Damn, those building renovations are definitely better than the image. But in all seriousness, you cant keep a straight face and compare a building being worked on to a finished piece of artwork, can you? Mind you, mid-construction of this I thought it looked amazing:
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I think that looks like a hideous corporate legionella-breeding phallus. At least graf can easily be scrubbed off or painted over - something like that building will sit there for decades, looking shabbier each year, until it's no longer economical and someone comes along and dynamites it. Each to their own though eh? 🙂
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Its actually a very well thought out and designed building, and it looks lovely to my eyes! Fortnately the owner OWNS the land on which it stands and has the right to put it there 😉
Ha! I'm sure building a luxury hotel in the middle of a godforsaken desert like Dubai is the most well thought-out, sustainable thing you can do. 🙄
Just one more example for the "all graffiti is vandalism" types. I'm not sure this did anything to brighten up the place where it was made, but it's cleverly done and very creepy:
http://www.blublu.org/sito/video/muto.htm
Before they built that gorgeous car park so that everybody can drive to Cabot Circus, there was always something clever painted on the billboards at the end of the M32. My favourite was a L'Oreal "Because You're Worth It" ad where they'd sprayed over the "It" and substituted "experimenting on and killing thousands of animals every year" (or something to that effect).
The bit of the Bath Road between Temple Meads and the three lamps is always good for a bit of billboard re-decorating.
I love graffiti. I like the fact that people are changing their environment to suit them, the fact that it reflects people who live there, warts and all. I like the fact that stuff like the daubings below reminds us that life goes on, changes, but still has its roots in the past.
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The streets of most cities are far more interesting than a portrait gallery. Why look at a flattering picture of someone who died a couple of centuries ago when you can see the still-warm leftovers of what's going on around you?
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Whoa Berlin is proper smashed, reminds me of Manchester 86-89 everywhere was tagged up, buses hammered.
Anyway love the old wild-style and london style, nowadays its all crappy stencils and street-art and 'proper' graffiti is a long faded away scene for all but the original 80's guys still doing stuff in their late 30's/early 40's.
I would have loved to been growing up in NY in the early 70's to witness the subways getting nailed.
I would have loved to been growing up in NY in the early 70's to witness the subways getting nailed.
I can't think of many worse places to be than NY in the 70s! But yeah, it would be amazing to see all this stuff appear for the first time.
Bez - Good work there.
I have no idea if Bez is being serious or not. But then I guess if he can find beauty and interest in surroundings that most of us would deem ugly, then it's no bad thing...
erm - i take it your irony filter is on Mr_A try pressing CTRL and F7 i think that turns it off.
The way i see it (graffiti - i'm not too cool for school so i will use that word) it is, like many things, an expression, much of it is too far removed from art to call it that, but it's an expression never the less. Music is also an expression - painting on walls and making noise, either singing, making music etc has been around since year dot. The way i read it thou is that if i were blind and wandered round and the graffiti made noise then Mr_a's birds on wall picture might be a cheery busker, (not too offensive, i'll chuck him a quid, he can play a couple of nice tunes) Banksy's early Bristol stuff might be some White middle class dropout with psudeo-dreads playing old levellers songs and a few of his own chucked in - that guy who used to stick up those A4 letters spelling out poorly informed political commentry on bill boards around Bristol would be a drunk tramp playing a mouth organ and harrassing you for 'spare change' and Bez's war memorial taggers would be a couple of drunk morons kicking a metal bin around outside your bedroom window at 4 in the morning.
None of these 'musicians' will get any radio airplay (except Bansky - who gets a record deal and cleans up) and they won't play wembly standium - there is a reason for that - most people wouldn't want to here it, let alone buy a ticket. So my gripe is, why the hell should minority inflict their 'expressions' on everyone else, it's just plain selfish.
I can't see how coffeeking can find the birds mural, and it [i]Is[/i] a mural, a mess. It was a lovely, cheerful piece of art that brightened up a rather dowdy building. Someone above said that much is far removed from art. Really? You don't appear to visit many exhibits of varied modern art, otherwise you'd know that 'art' covers an extraordinarily wide range of subjects, that happily includes grafitti. Pay a visit to the RA Summer Exhibition sometime. Most 'taggers' are just illiterate idiots, but a well executed, well positioned tag will make me stop and look, as will quality spraycan work. I've got a fantastic book on Japanese grafitti, and it's truly breathtaking. That train photographed above is a stunning piece of work, and I think it's clear when a piece is intended to be appreciated as an artwork by its creator, and when it's just someone spitefully defacing someone's property.
Or maybe it's just me.
Oh, and I support RB's original point in his OP.
