Sunday 29 April 2007

AWAY WITH WORDS

Graffiti is unquestionably the artform of the 21st Century and Banksy and others have already been accorded the status of Old Masters.

A recent exponent of this art took an intriguingly nihilistic approach to the medium by reducing Kibworth Street, SW9 to a Street-with-no-name relocated in W8....


While a Brighton graffitist demonstrated a laudably moral and ecologically sound approach to the craft...

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

EXPOSED!! BANKSY UNMASKED

photos of the formerly anonymous artist

http://brentley.com/wordpress/?p=52

Boll Weavil said...

I don't know whether graffiti is an art form as such. I've never quite followed the thinking on that one but when I worked in the old cells at a courtroom, I find marks left by the prisoners that, whilst not art, certainly contained some elements of interest.Amongst the daubings were comments from prisoners prior to going into the dock and then on their way back to prison such as "Jed, GBH, expect 6 months" with the later addition "Got 12 - Judge is a b******". Just below the cells, cut into the rock on which the courts were based, were the original 'holding tanks' where the accused men were kept pending trial. There also were names carved into the walls but, alas, little else, to tell of who passed that way for judgement.The earliest dated one was 1752 !

Brian Sibley said...

ANON - Thanks for the link exposing Banksy [?]. Fascinating!

And for anyone who hasn't visited Banksy's website, it's here

Brian Sibley said...

BOLL WEAVIL - Graffiti can indeed conjour yesterday: the dungeon in Venice's Ducal Palace has a graffitied inscription by no less a scribe than Casanova!

I'm rather less keen on seeing inscriptions (particularly on historical monuments such as seaside shelters at Bognor) that announce "Wayne and Lorraine woz here, April 2007" - but that's either because I'm a snob or because I've yet to be convinced of the historical significance of Wayne and Lorraine!

Brian Sibley said...

Have just enabled comments on yesterday's Dandelion blog...

Does ANYBODY know WHY New Blogger sometimes chooses to turn off the 'Allow Comments' option??

I've got so used to reading everyone's comments that I get tetchy when there's nothing from you there and it's all down to beastly Blogger coming between us!

Anonymous said...

I agree with you Brian - I hate graffiti as such. But stuff like Banksy's is more wall art to my mind. Some of it is really clever.
In the same vein, there is a wall in Prague with nothing but graffiti dedicated to John Lennon. Now THAT is something else!