Interview with OLGA

Partial Transcript: B2: Welcome to the Bronx Aerosol Arts Documentary, my name is Butch II (Two), on my right we have Pastor Crespo, and I believe in the house we also have Steve, Steve Payne and we got a couple friends sitting and watching. And I'd like you to introduce yourself to everyone.
O: Hi my name is Olga Correa, I'm a native of the Bronx, and I'm excited to be here.
B2: Thank you

Segment Synopsis: Interviewer Butch II introduces himself and the project, the Bronx Aerosol Arts Documentary Project, as well as the oral history narrator, OLGA.

Subjects: Art; Bronx (New York, N.Y.); Correa, Olga; Graffiti

Partial Transcript: B2: When you say native of the Bronx, you were born here in the Bronx?
O: I was born in Puerto Rico but I came here when I was less than two years old.
B2: How did that happen?
O: Looking for work, you know, the Bronx... A lot of Puerto Ricans migrated to the Bronx. And it was factories. My grandmother and my mother were seamstresses so it was a big industry in the Bronx when it came to the factories where there were women who were seamstresses.
B2: What year was that was this the 50s?
O: It was sixty-
B2: Oh early sixties
O: 'Sixty-Five

Segment Synopsis: Olga discusses her birth in Puerto Rico, her parents coming over to New York for work, and settling in the Lower East Side and then eventually the Bronx. Her mother and grandmother worked in the textile industry which had many factories in the Bronx in the mid-60s when they came over. Her father had a mechanics shop in the lower east side.

Keywords: Puerto Rico

Subjects: Art, Puerto Rican; Bronx; Lower East Side (New York, N.Y.); Puerto Rican children; Puerto Rican women

Partial Transcript: B2: What about your Junior High School, Public School?
O: Across the Street! Still there.
B2: What school is that?
O: I started at PS 60. That's between Prospect and Rogers Place. And then I went to I.S. 116 which is right on Tiffany so I was literally right across the street. And then when we moved to Simpson my mother made sure that I applied to schools in Manhattan. She wanted me to be a little bit more cultured and have that opportunity.
B2: That must've been an early influence for you.
O: Oh absolutely. She made it a point. There was no if, ands, or buts about it.
B2: And you wound up at what High School?
O: High School of Art and Design.

Segment Synopsis: Olga surveys her educational history beginning with the schools she attended in her neighborhood. When she was old enough to be applying for High Schools, her mother insisted that she attend school in Manhattan to "be closer to culture." A teacher recommended that she do something with her interest in drawing, and collect a portfolio to apply to High School of Art and Design, which she eventually attended and set her on the path to the world of commercial art and design.

Keywords: High School for Art and Design (New York, N.Y.)

Subjects: Education; New York City Schools; Public Education

Partial Transcript: O: The first jam that I went to was Grandmaster Flash and it was Theodore. They used to jam at Casita Maria. So that was my introduction.
B2: Where is that at?
O: On 163rd Street in the East Side of the Bronx. While they plugged in at the block party and then we brought it inside to the community center, I was there! That was my first job at that community center.

Segment Synopsis: Olga speaks about her introduction to Hip Hop at a jam at Casita Maria Center, a community center, where Grandmaster Flash and Grand Wizzard Theodore were spinning. Incidentally, Casita Maria was also her first job. Olga grew up alongside Hip Hop and speaks about what a strange experience it was to have Hip Hop evolve along with her life.

Keywords: Grand Wizzard Theodore; Grandmaster Flash; Livingston, Theodore

Subjects: Community centers; Hip-hop

Partial Transcript: B2: You were there for the burnt-down Bronx!
O: Yeah, absolutely.
B2: Yeah, I was too, but it wasn't a bad thing, just what we had! Played in the vacant lots...
O: Yeah, I got scars in my knees to prove it! You know, that was our background. The dirty mattress, that was our trampoline. The fire escape, we used to sleep there and all our friends would come up and put pillows, put the little TV there in the window. The whole summer we could chill!

Segment Synopsis: Olga discusses her experience of the so-called "burning Bronx," and how while everyone else seemed so horrified by the condition of the South Bronx at the time, her childhood memories remain quite joyful. She reminisces about the mattress-trampolines, and summers hanging out on the fire escape and swimming in the mobile pool truck, known as Swimmobiles.

