There 's Nothing More Dangerous Than Someone Who Wants For Make The World A Better Place

Graffiti has been used many times in history to preserve and show political and religious ideas of the past. Street artists are preserving the history that is deemed “illegal” at this time. Graffiti itself is history, and it tells stories as well as preserving cities and adding a creative aspect to everyday life. The “...first forms of scripture and storytelling … were through drawings on walls. Stories passed through generations… were preserved on rocks or walls.” (Lloyd, Alexis). Now street artists are simply doing the same, whether it’s murals, tags, or people just messing around; They are preserving the unique cultures that we have today, or trying to make a name for themselves through art, or portray a political message. 85% of graffiti is just tags. (Akbar, Airfa). People's names or words made to look interesting. People trying to preserve their name through art. And this is considered a crime. Splashing your political views on a building through a mural to some people is offensive and the fact that this is illegal is a violation of the 1st amendment. Making graffiti or street art illegal is limiting an expression of people's ideas and religion.

Graffiti has been around for more than half a decade and practiced worldwide. However there is debate between whether it is a form of art or vandalism. Graffiti artists’ debate that many do not understand the reason most graffiti artist take the risk of incarceration, fines, injuries, and in some cases death to paint a wall. A graffiti artist can have the simple desire to become recognized, or to create a piece that speaks to their audience as a form of self expression. Because graffiti is associated with gangs and acts of destruction to some many cannot see the history and importance graffiti can have on a worldwide scale. Due to the fact that graffiti is usually produced illegally, meaning it is

“In contrast to government-commissioned public art, street art is illicit and subversive in nature. Therefore, most street artists, including Banksy, use pseudonyms to avoid legal prosecution for vandalism.”(Chung 27) Banksy’s street art does not focus on competing with rival artists, but focuses on engaging with a broader audience in a deeper level. He provokes his audience by deeply expressing out various social practices that helps viewers to reflect and confront certain aspects together as a community. (27) The underlying message of Banksy’s art can lead towards an active involvement of street art within the community.

If you were to go open a dictionary and look up the definition of art, you would see that it has art as “The expression or application of human creative skill and imagination…” (“Art” 2017) and “Works produced by human creative skill and imagination.” (“Art” 2017). From these definitions, graffiti is art, yet in most cases, it’s considered vandalism because it is done without permission of the property. When graffiti is done in a designated place or with the permission of the property owner, then it can truly be considered art. But even if these circumstances are not met, if the graffiti goes beyond a simple tag, it is art.

Known for his contempt for the government in labeling graffiti as vandalism, Banksy displays his art on public surfaces such as walls, even going as far as to build physical prop pieces. Banksy does not sell photos of street graffiti directly himself; however, art auctioneers have been known to attempt to sell his street art on location and leave the problem of

Generally most people look and take graffiti as a form of destruction and wanting to cause violence, but in the artist’s mind they want to be creative and help the people around them by making art to cheer someone up or create a sense of creativity in others. They don’t do it to go to jail or because they want to pay a fine they do it because they are open minded and creative. For instance, “A lot of attention is given to the ‘broken window’ theory, which says that signs of disorder like petty vandalism, fare jumping … and yes, graffiti, open the window to larger crimes,” Verel told The Huffington Post. “But little is paid to the ways graffiti is harnessed for good in a form that’s both constructive and authentic”(Patrick Verel). They are taking this broken windows theory too far and only saying it can cause bigger crimes. Some graffiti artists are trying to uplift the neighborhoods and the people they live around with creative art. Also not all graffiti is bad enough to want artists to commit a crime. While making this art or graffiti I don’t think that these artist are trying to harm the buildings in any way, but they should ask for permission if they aren’t allowed to be painting on these buildings. This is to let the owner of the building know that they mean no harm to the environment or their workplace. For example, “Adam Cooper, cultural strategy officer for the mayor of London, thinks

In “Graffiti as Career and Ideology”, Lachmann states that organizations “tried to win their members recognition as serious artists by encouraging writers to produce graffiti-style works on canvas and various other media with a view toward their sale to art collectors” (246). Rather than stopping graffiti writers, they are being encouraged to keep producing graffiti-style works to sell. While they aren’t vandalizing anymore and they are producing art on canvas, it is unexpected to further support these “criminals” like the organizations are doing. Some graffiti is even so respected and praised that it is protected. The perfect example of this is that “The stencil work and street art of British artist Banksy, possibly the most well-known contemporary graffiti writer/street artist, has gained such value as a commodity that the work on some of his walls is now protected under the aegis of urban heritage” (McAuliffe and Iveson 139). How can graffiti and its writers be so frowned upon but so many people still praise

In the summer of 2013, a graffiti artist by the name of 'Lady Pink' had police barge into her house in Queens and arrest her husband for vandalism. They took her art supplies, photo archives, and many of her prized possessions. She had to sit there, helpless, watching police take away her things. In today's world right now, expressing yourself creatively is one of the most important things you can do to help figure out who you are. A part of creative expression is art. Art makes people happy. Graffiti falls into the art category. For some people, graffiti is what they do to express themselves. Graffiti is art and shouldn't be illegal. Expressing yourself creatively shouldn't be a crime.

