Unfortunately, life is not black and white. Even without knowing anything about graffiti culture, there is a border between defacing and improving. And graffiti artists are moving over that border back and forth.
Some of the most beautiful art I have seen are graffiti
What a strange argument that seems to romanticise this "border" called "the law".
It is black and white: someone is defacing something that doesn't belong to them. You can call the result whatever you want ("art","expression" etc) but the fundamental issue doesn't change.
Would you be happy to wake up and see your car covered in paint? What about the windows on your house? Would you see this as an "improvement" too?
> What a strange argument that seems to romanticise this "border" called "the law"
Just because something is illegal, does not make it immoral or unethical by itself.
I do understand the argument against graffiti, but there’s also something to be said about any kind of expression that’s inherently rebellious and counter-culture.
> Would you be happy to wake up and see your car covered in paint? What about the windows on your house? Would you see this as an "improvement" too?
Correct me if I’m wrong but the vast majority of graffiti is on public walls and facades, and not on houses or cars. At least here in the Netherlands that’s what I’ve seen.
Graffiti tends to appear on every surface which is not actively guarded. Including beautiful historical buildings, and including private properties. "Public" walls are just a visible example of a property which nobody cares about strong enough, and nobody is held responsible for (compared to a private owner who often can be fined for keeping vandalized facade as it is).
You apparently read only part of what I wrote really. You see it in places which are not guarded, or cleaned. So if there are not a lot of them - kudos to you city administration, and businesses. It's not because grafffiti is inherently benign. It isn't, and cost if keeping public spaces tidy is higher because of it
An ugly beton brut building defaces the landscape and the view that should belong to everyone. A beautiful graffiti can improve that view and landscape. Under those circumstances, a graffiti can be legally wrong but morally right.
However only very few graffiti "artists" rise above the skill level where their work could be considered beautiful. Usually it's just plain old dick measuring contests like spraying political slogans and overspraying the opposition's, putting your name on as many places as possible or proving their "worth" in the danger of getting caught, with no aesthetically relevant outcome whatsoever.
Basically, in my ideal world, whoever builds an ugly enough building should be liable to remove it or improve it if it is deemed too ugly by a majority.
Graffiti is (partially) just the consequence of not living in that ideal world, but because of all the other problems with graffiti, I'd rather just treat it as the vandalism it usually is in all cases. No sense holding an election before every prosecution or clean and paint job.
> Basically, in my ideal world, whoever builds an ugly enough building should be liable to remove it or improve it if it is deemed too ugly by a majority
This sounds like the words of a “community oversight” committee obstructing the construction of housing, and we already know the effects of that on the housing market. Society has swung too far into allowing other people to tell someone what to do with their property already.
In a way you are just debating who gets the power, and saying the people you like should have it. The fact that you or I like someone isn't a reason to give them power.
The buildings have a lot more impact then the graffiti, and arguably should have more community voices involved.
I think I’d be relatively happy if I woke up one day and saw a banksy or an invader mosaic on my wall.
I’ve seen graffiti art that definitely improved grey ugly walls and barriers. I’ve also seen ugly tags that are nothing more than letters. It’s relative
It only emphasizes the problem. There's only one Banksy, and millions prolific wall-defacers. You are unlikely to get the former, and almost guaranteed - the latter
Let me just put it this way, do I get to just move into your home and take it over simply because I believe that I can make it a better home than you can? Do I get to steal your car/property because I believe I can make better use of it?
Stop rationalizing narcissistic behavior and people trying to impose themselves on others. It’s not relative at all. You or the narcissistic graffiti vandals have no right to impose themselves on others.
The nice thing is that in democracies you can influence what is done against graffitis. Don't like graffitis? try to push your local representatives etc to be stricter on them or move to a country that has no graffiti like Singapore. One of the most sterile, boring city in the world.
For whatever reasons, Germany is rather lenient towards graffiti artists which, in my eyes, makes Berlin more enjoyable than it would be otherwise.
