When I was 15 I used to go to my local bookstore and thumb through a book about train graffiti. I was too young and broke to ever buy it but I was obsessed with full flood photos of train cars in New York covered in tags. I could stare at each page for hours. Okay - it was probably minutes - but still. It set my imagination on fire thinking about what it would take to execute a piece of art on that scale. Around the same time my brother introduced me to Shepard Fairey's work by covering his trumpet case (we were total band nerds in highschool - I played the French horn for seven years) in Obey the Giant stickers. I thought it was so cool.
I distinctly remember trying to figure out how I could possibly express myself with graffiti. I fantasized about covering the almost non-existent public transportation in my small suburban town with fantastic murals. I was probably bold enough to do it - I just never had anything to say. And the logistics of that sort of operation always made me sleepy.
My curiosity for this illegal form of public art has never waned. While in Europe this summer it was particularly fascinating to see these modern day equivalents of cave paintings juxtaposed on amazing works of architecture dating back to the 11th century. And these days I'm especially attracted to stencil and sticker graffiti - the execution is typically far more clever and designerly than the traditional train tagging.
What do you think about graffiti? Yay or nay? My vote is yay.
Ryan is obsessed, he thought Euro graffiti was the sh*t. I have so many pictures from our travels!
ReplyDeleteIn my neighborhood, everything gets tagged so I'm going to have to say that I dislike it if it's my personal property (fence, car, trash can- anything I don't want being marked as gang territory) but don't have a problem if it's a bus bench or sidewalk.
ReplyDeleteIn the right spots with the right message it's the best form of public art. I'm sure you've heard of him, as he's pretty famous, but Banksy is a fantastic graffiti stencil artist working in London. There's also a documentary about him: Exit Through the Gift Shop.
ReplyDeleteIn the right spot with the right message graffiti is the best form of public art. Banksy is a fantastic graffiti stencil artist, you probably know of him he's pretty famous, who does most of his work in London. There's a great documentary about him too, Exit Through the Gift Shop.
ReplyDeleteThere is a lot of street art here in Sacramento, CA. Including a naked girl riding an at-at. I'll instagram some, @icats_meow
ReplyDeleteI say emphatically YAY to graffiti, especially when ewoks are involved. I think it's such a great, public way of expressing yourself and creating art that people really engage with. I have one great photo from UCSD with an Autobots logo on one side and a Deceptacons logo on the other and under each it said "Sign up Here". Loved that.
ReplyDeleteOh man it's so funny that you mention this because I tried my first hand at sticker graffiti today! Just a little girl with a scepter that I whipped up and printed on sticker paper. It will fade with the rain but I'm excited to watch it happen. I'm all for it!
ReplyDeleteLove it in moderation...and when it's not just some vulgar words sprayed an an underpass. I actually did my final portfolio for my photography class on the graffiti around Austin.
ReplyDeleteI say yay also. I love seeing art everywhere I go and street art has some great emotion. Plus I love all the colors! My husband is crazy about graffiti and pull over to check out a cool piece. He may or may not be a street artist himself...
ReplyDeleteI say yay. My favourite artist started as a graffiti artist, Basquiat.
ReplyDeleteI say yay. My favourite artist started with graffiti, Basquiat. He tagged under the name SAMO.
ReplyDeletePaige - It's the best, right?!
ReplyDeleteAmanda - I'm definitely not condoning the kinds of tagging that is destructive or the equivalent of marking your territory. However, there are absolutely grey areas which are what makes this topic tricky at times.
Sporadic Habits - Love Banksy and Exit Through the Gift Shop is one of my favorites! Here are some other documentaries I'm fond of as well: http://jeremyandkathleen.blogspot.com/2011/08/watching-documentaries.html
Miss Vandelay - Ooh, I'll check it out!
Brandi - Did you know that Jeremy has an autobot tattoo on one arm and a deceptacon on the other!?
Madi Moon - Oh, how cool! I'm impressed.
Corrin - Yeah... I suppose not everyone who creates graffiti is an artist.
Becky - So rad.
Waltzing Ophelia - Basquiat is my favorite artist! I studied and wrote a paper on the collaboration between him and Warhol in college.
