“Do you know where the most respected graffiti art is?” my uncle asked me as we waited at a railroad stop. It was a sunny day, and his car smelled like watermelon gum. “The most respected art is on trains. Instead of the art staying stationary, as it would on a brick wall, it travels the world — its message and colors for everyone to see.”
I imagined everyone: train-conductors, cargo workers, drivers in rush hour traffic, farmers and cattle. I imagined each of them seeing the same bright hues and words, then I understood the immense power and potential of graffiti. I felt a lightness in my heart — a calling, perhaps — a need to protect it.
Ever since I was a kid, my favorite part of visiting cities was seeing graffiti and street art lining the narrow roads, but as I grew older, I recognized the political and social significance of it. Graffiti — a unique, but controversial medium — is an important and crucial part of our society. It is a form of self expression and allows artists to express their communities’ needs and identities.
Humans have been drawing on walls for millennia. Historians and archeologists have learned a great deal about the history of ancient societies such as Pompeii through the writing discovered on walls: “grafto.”
The graffiti we are more familiar with today started in New York in the late 1960s — “writing” — where young people would paint their tags across the city, often using singular colors. In the 1970s, people started to approach their painting with more color — the blooming of the vibrant, more skilled work we see on the streets now.
Graffiti, like much art, is political. Graffiti has played a role in notable subcultures and movements: the hip-hop scene, punk scene and in liberation movements. For young people in lower-income areas — especially inner cities — graffiti is an accessible medium that does not demand the money required to pay for expensive art utensils.
Hubs of graffiti lie in low-income communities of color that cities are unwilling to invest in. Graffiti allows young people to transform these areas into spaces of collective identity and is an additional job opportunity for poorer, aspiring artists. Graffiti creates a name — or in other words, a tag — and it has the potential to uplift communities.
Graffiti can be considered vandalism — the defacement of public and private property — but many ignore the unfortunate reality that there is no legal space for graffiti. The medium was born for the public eye to see, and instead of cities and officials shunning the artists, they should work together with artists to create public spaces where graffiti and publicity can co-exist.
Graffiti serves as the collective consciousness of local communities. Graffiti is a medium with deep roots, intertwined with diverse people’s lives and perspectives. Without spaces for graffiti artists to effectively create, yet another avenue of self-expression and activism will be shut down for the people.
