After watching Harry Kim’s documentary about street artist David Choe’s rise to fame, “Dirty Hands: The Art and Crimes of David Choe,” I had the opportunity to briefly interview him about the making of the documentary:

JI: Having grown up with David and having followed his career as an artist from day one, did you ever imagine that his talent would amass him the success he’s received thus far?

HK: I never really thought of it in concrete terms. It’s hard to imagine a future for anybody, especially in the arts. But it was pretty obvious that he would be successful in whatever form. People just can’t ignore that kind of talent. Don’t forget that he’s also a drummer so there is more to do. From the moment I met Dave almost twenty years ago, his talent was pretty apparent.

JI: Can you explain how you approached the creative process behind Dirty Hands?

HK: The risky part of it is a lack of process. The feature film came unplanned since I had expectations of making a much shorter piece revealing a lot less of his life. They tell you in film school to pretty much script out your whole documentary. I guess I would have failed that portion of the filmmaking process. I spent years editing it, shooting while editing, and so the story was mainly crafted and written in the editing room. But aside from doing interviews, it was pretty much just run and gun and let the footage do its thing.

JI: Has David’s brushes with the law ever put you or your film crew in any real trouble? Was there ever a point in filming that you had to stop and tell David that something was TOO risky or dangerous?

HK: I would never tell Dave he was doing something too risky or dangerous. Actually there is one point where I would try to help him out with that and that’s with gambling. If you don’t keep the beast in check at the Baccarat table, you could end up losing everything. But since I was the only crew, I really didn’t feel responsible for anyone else’s well-being. Anyways, we both knew when to stop when we found that we would definitely catch some diseases if we had to wade in dark infested waters neck deep for days looking for Mokele Mbembe, the Congolese dinosaur.

JI: What’s next for Dirty Hands after the San Francisco Asian Film Festival? What other projects are you currently working on?

HK: More festivals. What else? But both the fans and I know that it’s time to finally get this out there. So enough pussfooting, I think I’m pretty close to getting it out there.

For more information and future screenings,visit the official site here. Check out the trailer for Dirty Hands below: