“Cannabis and I have had a relationship since 2008,” Dago Arts told Leaf Magazines.
As the youngest of six cousins growing up in the wild city of New Orleans, Dago said he was introduced to it early on.
“When I was a kid, my older cousin came into the room, tossed a bag of weed on the table and told everyone to roll a joint because we were heading into the woods for a cousins’ walk.” He laughed and continued, “We had an incredible time together out in those woods, and ever since, it’s been a beautiful relationship.”
Born and raised in Louisiana, he can trace his family’s origins, he said, to when his great-grandparents immigrated to New Orleans from Sicily and opened a fish market. Being a third-generation Sicilian, he said he chose his artist name as a tribute to his grandmother.
“My nonna used to call all the kids in the family that growing up, so much so that some of my uncles have it tattooed on them,” he said. “I know people used to use it as a way to shame Sicilians, so people are sometimes shocked when I tell them my name, but I tell them it’s a positive way of carrying on my family’s heritage, and I’ve been using it for about 10 years now.”
Self-taught, Dago said he grew up practicing graffiti and was accepted to art school when he was younger, but his parents wanted him to lock into a more traditional career. Instead, he moved to Los Angeles to find himself as an artist. Since then, he’s returned to his home state and worked as a full-time artist for the last seven years.
Acrylic, spray paint and custom stencils are his tools. Like these tools, he sees Cannabis as something with no one set use in the studio.
“Some days, I’ll rip two dabs before I walk into my studio. Other times, I’m working towards a dab as a reward for finishing a piece,” he said. “Or I gotta wait for the paint to dry, and it’s a perfect break time for some weed. It all depends on what the situation and the day calls for.”
With such a vibrant style, it’s no surprise that the Cannabis world has discovered his work.
While he’s done traditional market projects, a 2025 trip to Art Basel led to conversations with Michigan’s Deep Stroke Solventless that evolved into a whole capsule project. Dago said they talked about how looking at a person’s jar of work often opens a lot of conversations or opportunities.
“The phrase ‘Jars open doors’ came up through the group, and together, we built this whole thing around it,” he said.
For Dago, the studio stays alive with music, movies and YouTube. During our conversation, he said he’s been stuck on Turnstile’s 2025 album “Never Enough.”
“It’s an album you can bump front to back,” he said.
Just as important, though, he said, are the times he’s working while socializing with friends and fellow artists.
He finds “the energy of being around other creatives and homies causes ideas to happen naturally,” he said. “A lot of my friends like that are out of state, so we like to keep that vibe up until we can be back in the studio again.”
Currently, you can find his original works through Orleans Gallery in New Orleans and Studio 4 in Pittsburgh, where he’ll be hanging work during the Parlay glass art show. You can also find original series and limited prints online.
