MONTANA-CANS LOOKBOOK 2020

MC
What has been the most challenging artwork to make
to-date both physically or psychologically?
↓ HOW and NOSM
on the olympic
stadium in Berlin
HN
Physically it’s always the large buildings, like the really
big buildings obviously, because it takes a bunch of
days and the sun hits you and you have to wear the
mask and the life line around you, it’s a lot of physical
work. Mentally, I don’t know (laugh) it is what we do,
we draw and stuff, it’s a mentally… it’s not a psychological
issue or a burden, it’s not challenging, not really.
No it’s not challenging, it’s not like we’ve never done
it, we have been doing it for so long so we have our
routine and we stick to the routine and just get the job
done you know. I mean, it might be sometimes stressful
but I don’t know if it’s psychologically challenging
or something (laugh).
MC
By the looks of your gallery work, it appears as if you
are as comfortable with indoor artmaking as outdoor
art making. Do your ideas for studio / gallery work
stem from the same origins as your outdoor work? Do
you try or want to separate them in any way or is it all
the same visual conversation?
If you look too much at
other artists your work will
change and starts looking
like other people stuff
HN
We can use stuff from the studio to do outdoors and
stuff we do outdoors we bring back to the studio. You
pick up ideas and learn from certain mistakes like
doing a wall or doing something in the studio you know.
You applied it on both so.
MC
Is there any artist or art makers that inspire you guys a
lot? Does art from the streets inspire you or is gallery
work more engaging for you as viewers?
HN
There are great artists out there in general, regardless
of backgrounds you know, artist graffiti or street
art or fine art or anything you know. We have tons of
books in the studio from all kind of genres of art you
know. I guess that people’s achievements and work
effects inspire us you know, when somebody does a
lot of great projects you know, it’s like something to
you know, just try for, do that too you know. There are
too many artists out there to just pick one by now you
know. If you look too much at other artists your work
will change and starts looking like other people stuff
so you don’t want that. It’s not inspiring anymore, it’s
gonna influence you.
MC
We assume your move to NYC in 1999 and your work
with the TATS crew must have been a massive step
for your careers. But was it a big change for your life
quality? Your origins from Spain, Germany and all the
countries you have travelled to must have given you a
sense of what it means to live somewhere else. What
makes living in New York enjoyable for you?
HN
TATS crew definitely helped us a lot when we moved to
New York, one, they gave us work so we could actually
support ourselves. We have done tons of tons of
projects with them hundreds of videos, I don’t know
how many videos, but like ten fifteen videos for like superstar,
musicians, we’ve done nationwide campaigns.
So as far as the job was, it was very multifaceted and
we’ve done quite a lot of that, but at some point it was
just too much of the same work and it became less
about what our art was looking like but it was more
about what the agencies or the people that hired us
wanted us to do you know. And at some point, it was
38 Interview HowNOSM IN PARIS