I SPEAK ENGLISH IF QUESTIONS

LAVA I II ALBERT MERCADO STRAIGHTMAN NYC MTA map Markers Signed (see pics)

Very rare art from un legend

If you know ? You know!

Shipping with inasurance

I was born in Spanish Harlem in 1953 to a mother and father who came from Carolina Puerto Rico which is the home of the famous Base Ball player ROBERTO CLEMENTE. Many thought I was just a light skin black dude or what they referred to many brothers back then as High Yellow. But Im Boricua from uptown Manhattan. I began writing with my brotherKOOL BREEZEin 1970 or the early part of 1971. We both love hitting the buses and walls, it is what many writers did back then, guys likeCAY 161, JUNIOR 161,TAKI 183,JOE 182,TONY184,EDDIE 181,COOL CLIFF 120,C.A.T.-87,HILT 505,CENTURY 120,JOCKEY 1,MAJOR 120,CLANCY 120,HULK 62,EDDIE 181,WEB 1&2,JEE 126,CAR 54andBORICUA 1(from the Broadway line) Were dudes I saw hitting the streets and buses before moving over to subway cars. I started writing STRAIGHT MAN before writingLAVA, it wasnt a name I picked but a name that was chosen for me while hanging out in the Bronx on 181ststreet and Baily Avenue. Both my cousins had nicknames likeJunbugandCaponeand decided to give me one, so they picked STRAIGHT. I asked them whySTRAIGHT? They said it was because I was very tall skinny and lathy. At first I was offended by others calling me by that name. But once I joined the street gang THE REAPERS no one in the group used their government names. The leader of the group asked what I wanted to call myself and I asked him what he thought about the name STRAIGHT? He said it sounded slick (good) but why dont you use man at the end of it. So I called myselfSTRAIGHT MAN. I never went out there and tagged up the name of the gang on the walls or anywhere else in my neighborhood. I always knew how to draw and did the first acrylic colors on the jackets for the members of my gang, which was something that was never done before. A year later I joined the BLACK SPADES and did the colors for the Manhattan division. It was for the group on the lower eastside, but I did the colors for the division uptown on 123rdstreet and Wagner Projects. They were the only groups who wore acrylic painted jackets. I personally felt they had the best looking colors in all of theBLACK SPADESdivisions. There were cats in our neighborhood that use to tell us that we had best looking colors in the city. Word got out that it was me who was painting the colors for the group. My younger brotherKOOLBREEZEwas a member of theBLACK SPADESbefore me, which made it easier for me to be down with the group at first. One day they had a sit down (meeting) in the Soundview area of the Bronx which was where the main division of theBLACK SPADESwas originally from, and during that meeting they chose me to be supreme commander of the Borough of Manhattan and I took on that responsibility. I was in charge of four divisions and three chapters of theBLACK SPADESand held that title from 1969 till 1973. But through-out those years everyone called meSTRAIGHT MANor justSTRAIGHT. Even when I was introduced to girls, it wasSTRAIGHTorSTRAIGHT MAN. They use to hesitate.then ask me where did that name come from? The girls thought the name was cool or slick ( good ). Most guys that looked like me had nicknames likeFlaco,Iceberg slim etc. My name was unique because no one had it and I carried the name well. I came up with theLAVAor found the name in 1973. My brother and I just came back from tagging up the buses at about 3 in the morning. My hands were full of all kinds of ink and paint which was always a bitch to clean off. My brotherKOOLBREEZEtold me to use this soap calledLAVASOAPit was the strongest soap that they made back then to remove paint, ink or heavy duty dirt. I still to this day remember the look of the soap. There was a picture of aVolcano withLAVAspilling out of it, reading in bold printLAVA SOAP. I thought to myself..WOW! I like the way that sounds, Im going to use that name. During that time a lot of writers were using second names, even my brotherKOOLBREEZEhad a second name T-SIP. I began writingLAVA 1then added the2next to it as well (LAVA 1 & 2) so no toy would start writing the same name, which I would beLAVAthe one and only! Lava also was a name that was easer to piece with rather thanStraight man. The name was catchy and many other writers would tell me, I think you should stick with that name. I kept writingStraight manand abbreviated the name by doing SM for short. My art improved more by doingLAVApieces and slowly start to introduce these cowboy style letters to the trains, which impressed a lot of other writers in those early years and made me want to paint more with that name. I can recall doing a top to bottom whole car at Kingston Avenue lay ups in Brooklyn. I didnt do many top to bottoms throughout my writing career, perhaps about 5 or 6 in total. But this was the best. I painted a volcano withLAVAdripping down the letters. Its was a real Hot which impressed so many other writers at the time. I have bombed so many subway lines, so many yards and lay ups though out the city but Kingston in Brooklyn was the best spot to do master pieces. Atlantic Avenue was the spot to bench trains out in Brooklyn. I use to hang out there withBOP-BOP,COCAINE 1, andSUPER STRUT, and after wards they would take me to some of their lay-ups out where they lived. They took me to a secret lay-up which they would hit often, from what I remember there was only one tag in the whole lay-up and it was this cat who wroteKOOLKITO. I have written with so many writers throughout the city, starting with my brothersKOOLBREEZEandAFRO 2, HULK 62 a/k/a GREEK 501, JOCKEY 1, COOL CLIFF 120, JEE 126, CLANCY 120, HILT 505, MAJOR 120, PIPER 1, ROSS 1, SPADE 158, JACE 2, ROME 150, MOSES 147, SEX 143, LEE 163, SLY 2, KOOL KEVIN 1, COOL JEFF, BIG O 116, SUPER KOOL 223, CHARMIN 65, CHRIS 170, BONANZA, DYNAMITE 161a/k/aDR. SOUL, STAFF 161, A.J. 161,SUPER SLICK