Graffiti Article KSU Sentinel

Category | Arts & Living
More than vandalism; Graffiti can be art, not just an eyesore
Published on September 30, 2008 by The Sentinel

"It’s as if someone threw oil all over your living room,” said one
local police officer about graffiti. Indeed, the act of altering the
appearance of someone else’s property without permission can easily be
interpreted as malicious.

However, even the policeman, who because of his position must be ideologically opposed to graffiti, reluctantly acknowledges that some graffiti is enjoyable. After he walks around the warehouse he guards, explaining its history as a railroad depot, he arrives at a large hallway covered in cracking green paint. Across the paint jumps a bright gold tag whose calligraphy is so embellished that the words have become indecipherable. “I like the colors,” he later explained to me in reference to this piece, his favorite.
According to a graffiti artist who, like the policeman, spoke on condition of anonymity, some artists produce their work “just to destroy some public property,” whereas others “really want to make the world a more beautiful place.” Whether simple or ornate, graffiti most commonly consists of a so-called tag, often a word invented by the artist; sometimes it is a symbol repeated throughout his or her work. When at least two colors of paint are used, either to reproduce a tag on a larger scale or to create a picture, the tag becomes what is known as a throw-up, and aesthetic value takes priority over what the officer called “marking territory like a dog.” Marking territory is an aspect of graffiti linked to gang membership more than the creation of a quality throw-up or even artistic tagging. Gangs often seek to impose a sense of ownership upon public places and outdoor areas where they seek or maintain dominance.
Unlike the macho-pragmatic markers of territory, those graffiti artists who create the ornate throw-ups, either pictorial or calligraphic, feel a sense of personal pride in creating something beautiful. According to an anonymous artist: “I just want to leave something really . . . cool.” The artist is not motivated by a desire to gain notoriety for having created a masterpiece; the anonymity required to avoid arrest makes recognition unlikely and fame all but impossible. Graffiti artists selflessly compete for the passing smile of the observer, the public who is their captive audience.
Fewer than three miles from KSU, on the grounds of an abandoned Cobb Community Transit station, exists a wonderland of color splashed on overgrown concrete infrastructure. Artists have made what was once a dull monument an art exhibit. A fence protects the place itself; one cannot enter without ignoring signs and deliberately avoiding armed police. One can be incarcerated if caught. Still, the artists ignore the useless restraints on their freedom to make the abandoned facility beautiful.
Graffiti, once relegated to the streets, now infiltrates galleries. In 2006, the Brooklyn Museum mounted an exhibition of works by graffiti artists Crash, Lee, Daze, Keith Haring and Jean-Michel Basquiat. Another graffiti artist, Doze Green, has become so successful that corporations wanting to reach a new market ask him to create large murals on street walls. Green said that graffiti kept him from joining gangs and so getting into trouble; although illegal, graffiti gave him a chance to express himself and fulfill his potential.
KSU Assistant Professor of photography Matt Haffner used a technique similar to graffiti to produce a portfolio that garnered him an award from the Museum of Contemporary Art of Georgia. Haffner was one of three artists to win the 2008 Working Artist Project for his “Used Fiction Series”. Haffner combined silver leaf, vinyl and spray paint on panel and said that his technique is “reminiscent of a graffiti technique”.