NOTE (June 2023): We just updated this 2002 interview with Chris Stain (his Stencil Archive), fixing formatting issues, a few typos, and making minor revisions where needed. Chris was an early supporter of Stencil Archive, submitting art for our early exhibits, being part of the "Stencil Nation" book project, and even sending art to sell while on the DIY book tour. Hope you enjoy reading about Chris just when his amazing career started to take off.

"I cut stencils as a way of documenting life; as a proof of my own existence and how I deal with that existence." – Chris Stain, from “Stencil Graffiti” by Tristan Manco (2002)

SA: How did you get into stencil art?

CS: I just kinda wanted to do something else with the spray paint. I wanted to do screen-printing and I didn’t have any money to buy my own equipment. I had learned how to screen print in high school, and I wanted to do it at home, because I had seen the work of Frank Kozik and I really liked it. I got inspired and thought, aw, I used to screen print in high school and I should do it again. And then realizing how much money I had wasn’t enough to buy equipment, I thought, “well, how can I reproduce the images,” and the best way to do it was to cut stencils.

So I started cutting stencils, just real simple. Actually, I had some old Fisher Price Learning How to Write stencils that were already cut that came with the old Fisher Price desk that had the magnetic letters and the chalk. I don’t know if you remember that.