I've lived in a lot of places and I've learned that I hate grey boring walls a lot, I much prefer it when they're covered by colorful graffitis. It seems I'm not the only one so some localities tend to be rather lenient towards graffiti artists and even invite them, other places are much stricter and so you can enjoy bleak concrete walls unblemished by any graffitis.
As to your example about homes, well, in France and in some other European countries, in the 90s there was a bit of a left leaning political push for "right to lodgings". This movement made squatting much easier (in France, it was extremely difficult to get rid of squatters if they moved in past 48 hours). I've always personally thought those laws were stupid and they were eventually repealed and amended recently. But that's the way it is with governments, you don't get to agree with all the decisions made. If it's a democracy you have some measures of influence.
>or move to a country that has no graffiti like Singapore. One of the most sterile, boring city in the world.
People who pretend to make art on walls are absolute minority compared to those who'd prefer to keep walls clean, or painted, or whatever (there are plenty of options between gray, and wannabe artists spraying smileys). But somehow you offer the majority to leave. I don't think that's how it can work really
I don't offer the majority to leave. Like it or not, currently in most European countries, the law and application of laws is done so as to either encourage or at least not discourage graffitis. A lot of cities even give space to graffiti artists to paint and try to entice them.
If the actual majority wanted to get rid of this problem, then it would be stopped, I'm not the one making the laws or deciding whether to apply them.
As for grey walls, there are plenty of gray boring walls in any city in the world, usually those tend to be painted on, in my experience, not colorful walls nor brick walls nor older buildings.
Well, no offence, but you idea of how society works is not particulatly correct. Both individuals, and institutions have to prioritize thousands of issues against limited resources. Because of that majority opinions doesn't necessary become policies. Only those urgent/emotional/tribal enough to become election fuel. Apparently, graffiti cannot compete with plenty of pains citizens experience now.
>A lot of cities even give space to graffiti
Try researching where it came from, and you'll see it's an attempt to civilize behavior cities found impossible to control.
So reality is that graffitists are active, and numerous to extent it's hard to fought them off the walls so to say, and while majority doesn't like it, it's not ready to re-allocate resources from other issues. This leads to equilibrium we are in at the time.
>plenty of gray boring
It makes a good excuse in the internet discussion, but it doesn't correspond to street reality. I'm in a nice medieval quarter now, and see lots of graffity across buildings which neither gray, nor boring. It is as if people who do that don't care about beauty, other humans, and all those good things usually claimed to legitimize the phenomenon
> I'm in a nice medieval quarter now, and see lots of graffity across buildings which neither gray, nor boring
Ok, point to you there, that would infuriate me. To be fair, I haven't traveled back to Europe since Covid (moved to Asia 20ish years ago) and I don't know if the situation has deteriorated. I didn't experience graffitis as much in places that are actually nice but I've liked them in places that are gray and drab and I remember enjoying them in Berlin and in Bruxels.
I live in Hong Kong and here quite a few people express disagreement over the government removing the works of invader and other graffiti artist (the "King of Kowloon") but to be fair, graffitis are really limited to exactly the type of places where not many would complain.
> Well, no offence, but you idea of how society works is not particulatly correct. Both individuals, and institutions have to prioritize thousands of issues against limited resources. Because of that majority opinions doesn't necessary become policies. Only those urgent/emotional/tribal enough to become election fuel. Apparently, graffiti cannot compete with plenty of pains citizens experience now.
I think it's not only limited resources, it's a political wish to be lenient against petty crime, there are plenty of countries with the same resource in term of police that are much stricter against petty crime with much more success. There's more policemen per capita in European countries like Germany, France, Spain than in Singapore, Malaysia or Japan (I was surprised looking at Wikipedia that Hong Kong as more but that makes sense given the response to the protests before COVID) [1]. They could absolutely enforce fines but they don't. Whenever I traveled back to Europe, I've not been as bothered by graffitis nearly as much as I was bothered by dog feces and littering which is absolutely everywhere and never fined.
