Taitano 1

Raylo Taitano
Mr. Price
English 12
Graffiti. Is it art? Is it vandalism?
Graffiti ranges from simple written words to elaborate wall-paintings,
and is found nearly everywhere. Ranging from buildings, the walls of train
tracks, and even in art galleries. Some consider pointless destruction and
others have a deep passion for the hiphop culture. Drawing the line between
vandalism and art is something that has been proved nearly impossible in
the past seventy years that modern graffiti has been around. This debate
starts with the simple question. What exactly is art? Merriam-Webster
dictionary classifies art as something that is created with imagination and
skill and expresses important ideas or feelings. The next point is: what part
of graffiti is ART? People disregard the more basic forms of graffiti as
pointless scribbles, and consider advanced murals as art.
Since the 1960s and 1970s young people in New York would write a
name that they have either chosen for their selves or been given on public
property. The people who did this were known as writers. This is where
modern graffiti came from. Its not really like an addiction, but more like a
sickness. The minute you get that first tag, you feel like you could have done
it better. So you do it again, and again, and again. Quotes SABER a Los
Angeles graffiti writer.

Taitano 2

Just like traditional artists, graffiti writers have different preferences of

mediums that they use. For example, traditional-artist mediums range from
acrylic paints, chalk, colored pencils, etc. Graffiti artist mediums range from
spraypaint, markers, solid-markers, scribes, and stickers. They use these
tools to place their mark, to express themselves. Whether that is in the form
of disgust for politics, pent up anger, or just to leave their mark and make a
statement.
Just like art, graffiti has different genres or styles. Art, in a traditional
sense, ranges from avant-garde, dada, conceptual, etc. Graffiti has scribes,
or etchings done with a scribing-tool; throwies, or the basic bubble-letter;
burners, a more complex version of a throwie; wild-style, and rollers.
The most basic and prevalent form of graffiti is the tag. This is a
writers signature. This is the starting point of all graffiti writers. Without
perfecting the technique of the tag, one cannot graduate to more complex
forms such as a throwie, then to a burner, then to a piece, then to a
beautiful mural.
And without the tag these advanced, socially-accepted pieces of ART
would not exist.