Taggers make a place look rather dodgy and are just a niusance. No-one likes the tags, no-one likes them. Prosecute them for criminal damage. They're no different from the sort of muppet that throws bricks at car windows.

That stairs image is actually quite good, however. I guess it livens up some quite frankly boring public spaces. It's one way of doing it, but if those areas (looks like a station there) were to have better lighting/pot plants/other things it would work too. Some of Banksy's works do have artistic merit.

i like graffitis when theyre good, unlike the ones that people in here at the place i live do. they suck, they are made by some fourth-graders and they do them everywhere. it gets fhrustrating when everywhere you walk you see some bad graffitis

tbh i like graffiti ART, i think it great, what i hate is tagging, and on that side i agree with sam, and it looks shite but real graffiti i am very much a fan of and the very talented artists that produce this art are weight down by the tagging image and being put into the same class as taggers when they arnt

I've seen some pretty amazing pieces of it, but I'd be majorly pissed if it was scrawled over my house/premisis.

I don't like tags, they are lame. but other ones like has been shown in the first post are simply amazing, the people have pure talent

Quote from pacesetter :

I've seen some pretty amazing pieces of it, but I'd be majorly pissed if it was scrawled over my house/premisis.

yh when its a total miss match its awful but ide love a house done in a propper graffiti design, now that would look good

Quote from SamH :

I wasn't comparing two crimes, I was indicating differentiation between crime and art. I used murder as an example because everybody recognises it as a crime. Some people clearly aren't capable of making the basic distinction between graffiti and criminal defacement of private property.

I don't think anyone thinks as graffiti as 'legal', I think we all know it is.. however it's not like they do it to private houses in 99% of cases..mostly it's walls surrounding train tracks... derelict buildings, etc.

Thats not my opinion, thats what my mate said on skype conversation: Graffiti, as most of you know...it's the most ancient art. But that's not what the story is about. Me, as a writer, i can surely say - most of you don't know what you're talking about. You like that cute, artistic stuff, that isn't really REAL street graffiti...it's art...it's beautiful tho, i love fresh, clean pieces and murals too, but graffiti is mostly about adrenalin, the rush, getting the spot, spitting in the face of the authority and...getting drunk and high *inster innoncent smile*. It's the art of destroying, available to anyone, it turns our dull, boring world(too big word, lets say city, because there's a lot of beatuiful things in world that aren't dull at all) into something living, something with soul, not just melancholic people walking between dull, one colored houses to work and back. Behind every illegal piece, tag, throwup, there's a story and it works your imagination. People who don't like graffiti...well..i wont say F00K YOU! But seriously, you should really think out of borders.
For me, i love bombed places, places covered in tags and throws, it looks so alive...
I love yards, pieces, tagds, throws, rollers, everything...
When you do graffiti, you don't do it for society, you don't give a f00k what society thinks, it's for you and other writers.
And, one more thing...if you'll ask a writer why does he do what he does, he wont really be able to explain, for a writer it's something natural, like pissing or laying a brick, you just HAVE to do it or else you feel sucky.
REMEMBER KIDS - DICK ON A WALL ISN'T GRAFFITI :>

^^^ as posted.

But I'm against it. Art for art's sake, but own your canvas.

Yes what Laurx's post eludes to is that a tag in a hard to get place, or in an exposed place where doing it has a high chance of descovery, carries the kudos amongst the scene of having got it up there.

What this fails to acknowledge however is the absolute litter of easy tags all over the place.

Further, I think the same thing can be achieved by putting something up there worth looking at, not some tag that can be created in 8 seconds.

These 'writers' (I preffer the term taggers, as a writer is capable of sentences) are confusing themselves with punks. Anarchy is not a few seconds of expression on Saturday night when nobody is looking. Anarchy is in your face. Punks where in your face. Talking of tagging the way your Laurx friend does, the way the people I know who do it talk of it too, they're trying to be punks without the guts to genuinely confront society and be angry at it.

The problem I have with tagging as an expression of anarchy, is that it relies on stealth.

Quote from Becky Rose :

Yes what Laurx's post eludes to is that a tag in a hard to get place, or in an exposed place where doing it has a high chance of descovery, carries the kudos amongst the scene of having got it up there.

What this fails to acknowledge however is the absolute litter of easy tags all over the place.

Further, I think the same thing can be achieved by putting something up there worth looking at, not some tag that can be created in 8 seconds.

