world, never met him.

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