Brandon Bye Artist Interview: MORE PAINT Series Explores the True Reality of Seattle

“MORE PAINT isn’t about condemning or condoning. It’s about noticing,” writes Bye, in MORE PAINT. “Looking closely at what’s happening on the surface and beneath it—how visibility, labor, and survival play out in public space, and how people, especially those without power, adapt to systems that are often rigged against them. Everyone’s trying to survive. Some are just better positioned to profit from the mess.”

It’s hard to comprehend that Bye only picked up a camera at the beginning of 2023, as his photographs have the feel of a veteran pro. Bye is akin to a chameleon shifting colors as he delves into different artistic mediums with ease. Before taking up photography, Bye was a writer and a musician who would record at Crybaby Studios and play shows all throughout Seattle. But once the pandemic happened, musical gigs started to fade. Coupled with the fallout of a friendship, Bye was left somewhat stagnant.

“I didn’t realize this at the time, but I think I picked up the camera as… a way to grieve the loss of those two relationships, and it just completely displaced my creative output,” Bye tells REDEFINE. “What was happening with music began to happen with photography. And as I was taking photos on the streets; I understood photography for the first time in my life. This is how people express themselves with this art form and this medium, and it felt really good.”

The origins of MORE PAINT lie in Buenos Aires, Argentina, during Bye’s visit in December of 2023. While there, Bye encountered the phrase “No Me Baño” (“I don’t bathe,” in Spanish) spraypainted everywhere he went. When Bye asked the local community about the tag, he noticed how ecstatic and excited it made them, which intrigued him.

“The connection between graffiti and life on the street remained,” Bye says, reflecting on the meaning of the book. “When I got back to Seattle, I started seeing it differently. The tags. The tents. The rhythm of removal and return. The way some things get erased overnight and others are left to rot. MORE PAINT came out of that—not from aesthetic theory or graffiti worship, but from the questions graffiti raises. From the tension it holds. From what it points to.”

Indeed, Bye states that the book is not entirely about graffiti, although it ostensibly is. More than anything, it is a sociopolitical book, with a perspective to share and something to say, while using Seattle’s street art and graffiti as a backdrop.

“When I say this isn’t a book about graffiti, I mean that graffiti is the doorway, not the destination,” says Bye. “People notice spray paint. They have opinions. It stirs up ideas of disorder, ownership, free speech. But it’s just the surface. What graffiti points to is the deeper, messier story playing out in plain sight.”

“The buffed wall has a twin across the street: a swept encampment,” he continues. “Both are symptoms of the same civic reflex—to scrub away what unsettles us without addressing why it’s there to begin with. To erase discomfort, not the conditions that cause it.”

Bye photographs every corner of Seattle, from U-District and Pike Street to alleyways full of dumpsters and demolition sites. A standout section of MORE PAINT is titled “The Jungle;” it is full of photographs detailing the landscape and atmosphere of the East Duwamish Greenbelt. This place has served as a temporary shelter for people-in-need since its existence, and has seen increases in the number of people sheltering there since spring of 2024, according to MORE PAINT. The beautiful lush forestry is somewhat hindered by a lack of sunlight due to the tunnels and freeway bridges above, signifying two worlds: the underground where the unfortunate lay, and above, where the privileged of society wander.

In the section titled “The Streets,” Bye photographs houseless people sleeping on the sidewalk next to dumpsters, walking past bus stops, and pushing carts full of their belongings. These photographs showcase the everyday reality of individuals in these situations and how they live one day to the next. It’s full of powerful but tough photographs that force you to confront the realities of the world we live in and to see the people we often want to ignore to display their humanity.

“This book uses graffiti as a breadcrumb trail. Follow it, and you land in harder conversations—about homelessness, about displacement, about the systems built to manage crises,” says Bye. “I’m not here to glorify graffiti or condemn it. Graffiti is a signal—a way of asserting, of pushing back against invisibility. It doesn’t ask for permission. It just shows up. Like the tents. Like the people in them.”

“So no, this isn’t a book about graffiti,” he adds. “It’s about what graffiti reveals—what the city covers up, what it can’t contain, and who disappears in the name of order.”

A landmark ruling in 2023 by Judge Marsha Pechman barred the city of Seattle from enforcing its ban on graffiti. This led to an explosive number of new graffiti artists emerging, which upset some artists, as many of the new artists didn’t respect unwritten rules such as writing over existing artwork. However, in February 2024, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the Pechman ruling, returning Seattle to the status quo.

“Graffiti laws loosened, then tightened. Encampments tolerated, then criminalized. That kind of whiplash tells us something: there’s no long-term vision—just a city chasing optics,” writes Bye. “Policy becomes reactive, not restorative. It’s not about fixing root causes; it’s about managing appearances.”

“This project taught me that street art in Seattle is just like street art everywhere,” Bye comments to REDEFINE. “It shows up where something’s missing—public attention, affordable housing, a sense of belonging. It fills the void. What’s different here is the backdrop: a city wrapped in a progressive flag but cracking under the pressure of its own contradictions. Tech money, housing scarcity, a rotating cast of policies that shift depending on which headlines get clicks. The writing on the wall isn’t random. It’s an organic presence claiming space in a city that keeps trying to sanitize itself into something it’s not—or preserve the image of a city it no longer is.”

The foundation of MORE PAINT explores the hidden lurkings of the unwanted, to confront the uncomfortable facets of our society. By turning his camera to these subjects, Bye captures moments that make you question the world around you.

“Some people see graffiti as rot: visual decay, bad optics, lower property value. Others see a vibe, a trend, something to co-opt. The same wall can trigger a 911 call or rack up fire emojis,” says Bye. “That’s the world we’re living in. Everyone’s looking at the same shit and arguing whether it’s art, vandalism, or a business opportunity.”

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