Someone above said that much is far removed from art. Really? You don't appear to visit many exhibits of varied modern art, otherwise you'd know that 'art' covers an extraordinarily wide range of subjects
Maybe not recently - but my wife was a professional artist for many years and we met whilst at Goldsmiths, so i've had my finger in the art pudding before - And i stick by what i said the [b]vast[/b] majority of it is jsut plain rubbish. Yes there are some very good pieces, but why should the vast majority of folk have to look at something they just don't want to see, i don't go rounding people up in a bus, drive them to a hideous stadium venue and make them sit through a Cher concert do I? (refering to my music analogy again).
[i]I have no idea if Bez is being serious or not. But then I guess if he can find beauty and interest in surroundings that most of us would deem ugly, then it's no bad thing... [/i]
Deadly serious. Without graffiti the plaque would just be a relic. Without the layers of posters the shop front would just be a plain surface.
We all ride bikes, right? We all dig scars, right? Scars tell stories. At the other end of things you have glossy magazines with airbrushed, Photoshopped skin. What story does that tell? Nothing, it just hides things.
[i]Bez's war memorial taggers would be a couple of drunk morons kicking a metal bin around outside your bedroom window at 4 in the morning.[/i]
No, that's an engraved Roman plaque on an amphitheatre and most if not all of the graffiti are not tags but people writing their sweethearts' names - note "ti amo" in the middle. So in this case they're not drunk morons, they're average Italian teenagers drunk on love and escaping the crowded family house for some stolen moments. "Ti amo" seems to be the most common graffito in that area - in fact apart from a few gang stencils as you move into Naples it's all astoundingly joyous stuff.
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Isn't that great to have in your streets?
And the fly posters? That'll be the local hot-shot priests.
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All of which of course you'd miss completely if you take the blinkered view that anything that doesn't resemble a Turner painting can't be good and anyone who scrawls or airbrushes in public is disillusioned, or malevolent, or a drunken yob. But for good or bad it reflects what's going on around you. It fascinates me - it's real stuff. I end up wandering off round back streets whenever I visit anywhere, and don't forget of course that unlike most tidy and sanitised art galleries, it's free 🙂
Where's the harm in the whole urban environment being a living work of art? It is after all a work of science, of engineering, of geography and politics - why can't it be a work of art as well?
Saboteurcherie and ernie_lynch are having a day off then
Where's the yawn smiley
*Edit* Its Bez now
Where's the yawn smile again
Sorry Mr_a you were right! I just could not believe anyone could be serious! Bez your an idiot.
Or just a Troll.
[i]Bez your an idiot.[/i]
What is it that makes me an idiot?
And by the way, no, I'm not trolling, otherwise I wouldn't have a Flickr photostream where half my photos of any European cities I've been to are of the graffiti there.
I even think - occasionally - tagging can look good. Or at least interesting.
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""What is it that makes me an idiot?""
I just spent 5 minutes writting a reply, read through it, and realized that you (if you are not trolling) just wouldn't get it. 🙄
I think I'd probably 'get it'. But then I think I'm not an idiot. (Edited - just noticed I misinterpreted one of your earlier comments.)
In any case, why's it pointless posting your reply if I'm not trolling? Surely it would be pointless if I [i]were[/i]...? 😐
Tagging is just calligraphy by another name. When it's done well, it looks amazing. Check out the guy writing his tag on a pillar at 2:30:
Shoefiti, your graf/busking comparison is flawed. I've yet to see a writer who put a hat at the bottom of his piece and expected people to put money in it. Most buskers make me want to stab them in the face.
I did not say that they were - it was an analogy, in terms of likening bad tagging to art. A cat sprays urine to mark where it's been and it's territory, your average tagger is doing something akin to this, it is not so much telling us of some multifaceted multi layered society that adds colour to our own lives and gives us a sense of place. It should however remind us of our need to be able to create and express ourselves and impress ourselves upon the world in a way that sets humans apart from animals. Failure to understand this, to me, makes you an idiot.
