Ever had the urge to write your name(tag)or draw on a wall,door,building...maybe on something else? Welcome to the graffitidawg blog where, together, we will investigate this phenomenon
View more presentations from Niels HendriksSusan Herring and associates have concluded that, '... social networks consist of people connected through various social relationships and exchanges ...' (Herring et al, 2005). dawg is prepared to argue here that GRAFFITI and its derivatives (paste-ups, tagging etc. etc.) is just that - socialisation , but in pictorial form. Artists and taggers express themselves to each another and to an ever widening audience (thanks to the Internet) in a manner that is saying something about them in a language that others can understand
Are we all contributing to social spaces by using a variety of
graffiti, to send a message in one form or another to each other like the
Ancient Egyptians did with pictographs?. (dawg does
not condone the use of illegal drugs btw...Image 4.
((which has now been painted over by the Hobart City Council 10-10-2011))
So is graffiti a social message then? AND who are they talking to about what?
I have an understanding with myself... (just letting you know) my hunger for creativity is in all realism, something that allows me to accept different concepts that melt into one word... ART. I marvel, step back, shake my head then step forward at the vicarious nature and thrill that people get from doing something 'not quite legal', even though graffiti is now becoming more acceptable within the art world and legitimately acknowledged by critiques alike.
WHAT also fascinates me is how high and low those artists will climb, hang and dangle to make their mark. There is something addictive about hunting out painted and stenciled works around the city and surrounding areas, then photographing them.
As a person and a facade, it is easy to hide behind this awesome GRAFFITIdawg persona. If I could, I would spray paint you a small picture so that you may tag along a stenciled path into my interest concerning the world of graffiti.
My interested concerning graffiti has been building up over the years to now and I am eager to find out what comes next. Like many, I have had a long-standing fascination with illustrative representations, not just ordinary old but archaeological old.
As an artist myself, though not in the style of graffiti,it has been my opinion for a number of years that graffiti illuminates and extols contemporary urban culture and the myths that have arisen behind the concept.
In the United States around the 1990s, I traveled and viewed first hand an indigenous American Indian rock painting in Utah. My main reaction was... “WOW... a human being drew and scratched that around a thousand years ago”. I just want to reach out like many others and touch it, feel it, even make a little mark to let people know I have been there, (note to all: I did not).
Even before my travels, my dawg-head was in the history books. I was filled with awe and wonderment at the likes of Pompeii's colourful murals, Greece's graphic brothel and political graffiti that acted like sign posts and adverts, scratching of names within the Pyramids of Giza from early 18th Century Western travellers and lately seeing pictures online of Australian Aboriginal rock art that is over 4000 years old. Having access to the Internet has only fuelled my addiction to graffiti; the concept of accessing others' contemporary works just allows the addiction to expand in different varied directions.
On advice from an illustrator acquaintance , this GRAFFITIdawg took a heady drive over the Tasman Bridge to the Schoolhouse Gallery Rosny Farm, run by Clarence City Council, where they have been holding an exhibition of works by art students interested in graffiti and associatedstencil work. The following photos have been taken by the dawg for this blog and reproduced with kind permission from the gallery. For further photos and information check out Rosny Farm on Facebook.
AMAZING WHAT PEOPLE CAN DO WITH SPRAY CANS AND STENCILS
INTERESTING SPRAYING
WORKSHOPS ARE BEING RUN ONCE A MONTH FOR THE REMAINDER OF 2011 AND 2012 FOR INTERESTED PARTIES
There are predominantly two main styles of art on the streets today. GRAFFITIdawg will explain the difference between tagging, and graffiti.
Tagging (sprayed initials) and its concept, has become the rushed act of leaving your name or pseudonym quickly, anonymously while...
Graffiti (street art) may be considered by some: the aerosol, brush painted endeavour of an adventurously talented person who wishes to ‘share’ their elaborate artistry with an appreciative audience, even when uploading anonymously to services like YouTube.
While graffiti might be considered art, practiced mainly on disused buildings and walls, tagging is predominantly considered by authorities vandalism (even historically), simply for the fact that spray scrawled initials are being left everywhere. There is a quasi war out there and that war is tagging.
As humans have progressed and graffiti has evolved, (well since we have the urge to leave any mark), people cover just – about - everything that they can get around, in and on. For some it is the act of leaving their own personal mark like a beacon for others to acknowledge and appreciate. Hobart, the capital city of Tasmania is one such place that has experienced an increase in both legitimate and illegal graffiti and tagging.
This is an image of an abandoned education facility, the ‘Hobart Tepid Baths’.
People have found the abandoned site interesting enough to post videos on YouTube that show the work of graffiti artists.
Situated just on the edge of the central business district of Hobart.
Image 2Image 3
Peering into the shady recesses it was easy to see what had been tagged, and what had been graffiti-ed.
Image 4
This image is just one example of a quick tag on the outside of the building. By the looks of the flow of the writing, it might have taken less than 10 seconds for the tagger to spray on the public access wall then simply walk away unnoticed.
Image 5
As a spectator, you might consider this image - street art, an example of graffiti, imaginative art.
Hobart and surrounding areas are dotted with examples of both graffiti and tagging.
In 2008, Street Art- Graffiti was presented as a 'legitimate' exhibition at the prestigious Tate Gallery in London, England. YouTube's ability to share with a widening audience has enabled anybody to experience that event while not actually attending in person.
Graffiti - after all - has become art in the eye of the beholder. Some may consider the spray-painting of walls vigilante vandalism, while others have a different perspective, a possible consideration that the outpouring of artisticdisplays avails creative open air galleries that are 'free' for viewing by young and old, rich or poor. Whatever artistic perspective a person has concerning the use of spray cans, paintbrushes and stencil cut-outs this web-blog aims to explore the inter meshing lines and colour of graffiti/tagging alongside the social bi-effects they generate
