City Art
I don't even remember how I found this website, but it's been a subject of minor curiosity for me for some time now and I don't remember seeing it come up on DCist, so I thought I would give it a shot.
Did you know there is an online community of graffiti artists? Washington, DC painters have their own thread here, complete with pictures. (To whichever gentle readers of this blog have an aversion to profanity, or to bad grammar/spelling, please limit your expectations to, well, what you would expect a community of graffiti artists to sound like, and click accordingly.)
I got curious in this subject because I started noticing a lot of graffiti in the places in DC I frequent. It's very obvious around the CUA metro stop, where "ROB" and "Nehi" have been busy tagging. In my neighborhood around Columbia Heights, I see Magic, Tragic, Ocho, Inca, and Nehi again. ROB is in a few other parts of town as well.
The thing that puzzled me--why I got curious--is that, unlike other towns I've seen like Houston, I don't see a lot of profanity. I don't see anything that I recognize as gang-related (realizing my knowledge thereof is limited, but still). I do see things like "Stop the War, Troops Out Now!" Sometimes I see some colorful stuff, but it's mostly just tags of names. ROB uses big, bubble capitals and things like spirals or + signs to mark the empty
centers of the letters. Nehi is a girl (according to the forum above) and sort of writes like one. The C on the end of "Magic" trails off to the right of his tag.
Graffiti is usually considered a nuisance, and I think if I ever saw any appear on the Corinthian columns of a federal building or on the side of one of DC's old Gothic churches I would be disappointed. But elsewhere, it's become part of the urban landscape to me. Maybe I'm nuts, but I've spent time pondering a piece of graffiti and wondering who ROB is and why he likes big, bulbous capitals, and who Ocho is and why he uses paint pens (I think?) on newspaper stands, and who Nehi is and how she finds the time to write her name everywhere I look. I'm aware of the possibility that all of this is much less friendly than I am making it out to be, but to me it makes the city seem more lived in and I think I'd miss it if it wasn't there. I'd miss wondering about who my neighbors are who find joy in painting their names on things.
And what makes me think that it is lighthearted to
a degree is the forums above. Under the main forum, there are smaller threads--most, but not all, of which are dedicated to individual cities across the nation. This seems to show that these artists are interested in what's going on in their own town. They post pictures and comment on them. Within the city threads, the posters are also artists; many of them know each other by name; some have worked together before. There aren't that many in DC. It's a curious little community of people with the same hobby discussing what they love best about it. They tell stories like this:
At any rate, that's my curiosity of the week, and it was more than I expected to find.
*Update* DCist takes a look at the issue.
Did you know there is an online community of graffiti artists? Washington, DC painters have their own thread here, complete with pictures. (To whichever gentle readers of this blog have an aversion to profanity, or to bad grammar/spelling, please limit your expectations to, well, what you would expect a community of graffiti artists to sound like, and click accordingly.)
I got curious in this subject because I started noticing a lot of graffiti in the places in DC I frequent. It's very obvious around the CUA metro stop, where "ROB" and "Nehi" have been busy tagging. In my neighborhood around Columbia Heights, I see Magic, Tragic, Ocho, Inca, and Nehi again. ROB is in a few other parts of town as well.
The thing that puzzled me--why I got curious--is that, unlike other towns I've seen like Houston, I don't see a lot of profanity. I don't see anything that I recognize as gang-related (realizing my knowledge thereof is limited, but still). I do see things like "Stop the War, Troops Out Now!" Sometimes I see some colorful stuff, but it's mostly just tags of names. ROB uses big, bubble capitals and things like spirals or + signs to mark the empty
centers of the letters. Nehi is a girl (according to the forum above) and sort of writes like one. The C on the end of "Magic" trails off to the right of his tag.Graffiti is usually considered a nuisance, and I think if I ever saw any appear on the Corinthian columns of a federal building or on the side of one of DC's old Gothic churches I would be disappointed. But elsewhere, it's become part of the urban landscape to me. Maybe I'm nuts, but I've spent time pondering a piece of graffiti and wondering who ROB is and why he likes big, bulbous capitals, and who Ocho is and why he uses paint pens (I think?) on newspaper stands, and who Nehi is and how she finds the time to write her name everywhere I look. I'm aware of the possibility that all of this is much less friendly than I am making it out to be, but to me it makes the city seem more lived in and I think I'd miss it if it wasn't there. I'd miss wondering about who my neighbors are who find joy in painting their names on things.
And what makes me think that it is lighthearted to
a degree is the forums above. Under the main forum, there are smaller threads--most, but not all, of which are dedicated to individual cities across the nation. This seems to show that these artists are interested in what's going on in their own town. They post pictures and comment on them. Within the city threads, the posters are also artists; many of them know each other by name; some have worked together before. There aren't that many in DC. It's a curious little community of people with the same hobby discussing what they love best about it. They tell stories like this:haha yesterday i saw a couple of writers, on the canal in a rowboat, puttin up some pretty wackthrows on the big concrete wall next to white hurst. [stuff] mighta sucked, but it was mad funny to see these kids try and balance and paint at the same timeThey respect each others' work and space:
relm owns that wall,i think he has 12 peices there,havent been there in awhile thoI know it's awful for property owners who have to clean up the mess and it costs money for the city to paint things over. I know it's illegal and a nuisance. But at the same time, most of the stuff they're painting on is stuff nobody cares about anyway. If a city is going to remake the landscape into concrete and steel, do I have to mind if stealth artists turn it into a spraypaint canvas? At least it gives me something to look at. It's an odd and slightly counterproductive method of taking ownership of one's city and community, but like your maddening neighbor whose house is never dirty or untidy, I think I'd feel more uncomfortable inhabiting a city of sterile walls and pristine concrete embankments.
i havent been to any walls lately because of the cold
but last time i was at that wall it was almost all him
At any rate, that's my curiosity of the week, and it was more than I expected to find.
*Update* DCist takes a look at the issue.
2 Comments:
I've read it's becoming increasingly common for cities to hire graffiti artists to do murals on walls in public places. I guess it's the "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" mentality.
That could be a fantastic plan in DC. There are already an abundance of public murals in the city, especially around the U St area where I live. There are some others - on Rhode Island Ave., and the iconic Madam's Organ sign overlooking 18th street, and this tongue-in-cheek one on 9th St that I like: "Bienvenue a Shaw, Slum Historique." http://www.flickr.com/photos/rllayman/123791526/
But at the same time I kind of appreciate the whole graffiti ethic of doing something random and cool just because you enjoy it.
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