Lecture - Graffiti/Street Art

(Notes from Lecture)

The third lecture covers Graffiti and Street Art a practice mainly acknowledged later 20th century, though of course people say the first real 'Graffiti' is cave painting.


Urban Graffiti grew alongside Hip-Hop culture, especially in New York (during the 1970's), where the 'language of the streets were made visible', as there were many people who felt invisible. Graffiti gave them 'a voice'. By spraying on transport they were able to create a 'moving message', allowing their voice to be distributed widely. 


Graffiti is usually seen as a 'destructive' form of expression, a reason why it often gets bad press. This makes 'Reverse Graffiti' all the more interesting (in my opinion) as images are created by removing dirt from surfaces (such as the 'Clean Me' written on the back of, well, most vans) and in most cases seem to leave the area worked on vastly improved. 'Moose' is a known practitioner of this form.

(Notes from Lecture)

Though some graffiti has become acknowledged more as 'art', and therefore has been moved to galleries and suddenly costs thousands of pounds due to it's more 'political' nature (e.g. Banksy) it has also taken form in more 'common' areas of media, such as in advertisement and video games (such as  in Grandtheft Auto there is 'Tagging'). Graffiti creates very recognisable imagery and is used a lot to relate to 'urbanisation' and 'hip-hop culture'. The use of it has caused controversy though (especially it's use in advertisements) as often they are created virtually, therefore not being true to 'real' graffiti.


The style of graffiti has also influenced design. For example the game 'Jet Set Radio (2000)' is cell shaded being said to have 'a unique music style' and can be seen to be influenced by graffiti.




It seems things will constantly be influenced by Graffiti, as long as there is Graffiti in the streets, even the 3DS takes the concept of marking objects, and involves it into their 'gameplay'.