Kraita317
- 3 days ago
- 3 min read
Kraita317 is a Romanian artist based in Florence. He grew up in Brașov painting trains and doing graffiti, and after moving to Italy he dropped the letters and started working with colour and geometric forms. He collects materials from the street, old posters, metal doors, construction boards, and paints on them. Most of the work is already done in his head before he starts.
We talked about his years in graffiti, what changed when he got to Florence, why he works without words, and how he chooses and reworks the materials.
Q: When did making work without words become important for you?
A: Words have immense power. My challenge was to find a formula capable of expressing emotion and research without resorting to verbal language. I believe color can transcend words. A color is already a sign: it carries with it meanings, vibrations, shared memories. Yellow, for example, evokes energy, optimism, happiness, creativity, renewal. In this sense, I draw upon Umberto Eco's vision of semiotics: every sign is an open system, in which meaning is never fixed, but is constructed in the gaze of the observer. My work thrives precisely in this tension between intention and interpretation.
Q: You grew up in Brașov and later moved to Florence. How did that change the way you work?
A: Before moving to Florence, from Brașov, I had a different relationship with urban art. In those years, I worked extensively with letters—perhaps from there, a trace is still present in my research—I painted trains and was immersed in the graffiti scene. After moving to Florence in 2020, I studied the city and saw the difference in historical and visual significance, thus I realized I had to find another language to intervene in public spaces and change my artistic approach. Meeting local artists was crucial: it opened me to new expressive possibilities, where image, form, and color become central tools. From there, a process of transformation began and that came with bringing something new to the scene.
Q: The street is still a big part of your work. Why do you keep going back to it?
A: Passion and dedication are the foundation of everything.
Q: You often use posters and found materials. What do you look for when you choose them?
A: I use posters primarily for urban spaces. At the same time, I collect materials from the street and bring them to the studio, where I rework them based on the medium: advertising posters, metal doors, construction site boards. I constantly seek an exchange between the street and the studio. I let the medium suggest the direction, as if it had its own voice.
Q: You cut, layer, and rework what's already there. When does it start to feel like a finished piece?
A: In 90% of cases, the work is already finished before I even begin. I visualize it, I construct it in what I call my "mental Photoshop." The rest I entrust to the medium and to the encounter with the material.
Q: Your works are very reduced but still feel tight. How do you build that?
A: Paradoxically, the hardest part is finding the simplest solution.
Q: In works like "Written in the Stars," traces of time remain visible. How do you decide what to keep?
A: I also identify with a vision close to eternalism: all points in time (past, present, and future) coexist. In my works, multiple temporal levels increasingly coexist: signs of the past, such as advertising posters; my visual language in the present; and the future context in which the work will be inserted. Each intervention thus becomes a point of intersection between different times, an open fragment that continues to transform.
Q: What are you working on at the moment?
A: I'm working... the city already knows it.