People tend to apply such hard-core legal standards to those they don't like. As the corrupt dictator says, 'For my enemies, the law! For my friends, everything!' Law-and-order leaders almost exclusively mean it for people they dislike.
Let's apply some strict law-and-order to the wealthy and powerful, to corporations, to government officials. Then to all adults. Then I think it would be reasonable for kids with spray cans.
Life would be meaningless if it was just black and white. Fortunately there are times that we're reminded that people do live in cities and do stuff other than just minding their own.
I really wish people minded their own more, then my ears wouldn’t be assaulted by boomboxes on the subway and I wouldn’t be accosted at an atm vestibule
Some areas had, if not fully formally, dedicated areas for graffiti.
As in, "we will leave this unadorned wall, and we won't clean up the graffiti unless it's truly an eyesore, and we won't chase you for it". The wall I most recall was close to quite utilized road, so yes it was very "public facing".
The end result was that it was the one place where I would see actually impressive graffiti, with competition to make better stuff, instead of random vandal tags.
I grant Banksy that he has some technical competency and is able to do something somewhat visually interesting (his use of color works quite well and makes his pieces stand out within the medium), but I really hate him as an artist.
There is basically no one who makes greater kitsch than him. Everything he makes is steeped in the middle class, liberal, mediocrity of someone who points out that things, which everyone agrees are bad, actually are bad. It seriously is something of the worst "art" I have ever seen and actually makes me quite sympathetic to the post modernists whose movement is a reaction to people like him.
The middle schooler, scribbling on canvas, is at least not trying desperately to impress the most bourgeois group of people the world has ever seen. That alone puts everything he does a serious step above Banksy.
Of course you can find stuff that's high quality, but that is rare. Rather than looking at outliers, it might be more sensible to look at the average and the reality is that the average graffiti does not have any artistic value.
Of course it’s graffiti and it’s still imposing on others against their will, regardless of whether it’s peak narcissist Banksy or someone else. Is very much about transgression and imposition and sadistic domination for personalities like Banksy and graffiti artists in general; it’s precisely why they put their “art” in other people’s things against their will.
So if I graffiti your car because I believe it improves your car; would that be ok with you? It’s art. You should be happy, right?
>Are you an art major to be able to judge objectively?
There is precisely nothing about "being an art major" that gives you any more or less right to an opinion. Especially if you actually had read anything about current philosophy of art you would realize how dumb that sounds in this context. Since "postmodern" theories of art focus on the inner expression of the artist, contrasted with the subjective experience of the art by the viewer.
I am the one who has to suffer through this every day in the train. How am I not entitled to an opinion about that "art"?
Are you suggesting most people enjoy graffiti? Because I don't know anyone irl who does so I'm a bit surprised by this perspective. I've personally always viewed it as equivalent to littering and assumed the ones doing it were just thrill seekers up until now...
I do. When I first moved to Berlin I was thinking the same, but now I prefer it when modern concrete buildings are touched up with graffity no matter if commissioned or "illegal" - the important part is to give the eyes something to stumble over.
Historical buildings is a different matter of course.
There are two types of graffiti: actual art, and tags which are akin to the forum signatures of yore.
The actual art is often a bit strange but can be beautiful, and is more interesting than a bare concrete wall or train hull. But I agree with you that virtually all tags are ugly. And not only that, tags represent an extreme concept of ego, where you subsume the art, spending your entire canvas on your signature.
Yes, I used to view it like that as well, until a host of grafittis offering a different perspective appeared in my city. It turned out that the author was an art student and a neighbour of mine from the lower floor. Not Banksy level but still good. Sadly he moved or who knows but his grafittis are gone and the awful football related vandalism tags are here to stay.
Some of the most beautiful art I have seen are graffiti