Monday, July 07, 2008

Graffiti In Seattle


Just days ago, some friends and eye looked throw a picture book filled with Graffiti in the mid 80's done on street cars. We thought to ourselves, wouldn't it be cool if we had the balls to tag the new Light Rail. Apparently we weren't he only ones who thought it was a novel idea because just Saturday morning it was reported that the Light Rail that was being displayed was "Vandalized" by taggers. The car was parked near I-5 South bound on an elevated platform. It was said to be there to exhibit the progress of Seattle's Light Rail and that they were confident in security of the car. Little did they know that Seattle taggers are quite the ambitious bunch and the first to tag a new light rail gets mad props. Here in Seattle graffiti "Vandalism" as it is referred to by adults and some responsible teenagers, is on the rise by 40% since last year. I myself have seen a rise in tagging around my own neighborhood with prominent taggers like Eckel, Loser, and The Chicken Kid. Adults fear that nothing is safe anymore from these terrible people who vandalise property with no regard to its owners as they refer to them as. Seattle spends over a million dollars on painting over graffiti and installing cameras to parks and graffiti hot spots. Graffiti is not a very high priority for the police, simply because it doesn't matter! I for one believe that people are a little to uptight about the subject of graffiti, so I'm here to explain this for you and clear up any confusion you might be having. There are two kinds of activity's that can be used with a pen and can, one is able to either tag or graffiti. Tagging is simply going around various places in your neighborhood and writing what you think is a clever "tag name" on just about anything you can think of. Tagging is not art in any way and is truly vandalism. Then there is graffiti, graffiti is much more then writing your tag name graffiti is art. Graffiti takes time, it takes first and second drafts just like any other piece of work. Graffiti should not be looked down upon by society or confused with tagging, a graffiti artist is an actual artist and should get the due respect of an artist. Too often the term graffiti is used with tagging and is confused as being the same thing, but if we look closely we will see a clear difference in tagging and graffiti. Society as a whole I am petitioning you to pay a little bit more attention to what you may think is a vandal, because on second glance you may find an artist. Graffiti is art don't discount it for anything less.





Real graffiti art is done here.



This is no graffiti, its Vandalism!



Art? Or Vandalism?

1 comment:

SHMU said...

nice post man.

Its very well done, but my concern is that graffiti should not touch new nice things like the light rail. What i like about graffiti art is that i can bring color to a bland cement or brick wall But when its a brand new light rail that our city has spent millions upon millions of dollars on i feel that it is disrespectful. Also the thing about tagging is that people have to start somewhere to grow balls and really do graffiti art. tagging is fine if its on a trash bin cause who gives a fuck about a trash bin, but if its across a restaurant window for instance it should be vandalism.