When someone of note passes away you are more likely to find out via social media before you actually read the official news headline. Such was the case with finding out that Stay High 149 had recently passed away.
I saw a picture of his famous "Saint" character with the words "Rest In Peace" suddenly appear in my Instagram feed and I knew that it must be true. I never met Stay High 149 or Wayne to those that knew him well, but I know a handful of people that had and they always said he was a real nice dude.
Stay High's work wasn't a huge personal favorite of mine or anything, but I always considered him to be like a living mascot for writing as a whole. His simple tag and character could be used for official logo for graffiti if it were to ever have one.
The dude was 62 when he passed away. I haven't read any single blog tribute that has really pointed out how unique that makes his work. A 62 year old man that still wrote graffiti. Less than 1% of people who participate in writing graffiti will probably ever continue to do so to that old of an age. I could even go a step further by pointing out that he really built his entire notoriety solely on tags. This makes him a part of an even smaller group of writers since most writers more often than not concentrate their efforts on pieces.
I am not going to attempt to give a history lesson on the dude since most of what I know about him is readily available on tons of websites and written by people that actually did know him. If you take away anything from his work it should be that if you want to become a legend in your craft do it well, do it everyday, be a nice person, and you will most likely make an impact in your lifetime.