Vandalism or graffiti is another crime that affects the public. Taxpayers have to deal with this because we have to pay for the graffiti to get off of buildings, cars, or homes. Graffiti encourages more crimes to happen because if one gang doesn’t like what another gang puts out there, then it becomes a gang fight. Graffiti promotes gangs, this shows that this is that particular gangs turf. Once you notice the graffiti you automatically know that a gang has taken over this area. Members wear graffiti tags to announce what gang they’re in (Almonte and Desmond 13). Gangs may identify themselves in many different ways, graffiti is just one of the most common ones. According to Justice, “the removal and preventing of graffiti vandalism is way costly to the

Graffiti portrays a message whether it’s spelled out on the concrete or hidden behind a sort of code. It lets unheard voices, be heard. There are many different forms of graffiti, tagging is the form of street art that most often results in consequences (Eickmier). This is because tagging is basically signing your nickname on a wall, and once the police figure out your pseudonym they will most likely find you. Graffiti is not always considered to be ugly though, some artists work actually ends up in museums (Wark) A manchester artist who goes by the name “Banksy” ultimately avoided jail because his work was deemed “artistic” He was later given an opportunity to showcase his work in a museum. Graffiti does not

Graffiti can be found everywhere and anywhere. It is a way for people to express themselves and be creative in a public manner. It shows how passionate and talented they can be when it comes to drawing or tagging and have it displayed as a piece of art for everyone to see. Graffiti goes way back to the ancient times and is now very well known in the modern days which makes more and more people interested and fascinated by them. It can be used in different types of ways. Many artists can either spray paint, carve, paste, or stencil them on a surface. From how we see them today they are usually images of random cartoons, big bubbly letters, vintage black and whites or inspirational quotes. Virtually anything colorful or not and big that can be easily spotted. Graffiti is more superior to be known as art than vandalism because it is a self expressing act. People need to be open minded about the images they see and look at the message behind it or else they will immediately criticize and say it is vandalizing property.

However, street art predecessor, graffiti, is less well-liked. With its history of being rooted in gang activity and vandalism, it is not hard to see why. As pointed out by student writer Matthew Powers, “Because graffiti is vandalism at its core, it quickly became popular with New York City’s gangs, and in turn became associated with crime…” (Powers). People often see the names scrawled on trains and park benches and only see the vandalism and gang activity, not the effort behind the writing and style. Despite this, there are still those who see graffiti and street art as a new form of art to capitalize upon. In the eighties documentary Style Wars, there were already investors in canvas graffiti. It seems that there is a sort of allure to the illegal nature street art and graffiti. Still, there are people who love the commissioned murals, but refuse to acknowledge that without graffiti, what is known as the legal “urban art” wouldn’t be the same. Artist Peter Ferrari put it into words the best, saying in an interview, “‘People hate the tags, but they want the murals,’…’I think there is a misunderstanding, and people don’t realize that it is all connected and all related. You can’t have the mural without the tag’” (Imam). On the opposite side,

Art is a persons’ opinion. The definition of art is the quality, production, expression, or realm, according to aesthetic principles, of what is beautiful, appealing, or of more than ordinary significance. There is no real definition for what is beautiful or appealing to the human eye. Banksy is said to be an artist by some and a graffiti lawbreaker by others. Basically, it is up to the person to define Banksy as someone who is doing the right thing verses doing the wrong thing. Banksy creates his graffiti pictures to make a stand for what he believes is the right way to look at controversial issues. Some people may not like Banksy’s graffiti because they do not have the same views as him. Some people might

Graffiti has put a major impact on the way people look at their everyday life. It was not used so much here in the United States but was used overseas. Overseas, graffiti, or street art, was used or played as a sport, just like baseball is Americas sport. There are different laws that are put over there than what there are here. They can get away with some of the things that they paint or make over there. If we tried some of that type of work over here, we would get in trouble and possibly serve time for vandalizing someone else’s property. There are many biased outlooks on graffiti, but it should be considered art in all places because of all the time, effort, and design the artist put into their work.

To make this world a better, safer place to live, there are really two things that stand out. The first is that we need to promote in whatever way possible the idea that we are all human beings and they we are in this together. The world and its resources need not be a zero sum game. Too often, we are divided by race, class, gender, nation-states, religions and we forget that we are all the same inside, that we all want the same things, and that this world has enough resources for everybody if we work together. Conflict, war, and strife are the things that make this world unsafe, more than anything else. It is estimated that 5.4 million people at least were killed in wars between 1955-2002, to say nothing of the conflicts before and after (ScienceDaily, 2008). Millions more are injured and displaced as the result of such conflicts, to say nothing of the negative impacts on economies and the lives ruined as a consequence.