I spent the better part of a year photographing all the graffiti in OKC - like 13,000 images or something like that. I learned a lot doing this and I spent a lot of time thinking about graffiti, talking graff writers. I did a Graffiti Wednesday meme on my blog for a few months. But, I'm kind of like that scene in Forrest Gump where he decides after all that time to stop running and decides to go home. I just stopped photographing graffiti one day. I think it is an amazing public art form, undervalued and underappreciated. I'm sure I'll return to my love of graffiti and photographing it, but my meme is on hiatus for now. Actually, I stopped photographing it after someone did some graffiti behind a MWC Walmart. I realized then that much of the graffiti in OKC wasn't really "saying" anything. Few political or religious statements. It was pretty and colorful, but I started to want more. My best find was some Sonic the Hedgehog graffiti, which was on a train passing through downtown. I broke speed limits to catch up to it. =)
ReplyDeleteBasquiat's version of him and Andy is one of my very favourite paintings! Have you watched "The Radiant Child" yet? I thought it was brilliant, sad, perfect. I have been trying to find a decent copy of his "Portrait As A Heel" to frame for my bedroom but have yet to find a copy that isn't tiny.
ReplyDeleteJen - I loved your graffiti series. I'm sad to see it go!
ReplyDeleteWaltzing Ophelia - I haven't watched that yet! But I will.
Yay! I love graffiti!
ReplyDeleteCool images. I highly recommend the Banksy movie, Exit Through The Gift Shop if you haven't already seen it. You can find it streaming on netflix.
ReplyDeleteI thought I already commented on this post, but I guess I just must be crazy. :) YES YES YES for graffiti!
ReplyDeleteI love street art and I've seen some amazing art exhibits covering the subject. The Art in the Streets exhibit in MOCA in L.A. was incredible.
http://www.inwardfacinggirl.com/blog/2011/6/8/art-in-the-streets-geffen-contemporary-at-moca-los-angeles.html
I agree with Sarah. If you haven't seen Exit Through The Gift Shop you have to watch it. It's great.
Sarah & Melanie - Ha! Everyone is commenting that I need to watch Exit Through The Gift Shop - and I have! Loved it.
ReplyDeleteI know I'm a bit late on this, but I've got some two cents that appear to be unpopular but I think need to be voiced.
ReplyDeleteThere should be a distinction between "graffiti as art"/"street art" and just any ole graffiti.
Most graffiti that I see is bad. Random tagging of names and cusswords and other hateful things, covering useful street signs etc; the gang graffiti that used to splash across my neighborhood (everywhere, the place was covered, paint over it, it reappeared - the neighborhood was gang territory at the time, and gangs use graffiti to communicate, like it's a newspaper stand); one day someone graffiti'd my fence and the wood was so old it sucked up the paint and disappeared the graffiti. I laughed. THis last week I drove down 23rd street heading from Cuppies towards Lincoln, and you remember that old medieval mural that had been there forever, that said "The Times They are a' Changing?" Well it's dead; it's been heavily graffiti'd over, and you know no one will repaint that. None of these things are artistic. They're just mean and/or destructive, and they're the majority of it.
However, the graffiti you showed? Lovely. But it needs to be both artistic and in the right place. The Womb gallery and the graffiti up and down the street around that? fantastic. The sly little stencil graffiti near my building of a punk girl dancing on a rain pipe? Beautiful. There was a street sign that said "war" under "STOP" - I giggled, felt delighted, then felt guilty at enjoying it so much. The graffiti I saw in Stillwater that said "Perhaps There Never Was Such" on a stairwell in cursive? Great; Took a photo. As a side... I learned that I really like it when I see chalk graffiti (the above was one)... because then it is lovely for a time, but the rain will wash it away... gives me a sense both that it is more precious in its ephemerality and more polite in consideration of the property owner.
Graffiti yay or nay? Yes to both. Whole heartedly.
Wow. I LOVE the Ewok art! One of my favorite movies is "The Ewok Adventure." My son and I dressed up as Cindel and Wicket for Halloween last year. Anyways, I honestly love graffiti if it's done right. I think it can be amazingly beautiful.
ReplyDeleteI posted more stencils 'n' spraypaint photos from our walk to brunch this morning @icats_meow on instagram :)
ReplyDeleteA big yay for me -- I recall (this is over 30 years ago) watching -- unable to pull myself away -- subway trains in NYC roll by, completely covered in graffiti. It was hard to absorb the visuals as they passed by so quickly; I wanted to slow it down so I could see more but at the same time the train's speed enhanced the hypnotic clickety-clack of cars rolling on tracks which is, to me, the ultimate enhancement for this artwork.
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