Keywords: swimmobile

Subjects: Bronx; Bronx (New York, N.Y.); Summer Activities

Partial Transcript: B2: How did you move from Art and Design to Fashion? Well first you made it through Art and Design!
O: I am a graduate, thank you! A lot of people, you know...
B2: A lot of stuff is going around. That's a plus
O: I had to. It was the only way I was able to elevate to where I was. I had to. My mother sacrificed, my family sacrificed.
B2: Did you ever sit down with her and discuss the mission? What we doing here and what we gotta do or what we need to do to get where we going? Did you ever have that conversation?
O: No, back then we just listened to your parents. Listen to what you're supposed to do.
B2: No reason, just
O: You don't talk back!

Segment Synopsis: Olga discusses graduating from Art and Design and attending the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT). She also speaks about how her experience being raised by her community as a whole in the neighborhood shaped her own goals in achieving at school and her career. Her mother's profession as a seamstress also brought her into the fashion world.

Keywords: Garment Industry; Seamstress; Sewing

Subjects: Bronx; Fashion Institute of Technology (New York, N.Y.); neighborhood

Partial Transcript: O: So I graduated in June, I got my first fashion design job in August.
B2: Where at?
O: Elco Imports. So we was an importer. So we would get––I did a lot of men and boys, so Bugle Boy, French Toast, all those designs were mine. We did a lot of department stores: Sears, back then Woolworth's had clothing so I would do all the baby lines and whatever. So we had import from just different factories. And then one of my bosses, Eliot [unk.], his wife worked at J. Crew so I got to do a women's line at J.Crew!

Segment Synopsis: After graduating from FIT, Olga gets a fashion design job with an importer. She had a number of prolific designs with clothes sold at Sears and Woolworths but because the designs were owned by the company and officially corporately authored, she was never credited. Some of her high-profile work included a women's line at J. Crew and the Ocean Pacific silkscreens, including a life is a beach design based on california, a place she had never been.

Keywords: Fashion Institute of Technology (New York, N.Y.); J.Crew

Subjects: Advertising--Clothing and dress; Children's clothing industry; Clothing factories; garment industry

Partial Transcript: B2: So when did you first get the graff bug? When did you wanna pick up some spray paint?
O: Funny enough, 2019.
B2: Recently! Well that's not recent but it's recent.
O: Yeah! Because after the 15 years working as a fashion designer, I had my first child. And in art, in fashion, in practically every part of art there's no health benefits. And living in the Bronx there's a high percentage of asthma. So she was born with asthma and here goes all of my funding trying to pay for medical expenses. So a college friend of mine said, "why don't you come work for the city?" You know she had not wanted to do anything with art so she went into the social service. And at that time the benefits were phenomenal. And there was a pension! So I said alright let me do it for two years. And that's how I landed in the department of social services.

Segment Synopsis: Olga speaks about how she got separated from her artistic outlet in her job when she came to work for the city. What was meant as a temporary job in order to reap the health benefits for her asthmatic child turned into a 25+ year career. Going to art shows again and introducing herself had her old friends wondering where she had gone off too. Her lunchtime drawing notebooks became a portfolio shopped to galleries had Olga in a solo show in no time at all. Support from Wallworks assured she sold all of her pieces.

Keywords: New York (City). Department of Social Services. Department of Services

Subjects: Art Gallery (New York, N.Y.); Graffiti; Mural painting and decoration; Painting--Technique

Partial Transcript: B2: What you got––the little goodies you brought?
O: Oh yeah, so this is my diary!
B2: And in there is all drawings yeah!
O: It's all drawings for every night or...
B2: And that's consistent. That's what keeps you up that consistency.
O: Well you know a woman I work with at social services she says I need a release. If I'm not dining in a fancy restaurant having my dinner, I sit home. So sometimes I'll do colors of it where I express myself at all that.

Segment Synopsis: Olga shows off some objects from her personal collection, including her sketchbook diary and keychain-sized blackbook she helped popularize.

Partial Transcript: O: I'm doing workshops at libraries I have two coming up.
B2: Where?
O: Morrison and I can't remember the other one. I usually put it on my instagram because they give me the fliers. So I love doing workshops with kids because I make sure that the kids understand that big brother is watching. Do not tag up. Like I'm prideful that I graduated from college, I graduated from high school, I wasn't a teenage mom, I don't do drugs, I never went to jail. All of the above still living in the south bronx.

Segment Synopsis: Olga speaks about the importance of mentorship in general as well as in art specifically. She speaks as both a mentee and mentor. Having that support is, for her, incredibly important for children to actualize themselves, for instance to turn their tag into a logo and sell t-shirts. This is a lesson she already applied to her own daughters. She, for instance, enabled both of them to start tattooing on the side.