Most buskers make me want to stab them in the face
I on the other hand quite like them. Especially a good Saxophonists on the underground. And if you think that Grafitti is enirely altruistic then i'll have to disagree with you on that point too. 😆
[i]I did not say that they were - it was an analogy, in terms of likening bad tagging to art.[/i]
Yeah, sorry, I misread your earlier post and while you were writing that I edited mine to reflect the misunderstanding so now it looks a bit of a hodge-podge - my bad 🙂
[i]A cat sprays urine to mark where it's been and it's territory, your average tagger is doing something akin to this, it is not so much telling us of some multifaceted multi layered society that adds colour to our own lives and gives us a sense of place. It should however remind us of our need to be able to create and express ourselves and impress ourselves upon the world in a way that sets humans away from animals. Failure to understand this, to me, makes you an idiot.[/i]
Well it would, but I do understand that. Furthermore I agree. Tagging is every bit like cats spraying. Whether or not to be overly concerned by the desire to 'elevate' all of society beyond that level is a subjective thing, and to be honest not one I feel strongly about either way unless it's manifested in violence or oppression. I do understand this, I get it. So we hopefully agree I'm not an idiot 😉
But as you say, all these visual artifacts tell us something - however small - about the world (not just the space, but the time) we inhabit together. And my point, or at least my opinion, is this: that it's perfectly possible to find beauty in [i]the simple fact that it's interesting[/i].
Looking 'nice' isn't usually interesting, but it can be beautiful. And interesting stuff often doesn't look nice, but it can still be beautiful. And even if it's not beautiful, being interesting is still an improvement on most stuff in towns 🙂
""But as you say, all these visual artifacts tell us something - however small - about the world (not just the space, but the time) we inhabit together. And my point, or at least my opinion, is this: that it's perfectly possible to find beauty in the simple fact that it's interesting.""
On that i agree with you. Yes it is possible to find beauty in fact that it is interesting. The world would be a very boring place indeed if we all found the same things intersting and beutiful, and being force fed sanitised images of stereotypes isn't healthy.
I live in the countryside now, I also did for a time when i was young. To many this was a place of beauty, i found it claustrophobic and opressive as it was all around me. This i now feel about much of the tagging in urban areas, it's all around you, and i find it oppressive, it ceases to be interesting (to me!) due to it's prevalence.
I'm wholely in agreement with shoefitis busking analogy, only I think my cut-off between acceptable and ****ing annoying is very much away from the busker end. I find the stuff Bez is posting is a disgraceful mess that truly degrades cities and towns.
And going back to Mr_A's point about the building, sure it's not "sustainable" but people LIVE in that desert and people holiday there, the building is created with great inginuity to make good use of the available energy and the structure is full of simple and clever creations such as harmonic dampers to reduce wind-induced sway etc. I find beauty in that creation and application of the technology to solve a problem. I guess its my "Banksy" and most normal houses and car parks are your average street graffiti. But then my view of the building is not "tainted" by its use or its intention, I enjoy it for what it is, not what it is trying to say. Likewise with the graffiti, I see it as a mess (99 times out of 100) and really dont give a crap about the underlying obvious political commentary and questions. Some may say art should raise these questions, I do not believe it adds anything - I can and do discuss the political comments with colleagues daily without the need for someone to present it in a scabby painting as if no-one ever thought about it before and they need it painting on a wall to get it.
go paint.
I'm with CountZero.
There are some real fuddy-duddies on this site. 🙄
I find the stuff Bez is posting is a disgraceful mess that truly degrades cities and towns.
Oh dear lord. I bet the naysayers here think that modern art is all Damien Hirst-style rubbish, music isn't "proper" unless it's made by white people with guitars, and if their kid drew them a picture they'd screw up their face and say "Yes, well done, but if I'm being honest it looks a bit shit". 😉
Oh dear lord. I bet the naysayers here think that modern art is all Damien Hirst-style rubbish, music isn't "proper" unless it's made by white people with guitars, and if their kid drew them a picture they'd screw up their face and say "Yes, well done, but if I'm being honest it looks a bit shit".
Did you actually LOOK at the mess he posted?
Most modern art I find a bit overly abstract and having chatted to a few over beers (modern artists,not art!) I/we concluded that at least 50% of them just bluff the explanation of the work and just make whatever random tat comes into their heads.
I've no idea why you'd think my music taste would only include white men with geeeeetarrhhs, though I do like some music produced by white men with them, there is a lot of crap that out there, I dont care who makes it. And no, if my kid gave me something I'd be impressed, but since none of the above seems beyond the level of a kids capabilities yet is being done by adults I conclude it's tat. 😀
Im not keen on modern "art" and prefer music with a tune and meaning to its lyrics instead of an incessant beat and inane pointless lyrics, however that doesnt make me *wrong* in any way, it simply means I dont value the stuff you seem to like. None of that has anything to do with graffiti, an illegal and mostly ugly blight on the streets. Apart from anything, the "good" graffiti encourages little scrotes to have a go on every other wall in the area, leading to a total mess in very little time. People need to think of the consequences of their actions.
LOL!
Kid comes home, all excited and proud of their latest painting, parent looks at it, screws it up and throws it in bin. Kid is traumatised, and never succeeds at anything... 🙁
Some inertesting onions, and I think Bez has posted some of the most insightful and intelligent comments of anyone.
