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| Street Art |
Graffiti dates back to ancient times, prior to
written language. The word “graffiti” is derived from the Italian “graffito”,
which means “a scratch.” Graffiti can be found etched into the stones of walls
and monuments in ancient Greek and Roman cities. The Alexamenos graffito,
graffiti purported to be the earliest known image of Christ, was carved into
the wall of a room outside Rome sometime around 200 AD. In the 9th
century Viking mercenaries scratched graffiti into stone at the Hagia Sofia in
Istanbul.
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| Graffiti Tags |
Modern graffiti, the kind we associate with spray
cans and gangs, first sprang up in the early 1960s in Philadelphia and quickly
spread to New York City, covering subway trains, inside and out with what were
known as “tags”. Tagging quickly became competitive with the graffiti artists
trying to outdo each other with multi-colored, stylized tags, moving from
subway cars to buildings, bridges, and even rock formations.
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| Banksy's Girl with Balloon |
However, in the 1970’s graffiti began transforming
from gang tags to street art when it became part of the hip-hop subculture,
beginning in The Bronx. Jean-Michel Basquiat and Keith Haring were instrumental
in bringing graffiti mainstream and moving it from the streets into art
galleries. Today the elusive Bansky is carrying on what they started. Nowadays,
instead of painting over graffiti, many major cities are commissioning artists
to decorate the sides of buildings.
The old form of graffiti never truly died, though.
It’s alive and well inside public restroom stalls were you often find crude
commentary scratched into the paint of the metal doors. Normally these messages
are of the “For a good time call…” variety but not always. The other day I
found myself in need of a visit to the ladies’ restroom in Penn Station,
Newark. This is what I saw in the stall I stepped into.
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| "Learn Proper Grammar" bathroom stall graffiti |
(And yes, this is the first time I’ve ever whipped
out my phone to snap a picture in a public restroom, but can you blame me?)
That is hysterical. Reminds me of the elevated puns in the ladies room in the science building of the university where I got my degree.
ReplyDeleteThanks for stopping by, Anne. We're always happy to provide a laugh. ;-)
ReplyDeleteIn Greece, graffiti is everywhere. Very surprising. There was a lot of trash too.
ReplyDeleteI'd never written on a bathroom stall before my freshman year in college. In the library, one of the stall's in the women's room had been taken over by some overtly religious taggers. It annoyed me, as such things will, but then someone else got annoyed. Amidst the "Repent" and "Burn in hell, sinners" and "John 16.2" tags, she'd written "If you love God so much, why write about Him on bathroom walls?" Well, I couldn't let that go, of course, and grabbed my pen:
ReplyDelete"Because there was no room at the inn."
I really should learn to resist, shouldn't I?
Good article, thanks for sharing!
ReplyDeleteAuthor of: My Pal Buddee:The Checker King!
and Words and Games Activity Books Pre-K to Kindergarten