These 'writers' (I preffer the term taggers, as a writer is capable of sentences) are confusing themselves with punks. Anarchy is not a few seconds of expression on Saturday night when nobody is looking. Anarchy is in your face. Punks where in your face. Talking of tagging the way your Laurx friend does, the way the people I know who do it talk of it too, they're trying to be punks without the guts to genuinely confront society and be angry at it.

The problem I have with tagging as an expression of anarchy, is that it relies on stealth.

Dude, seriously, stealth? Do you think we always care about stealth? No, we don't, but it's important on serious missions. Tag can be put up fast, but to get a good tag...it takes a while, i want to see you do that...you just couldn't. There's a huge cultur behind writing. We call ourselves writers, because that's what we do, we write...we write a name, sometimes something beside it, you wont get it, and nobody who doesn't write wont get it. So the discussion here is pretty pointless, you're just random dudes talking about something you don't know anything about or you have a twisted/wrong look at it

Laurx, you missed the entire point.

Suffice it to say that, in my opinion, graffiti has nothing to do with revolution, or any other political statement - despite the fact that many of its fans pretend that that IS what it's about. It's not.

Graffiti is cancer. One day it's nowhere to be seen. The next, the place is riddled with it and you know once that happens, everybody immediately sees that the whole place is condemned to death. Cancer is a perfect synonym for graffiti.

I's not art, it's not revolution, it's just degenerate, drug-fuelled, selfish and repugnant shit. As Laurx describes above, in fact. What a "scene" :rolleyes:

Quote from Laurx :

graffiti is mostly about adrenalin, the rush, getting the spot, spitting in the face of the authority and...getting drunk and high *inster innoncent smile*. It's the art of destroying, available to anyone

Hi, i'm here in person, Laurx just quoted what i said.
No offense, but...
But yeah, you can't make people love it, i understand how you feel, but the way you feel...it's stupid. It's not always political, not revolutionary, it's not always art *points a finger at toys who think they're artists*. BUT, some writers are political. Do you think world is always in a need for revolution? No. Then why should we have revolutionary writers? Art? How is graffiti NOT art? When a man considered "artist" would do a mural or would do a full page piece with letters in it, you would call it art because it's done by a man that's a artist in your eyes, but when a man that calls himself a writer not artist and is underrated would do the same and mayb even better you would say that it's not art...

Case in point..
"No offense, but... "

But.. what? Expression, no substance.

Graffiti is criminal before it's art. Two things..

1) It dirties itself before it even enters the race. Much of what IS legitimately artistic sucks at being a work of art. I've yet to see a piece of graffiti that I'd describe as a work of art. It's just graphics out of a can, on someone else's canvas.

2) The art isn't what graffiti is about. You said it yourself, graffiti is all about the crime. All those people who think you're "talking to society".. my ass.. you're just getting your jollies by pissing on someone else's patch. That's as legitimate as graffiti gets.

It's not ALL about crime, crime is a huge part of it.
It's something that not everybody is destined to understand or accept.
For example, how is not this art?
http://fc07.deviantart.com/fs2 ... OENIX_by_saltybastard.jpg
http://fc38.deviantart.com/fs2 ... kbook_by_saltybastard.jpg
http://saltybastard.deviantart.com/

Quote :

Tag can be put up fast, but to get a good tag...it takes a while, i want to see you do that...you just couldn't. There's a huge cultur behind writing. We call ourselves writers, because that's what we do, we write...we write a name, sometimes something beside it, you wont get it, and nobody who doesn't write wont get it.

You'd be suprised how much I get and what i've been involved in. You likely don't know me well, so perhaps it is better to touch on your assumption about my lack of understanding.

As I was growing up my best friend was a tagger, my last partner was a tagger, and I know more about the street than all but a few 'writers' i've met courtesy of the fact that I too was an anarchist. I did not tag myself, the fact that I know the scene does not automatically meen that I like it. (EDIT: I want to add, there's wonderful people in every walk of life and I have liked many 'writers', afterall I dated one! The reasons for my objection are above).

Quote :

So the discussion here is pretty pointless, you're just random dudes talking about something you don't know anything about or you have a twisted/wrong look at it

It wasn't a discussion on the validity of tagging, it was somebody fielding for the community view on it.

It is easy with internet forums to become entrenched in your values and forget what you're arguing about.

My opinion is: I dislike tagging, I have no respect for it. I disliked my ex doing it, I didn't stop her it's was her own thing.

