As Perenix [“Pears? No”], this early European writer began punk graffiti in Amsterdam in 1980. “In 1981, I fell into the halfpipe at Waterlooplein while rollerskating and broke all four of my front teeth. I was still in the punk scene and I didn't care about walking around like that for a year. That’s why I got the nickname Vampirella [like the horror comic character created in 1969], but it has nothing to do with my first name.”

Graffiti writer Vampirella (Valesca M.) posed with a skateboard in front of her VAMPI piece in Amsterdam on May 1, 1985. Motorcycle police officers look on. Someone had set the graffiti on fire during the usual Queen's Day riots (like May Day in Germany). Vampirella refers to the fire with her cigarette and her arm gesture to her graffiti figure.

Photo: Valesca M.

Even as the graffiti style developed from punk to hip-hop, Vampi's tag remained a simple handwriting.

Vampi is captured here removing sexist insults from one of her works at a club in Vondelpark, a typical Amsterdam graffiti location at that time.