Punishment to fit the crime

Likely in response to the 15-year-old graffiti artist who was stabbed to death by a neighborhood resident last weekend in Manurewa, New Zealand, the government announced the start of a program designed to crackdown on graffiti. The program called Stop (Stop Tagging Our Place) will include legislation to fund anti-graffiti programs, limit sales of spray paint and increase law enforcement efforts.  

One part of the crackdown is an increased use of ‘restorative justice.’ Apparently taggers who are caught would be forced to clean up some of their own work.

“I think some of the most effective punishment is when taggers have to clean up their tags in the full glare of the public,” said Auckland’s Police Minister Annette King.

I’m not sure if it will work, but it is an interesting idea. Maybe taggers would be less inclined to paint on illegal walls if they themselves would have to paint over what I can only assume they consider to be great art work.  

Making Graffiti Interactive?

As this blogger points out, the problem with graffiti art being anonymous, is that when you stumble upon a really great piece there is no information card attached to the artwork to tell you who made it, when it was painted and what they were referencing with the work.

New technology being tested in Hamburg, Germany, by the new media agency Jung von Matt, would give the viewers information they are looking for. The technology would allow artists to affix interactive stickers to their work that, when photographed with a mobile phone camera, explain the details of the graffiti.

Hamburg’s first interactive wall, called Nextwall, allows viewers to watch videos of the artists painting the wall,  download wallpapers for their phone and virtually ‘tag’ the wall with an “I was here” feature. Another blogger notes the technology can also be expanded to include a comprehensive guide to the graffiti via Bluetooth and allow users to download coupons to area stores.

I wonder if making graffiti more informational would cause more people to foster an appreciation for the art. Graffiti is often just understood and appreciated by the artists themselves and their close circle of followers — could this new technology bring graffiti to the masses?

Judge Acknowledges Graffiti Is Art

An alleged graffiti artist was tried in an Ontario, Calif., court for spray painting at a local skate park. Nothing new, right? Except that in this newspaper’s report, the judge himself acknowledged that the blue-colored abstract looked “more like a painting than mere graffiti.”

The man was still sentenced to 100 hours of community service for the painting, because — art or not — it was a problem for the city, the judge said. A problem that cost the city $1,300 to remove.

Opening the Dialogue Between Graffiti Artists and the Community

An event in Birmingham in the U.K. will open the line of communication between graffiti artists and community members as they tackle the debate over graffiti art vs. graffiti vandalism.

A group of Birmingham’s graffiti artists will explain the different between graffiti art and graffiti tagging, and how they as artists can help reduce the level of graffiti tagging by harnessing the energy and creativity behind graffiti into something more positive and legal.

The event will discuss one way of reducing illegal tagging – providing ‘managed’ legal graffiti art zones.

An open dialogue between graffiti artists and community members is essential to increasing the understanding of graffiti as an art form and not just an illegal act. I would like to see events of this type occurring on this side of the pond — they may lead to the most productive efforts in the war against illegal tagging.

From Street Art to Fine Art

A gallery showing in Los Angeles this month will feature work from one of the city’s best known graffiti crews, Angles Will Rise. The crew is famous for its West Coast “wild style” — both for commissioned walls and illegal tags. What’s interesting is that one of the artists said in a Los Angeles Times’ story that the gallery space allowed them to explore new angles to their art that they normally couldn’t because they were rushed or feared getting arrested.

I wonder if more graffiti artists were to take their skill indoors if their art work would start being appreciated for its artistic merits and stop being treated as a public nuisance, or worse, a crime.

Graffiti War Goes Mobile

Toronto is enlisting residents — and their cell phones — to help crack down on graffiti on public property.

The idea is to provide more accountability to the city’s efforts of cleaning up street art in a timely manner. As reported by the East-York Riverdale Mirror, residents would photograph the graffiti, send it to the city’s licensing and standards committee who would then get the clean-up process started. After the graffiti is cleaned, the resident would receive an emailed photo of the cleaned site.

While other cities like Phoenix have enlisted residents to call-in to a ‘graffiti busters’ hot-line, Toronto appears to be the first city asking for photos of the street tags.

The plan may help Toronto clean up the graffiti faster — and with more accountability — but it probably won’t stop the art from being painted in the first place. Graffiti artists hardly expect their work to live on for years, in fact, most have the attitude that once it is up you better take a photo because it will likely be covered over quickly.

A more proactive approach for cities to take might be to crack down on the supply. Many cities have strict restrictions on spray paint, which may prove more effective in the long run. Toronto could take a lesson from their neighbor, London, Ont., who has a ban on selling spray paint to minors.