Keywords: Surveillance in art

Subjects: Business and education; Early childhood education; Mentor

Partial Transcript: B2: OK so what do you consider yourself? You already said you were born in Puerto Rico and you came to America at 2 years old, moved to Tiffany Street, junior high school, and public school. What do you identify as? Are you Puerto Rican, Nuyorican?
O: Yeah I'm Puerto Rican. I'm Puerto Rican. Both parents were Puerto Rican. Um, if you see my parents they're dark-skinned. It's funny because I relate more with black, but back in the 60s and 70s Puerto Ricans and Blacks didn't divide. So I don't understand this culture where we divide. Like I don't understand because Puerto Ricans are black, but, you know that's a whole other––So when people ask me what are you, both my parents are from Puerto Rico, I was born in Puerto Rico and raised in New York but I don't call myself a Nuyorican. If you wanna classify me––In Puerto Rico they classify me as Nuyorican because I speak really bad Spanish hahaha!

Segment Synopsis: Olga discusses her ethnic and racial identity. She describes herself as Puerto Rican, but she also identifies with Black because in her upbringing there was no divide made between Puerto Rican and Black. She does not consider herself Nuyorican, but Puerto Ricans in Puerto Rico do, due to her poor Spanish skills, which she only picked up when starting her social service job.

Keywords: Puerto Rico

Subjects: Ethnic identity; New York (N.Y.)--Race relations; Nuyorican; Puerto Rican experience; Puerto Rican women

Partial Transcript: B2: I got one more topic that I was gonna probably bring up. You talked about mentoring but from what you say mentors come in disguise all through life.
O: I would say that yes.
B2: Someone that sticks by you and really wanna guide and put you under the wing. You had brought up a mentor in graff is that your graffiti mentor?
O: Skeme is, absolutely.
B2: What did you learn?
O: Oh my god, so when I had my solo show Skeme hit me up on DM and he said––and I had met him at his solo show when he had––
B2: Was that that little spot on Twelfth Street... 212 Gallery?
O: Yes. And then I think maybe two years later I had my solo show and he follows me on instagram and I didn't even though and he said, "I really wanna put you under my wing," because me and him have similar styles. We have our name and then a character that represents us. That's us. And he's like, "I think it's phenomenal and I need to support women. We never take them under our wing like we should. I going to Chicago you wanna go?" I'm like are you serious?

Segment Synopsis: Olga discusses the role of Skeme in mentoring her career in graffiti art. He saw that they worked with similar styles and wanted to support more women in the scene, whom he felt had been neglected by the veteran men up to that point. He brings her to Chicago and immediately asks for 30 canvases for a show and guided her through the process. He instructed Olga on how to take her art to the next level with huge canvases and found street objects, which she excels at.

Keywords: Art galleries, Commercial

Subjects: Graffiti; Mentoring; Skeme (Graffiti artist)

Partial Transcript: B2: I got one more question: What do you think I say The Bronx; what do feel about the Bronx? What is the Bronx to you?
O: Culture. Music, dance, graffiti, fashion. We started it all, stop playing! Everything: Food, community, everything. This is where it started. So this is to show that every country is teaching that in their schools as part of their curriculum because they are so fascinated by what is the reason for that. It's home!

Segment Synopsis: Olga speaks about the significance of the Bronx to her. It is primarily an impressive site of culture for Olga, the origin of so much important world fashion, music, and art. It also is, of course, her home and she is incredibly proud to live here.

Keywords: Graffiti

Subjects: Bronx; Bronx (New York, N.Y.); Bronx County (N.Y.)

Partial Transcript: B2: I wanted to ask you to tag my book!
O: Let's go!
B2: I'll give you a page. Closing up, as the culmination of this project we're gonna have a big block party. Have you seen the Bronx Historic––that little house across the street?
O: Yes
B2: They're gonna do the landscaping and clean up the yard. There's gonna be DJs, there's gonna be art. I think BG might be a part of it.
O: I got a lot of love for BG.
B2: I saw a picture of him going back and I was like, wow now I think I know this dude!
O: Yeah we lived in adjoining buildings. Man, his work has improved 1000%.

Segment Synopsis: While presenting a tag for the BCHS archives, Olga discusses upcoming shows and projects. She is excited about her role as a judge for a competition marking the celebration of a street renaming after Black Benjie, whose death sparked the 1971 New York City gang truce. She also speaks about her close relationship with BG183 who opened up space for her in the Bronx Terminal space he is involved with.

Keywords: Tats Cru (Group)

Subjects: Bronx; Graffiti