Graffiti Art

However through the course of history we can see that just because something is against the law does not mean the act is unjust or bad. In Dr. Martin Luther King's "Letter From a Birmingham Jail he says "To put in terms of St. Thomas Aquanis [sic] : An unjust law is a human law not rooted in eternal law and natural law. Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust."What an atrocious example. Dr. King was an advocate for equal rights for all races. He was breaking down barriers in our society-- trying to get blacks and whites in equal schools and desegregating bathrooms, careers, and drinking fountains. He wasn't fighting for the right to trash bridges and houses for art's sake. Graffiti doesn't "uplift human personality." Trying to compare civil rights to street art is horrid."So a law that is preventing artists with a message, a story, a legacy to tell by putting up their art in what better a place than a wall where hundreds walk by; admire the art for what it is and appreciate it."You say that as if the law has kept anyone with a story or art from sharing it. Did you know that for thousands and thousands of years, we have been sharing our stories and art in legal areas? In books? On canvas? Commissioned in churches and other places of worship? All in places where they were acceptable and unintrusive. Graffiti is a relatively new art form (note: Not a new activity, a new art form), but an illicit one. Painting on the sides of buildings that are private property has always been seen as a disagreeable activity."Not being cooped inside a small area such as a private property or inside a barely visited art gallery, graffiti art needs to be free to all and to be seen by all."Yeah, because everyone wants to see the word "PENIS" written on every bathroom stall for the sake of art. ("Well, I don't support vulgarities on public property.") Who and what is to decide what is appropriate for graffiti, and where? We can't justify some and condemn others. The only thing we can do is make it legal to display your art on your private property and show it in museums."By making it illegal are the higher powers degrading human personality or not?"Are you asking me? No, higher powers aren't infringing on our first amendment rights and degrading our human personality by making graffiti illegal. What about the rights and human personality whose property has been defaced with some spray-painted eyesore? Graffiti can negatively affect the person whose property is harmed. People who don't want to see it are affected. Is this all for the sake of saving one person's artistic vision? "The mention of the art on homes and private residence does upset me. As an artist I hold myself to a moral code, and that means not writing on private homes, cars that people use, or schools and churches. People who do this are not to be taken seriously as artist, and are looked down upon in the graffiti community."Everything you just said offends you as an artist and that it looked down upon in the graffiti is exactly what graffiti is by definition. That's ridiculous. What makes graffiti better? That it's on a building or a bridge that belongs to the state and not a private residence? What's the difference? It's defacing something that isn't yours. It's criminal activity regardless of where it's at, and you have yet to explain what exactly the difference is or why it's forgivable in one area and not another."To your acknowledgement that you do like some street art ,that is great. However how much graffiti would you have seen in your life if it had not been put up illicitly?"Fair enough. But how many curse words and offensive jokes would I have not seen in my life had it not been put up illicitly? I don't want my kids or even my parents to see the stupid vulgarities in the bathroom stall, on the sides of trains, and displayed on the sides of buildings. If we make graffiti legal, we are not simply giving every person with a story to tell a canvas, we are justifying every stupid middle schooler who thinks swastikas are funny. If we keep it like it is now, legal in private areas, we are letting everyone who wants to see the art see it. Legalizing it all over just makes people all over, even those who don't want to see crudely drawn penises on buildings, subjected to it. That undeniably degrades everyone's human personality."Those who draw penises and profanity on walls and mirrors and other things are childish, street art should be what it says, art, not childish marking scribbled on a desk."But what gives you the authority to declare what is and isn't art? I don't think Andy Warhol's vibrant paintings of soup cans is quote-unquote art. I think it's ridiculous, pretentious tripe, in fact. But the world tends to disagree with me, and on it goes being proclaimed as true art. I'm sure others feel the same way about Da Vinci, Michelangelo, and Van Gogh. What makes anyone's opinions on what's art valid? I'm sure there are some who feel that penises and swear words on desks are art, too. Nobody has the authority to say it isn't."There is a difference between vandalism and art, and I hope that you can understand that."Care to define where exactly that differing line is? And how you judge that? And how anyone can judge that? And what makes an artful penis on the side of a building better than the crudely drawn one right next to it? There are millions upon millions of opinions on the topic, and no one can declare which is more valid than the other.