Don't take me for middle class just because I use punctuation.

To you, Seamroc, we're meaningless, faceless, irrelevent names that know nothing. Don't confuse that with us BEING meaningless, faceless people that know nothing. That'd be a mistake.

Quote from SilverArrows77 :

/me looks at laurxs age and ponders all the little life lessons he will stumble across unwittingly thoughout the next decade or two....

Graffiti ... A $260 million co ... munity in australia alone - thats enough reason, without any other thought, to be against it...

Actually, it does not cost nearly that much....you'd know if you would look into it more and read more.

Well, BR, it's all about opinions, i'mnot trying to fight anyone elses opinion, i'm just explaining mine and opposing elses opiniona little bit.

proper graffiti has nothing to do with the law and everything to do with the art itself anything that is not about the art is just vandalism ie tagging and random names etc

Quote :

Dude, seriously, stealth? Do you think we always care about stealth? No, we don't

I forgot to comment on this and it's gotten quickly cross posted so i'll just backtrack if I may.

Yes stealth.

Sometimes it's the kudos of 'getting one over' on the police officer and getting the can back out to carry on working the moment he's around the corner.

Sometimes it's the rush of the chase.

Sometimes it's the audacity of confronting people with it, whilst backed up by the intimidation of numberical superiority, or in the case of facing police officers, the ability to pre-empt their actions and stay one step ahead.

Mostly however, the majority of tags, are in easy to reach places and put up with ease and their purpose is to spread a name by quantity so that you can be "ah yeah, I seen your stuff around, cool like yeah, init".

You must understand though that none of these things are actually positive personality attributes, or are positive expressions.

Don't get me wrong, I know what adrenaline is and I know what audacity is and I know the short and long term effects of most of the drugs you take and i've had my run ins with police. I just got older enough to start evaluating risk, I guess you've got that ahead of you still... Hell today I even wrote a poem (a form of writing that also doesnt complete sentences) about my guilty "Conscience".

How is a painted place a destroyed place? Your argument, sir, is completely invalid. Maybe i havent learned the value, but i know how much wall paint or paint thinner and some gloves and shit costs and how much can it clean. You could clean the whole ****ing Australia with only one million...maybe 2. It isn't much for a country like Australia.
Edit:
BR, it's odd, that your site has a "tag style" logo =D I suggest you to change it, it doesn't look good, no offense.
It may not be positive, it actually isn't very positive, but...you havent wrote man, you don't know how it feels, that's what i'm trying to say..none of you will EVER get it, no matter how close they've been involved.

Quote from BlueFlame :

Banksy. The best.

Hear, hear

Taggers on the other hand... :thumbsdow

Quote from SilverArrows77 :

and your ignorance shines clearly for all ...

Huh, where? ohh...so you REALLY think it costs 260 million $? Give me a break man.
Banksy is nowhere near the best. NOWHERE NEAR.

Quote :

BR, it's odd, that your site has a "tag style" logo =D I suggest you to change it, it doesn't look good, no offense.

haha, well my ex was doing me a proper header, then we split and I havnt updated the site since (just some content) .

Quote :

It may not be positive, it actually isn't very positive, but...you havent wrote man, you don't know how it feels, that's what i'm trying to say..none of you will EVER get it, no matter how close they've been involved.

Actually I believe I have enough parallels to relate to it, and have been close enough to those who do it to have a pretty good understand of the parallels. I'm not going to detail here nor in PM or discuss anywhere the details of my past, it's not rellevent, but I know what it is to live on the brink.

The thing is understand what drove me to it and I understand myself well enough to enjoy my life without harming others. I guess I just grew up .

Maybe one day you'll be sitting in my shoes, or maybe one day the best conversation available to you will be talking to the screw on your wing.

But you know what, this is a racing forum, and one of he other things I did was race cars. I gotta tell you, on an adrenaline per millilitre of blood ratio, i'd race cars over crime any time.

Quote :

you REALLY think it costs 260 million $?

Do you know how slowly contractors for local councils work? Seriously, I can believe it.

Why clean it? If they employed the good artists to paint over any crap graffiti they see then they could solve the problem easily and at a fraction of the cost. But that would mean embracing something poor people do, which is frowned upon in most places. If a university educated twat screws up a piece of paper and leaves it in an art gallery then they are considered a genius and given millions of pounds for their effort, if someone spends days creating a masterpiece on the side of a building they are a vandal and some cretin with paint stripper ruins it.