Im not keen on modern "art" and prefer music with a tune and meaning to its lyrics instead of an incessant beat and inane pointless lyrics,
In other words, guilty as charged. 😉
[i]at least 50% of them just bluff the explanation of the work[/i]
But does that matter?
A perfectly valid purpose of art (or indeed anything) is to make other people, the observers, talk. A lot of modern art is intended purely for that reason.
Inevitably, the artist creates something and then just releases it into the wild. What happens to it from that point is out of their control. The meaning the artist chooses to give it is worthless - it's the meaning that the viewer brings to it that's of value, regardless of whether they've been given guidance from the artist or a critic, and equally regardless of whether they've accepted that guidance.
The problem with being dismissive of modern art, of course, is that it equates to saying that the viewer needs to be fed a digestible lump of something. It's a lazy approach where all of the meaning has to be expressed by the artist. Bringing your own thoughts and ideas to something that's at least in part vague or abstract is an important part of the process. And the more you can put in, the more it can affect you.
[i]People need to think of the consequences of their actions.[/i]
Couldn't agree more. And the consequence of graffiti is almost entirely the act of distressing some very conservative people. Which I think is an utterly commendable end 🙂
The act of imprisoning these [strike]vandals[/strike] artists is merely performance art 🙂
Bez expresses my opinion far, far more eloquently than I, a iggerant country yokel ever could. Coffeeking just leaves me shaking my head at his narrow, conservative, (with a small c, of course), attitude. His reference to 'modern art' just shows how little he knows about modern art, as the breadth of it covers just about every style, from photorealistic to totally abstract via traditionally figurative. I love work by Gormley, Mack, Hirst, as well as Turner and Constable. And Banksy, and BELX2, Sklawl, Missile, Emar, SCA, Fate, and Shizentomotel. They are all Japanese grafitti artists whose work I would be proud to have on a wall of mine. Check out [i]Graffiti Japan[/i] by Remo Camerota, and broaden your outlook just a little.
Kid comes home, all excited and proud of their latest painting, parent looks at it, screws it up and throws it in bin. Kid is traumatised, and never succeeds at anything...
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First of all, I don't even know what this is. If it's supposed to be a dog, then it's the shittiest dog I've ever seen. F
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Ding Ding! Here comes the shit-mobile. I've never seen a fire truck that needed to be shaved. I would rather be burned to death than be saved by this hairy piece of shit. F
http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=irule
LOL @ grumms post, very good - I think the problem with this thread is that now you have a very black/white issue, which of course it isn't. Countzero seems to be a follower of art modern or otherwise. Mr_A seems to just disagree with anyone that displays any amount of white middle classness no matter what there opinion, I'm not sure where this is coming from, maybe he wasn't allowed to stay up and watch The Young Ones when he was 9 and he's taking it out on everyone now? I still can't decide on Bez 😕
Clearly the guy's who sympathise with the graffiti 'artists' should be able to make some distinction between art and vandalism, it really isn't that hard a distinction to make. For example some kids keep scratching some shape, not really sure what it is, hard to tell, into the perspex window of a bus shelter near where i live, this is graffiti by definition, but is it art, no! is it performance art, no - there was no audience, at least i wan't invited. Does it make the place look untidy, in my mind yes. Does it cost money to put right? I'm afraid it does, money which could otherwise be spent on renovating the local park maybe? I for one like art, and if and i am pretty sure that a lot of tagging etc is a social nusiance, not art. I may sound 'white, middle class, fuddy duddy' but i am in my late 30's have a wife, two kids, dogs and a house - what do you suggest i do, start listening to brazilian bongo music, smoking weed and living in a ****in teeppee? Maybe whilst i'm at it i'll 'home school' my kids and knit my self a poncho out of my wifes arm pit hair. Get over yourselves - people are different, and if you want to live in a crap hole so much move to Sao Paolo so you can wax lyrical about it's diverse and colouful culture, rather than sitting in front of your computer in the nicer cities of the UK calling people who quite like the original look of the local bus stops 'fuddyduddys'.
[i]what do you suggest i do, start listening to brazilian bongo music, smoking weed and living in a ****in teeppee[/i]
sound like u could do wif a spliff to me
Yes - drugs and parenthood is a great combination. 🙄
teetotaler then?
I only drink Absinthe, as i find it best to consume a product that gives me the chance of a halucinatory effect, a glass of wine or a beer just won't allow me the degree of visual/auditory distortions necessary for being in a position of responsability. Also i get the wife to mix it with Listerine, in random measures, that way i can be sure that i'll not have a clue of the strength of the drink too! 🙄