Artists strive to create complete memory of their late friend

Peter Berry Memorial Scholarship Benefit, with Seel Fresh, Babble,Matlock, I.L. and more

*10 p.m. Saturday

*Morseland, 1218 W. Morse

*Tickets, $10 (21-over show)

*(773) 764-8900

No one knows exactly what happened on the CTA Red Line tracksbetween Morse and Jarvis late at night on Aug. 16, 2004, but by themorning the word had started to spread.

Peter Berry, 22, known to some as an art student and a member ofthe U.S. Army Reserves, to others as the graffiti writer King Kaiser(or just Kiser or even Kyser), and known to thousands of others onlyby the vandalism he'd created, was dead.

A mother who had pleaded with her son to stop doing graffiti hadlost him. A crew of graffiti writers had lost one of their most well-known friends. Chicago's hip-hop community had lost one of its own.And the letters pages of the city's papers flared with emotionssparked by graffiti.

Now, a year later, Berry's family and friends are working toensure his legacy is one that supports the arts -- the legal arts --and that the memory of Berry is one of a young artist on the rise,rather than of a clandestine vandal who thrived in the shadows.

On Saturday night, several Chicago performers -- some of whom grewup in the Evanston hip-hop circles that attracted Berry at a youngage, some who did graffiti with him and some who just believe hismemory holds something positive -- will give a concert to benefit thePeter Berry Memorial Scholarship.

The scholarship, started by Berry's mother, Cinda Cason, is giveneach spring to the Student's Choice Award winner of the AmericanAcademy of Art spring show.

"We all know that Peter was a graffiti artist," Cason says, addingthat this was a point of contention between the two. "But I want hisfriends and everyone to know he followed his dream to the academy. Hewent with that extreme confidence he had. He was fearless with hisart."

Seel Fresh, a Chicago rapper who says he did graffiti with Berryand refers to his fallen friend as "Kaiser," says this fearlessnessand confidence is what made Berry a "king" of Chicago graffiti.

"Kaiser," he says using Berry's graffiti name, "never did anythinglittle. Everything he did, he did big. He wouldn't do 2-foot[pieces]; he'd do 7-foot [pieces]."

Seel says that Berry had unrelenting creativity in style and inhis vision, adding, "He'd do things that no one else would evenimagine doing and he had styles that no one else had."

Beyond graffiti, Seel Fresh says, Berry endeared himself to hisfriends with his commitment and selflessness.

"Before he died, I had just started recording my album," SeelFresh says. "I played him just a few songs and he told me he wantedto do all of the promotion for it, he wanted to be my street team. Hesaid, 'We'll do this [promotion] unlike what has ever done before.'Now when I work on my music, it's like I'm keeping a promise toKaiser."

Cason says this provides just a glimpse of who her son really was.

"The most amazing thing about Peter was that at his age he wasabsolutely authentic," she says. "He had a passion for life."

And, she added, he was dedicated to his art.

"I remember I asked him to take a day off before Thanksgiving, andbefore I could finish he said, 'No,' he didn't want to miss school,"Cason says. "He wanted that discipline the academy was giving him. Itwas like it was harnessing that creativity."

David Jakubiak is a local free-lance writer.