Picks Of Tagging

Graffiti - Picks Of Tagging

It doesn't matter where you live in the world, chances are you've seen graffiti somewhere around your local community. It seems to spring up in every culture, although it tends to be more prevalent in big cities.

But is it vandalism? Or is it art? That's a difficult question to answer, mainly because there are so many different types and styles of graffiti. The most basic form of graffiti is "tagging" - which is usually a simple graphic, usually letters, perhaps a play on the creator's initials or nicknames. Often small and monochrome, it's probably one of the most annoying and frustrating types of graffiti, because it is small enough to deface almost any surface, and is almost universally condemned as having no artistic merit.

Graffiti, however, isn't restricted to tagging. On larger surfaces, many graffiti artists employ multiple colors and intricate designs to create their pictures. This is the type of graffiti that starts to cross the line into being artistic. It's this type of graffiti art that is now being showcased in a number of art galleries, both in the USA and around the world.

The other problem with graffiti as art is that the issue is clouded by the location of the art. If some of these stunning designs were created on a canvas, or a wall specially set aside for the purpose, then it would be easier to recognize them as art. Unfortunately most graffiti is placed on private property, without the owner's consent, and so is less likely to be viewed as a welcome addition.

Around the world, communities and governments have become more vigilant in their attempts to reduce the amount of graffiti. In many places there are community groups or government funded teams who guarantee to clean up graffiti in 24 hours after it's reported. Trains in New York were given new coatings that allowed paint to just be "dissolved" off their surfaces.

In my own local area, the sale of spray paint to persons under 18 is illegal, and all spray paints are kept in locked display cupboards. Another area has a team of painters who regularly go around and repaint any fences that have been covered in graffiti. One homeowner I know has had his fence repainted 7 times so far! Over time, however, the amount of graffiti reappearing is reducing, which is a victory for the opponents of graffiti.

Still, simply removing the problem may in fact be a loss to the artistic community in general. If graffiti is considered in its most highly refined form, then are we in fact stopping artistic development in its tracks by making it impossible for budding graffiti artists to practice their craft?

When you illegally deface someone else's property, no matter how beautiful the art you create, you have still committed a crime. Maybe what we need to do is find ways that graffiti artists can learn and practice their craft, without needing to deface hundreds of properties in the process. Some communities now provide blank spaces and invite local graffiti artists to paint them. Others have graffiti walls, where anyone can paint whatever they want.

Maybe there needs to be a shift in the thinking of graffiti artists, so they can discover the value of painting on paper, rather than walls. Would the great painters of the past still be as famous today if they had painted on walls, rather than on canvas? The problem is complex, so finding a solution that makes everyone happy is unlikely to be simple.

1. Tagging: Keeping Tabs On The Net
... Investing: Europe Annual Reports BW 50 S&P Picks & Pans Stock Screeners Free S&P Stock Report ... ... Of The People E-Society: My World Is Cyworld Tagging: Keeping Tabs On The Net School Aid: It Takes ...
http://www.businessweek.c ...nt/05_39/b3952408.htm

2. Campus Technology Featured News Archive
... Photo courtesy John Jameson, Princeton University 2005) From the October 2005 Campus Technology Multimedia Platforms: Top Picks for Converged Networking Three consultants, Wendy Chretien, Will Craig ...
http://www.campus-technology.com/featured_news.asp

3. Id cards for kids
... kits being pushed on kids Biometrics, ID cards, tagging, DNA kits being pushed on kids. Steve Watson ... ... bluecross blueshield insurance news football picks insurance loss ratios homeowners insurance ...
http://3746.xvipfd.info/

4. The Flickrization of Yahoo! - December 1, 2005
... Employers Top 50 Best Jobs 50 Small-Cap Stock Picks Sivy 70: Best Stocks MONEY 65: Best Funds Boom ... ... development group, was all that voluntary tagging Flickr users were doing. Horowitz is the ...
http://money.cnn.com/maga ...e/2005/12/01/8364623/

5. Dining & Bar - Bar Tools & Accessories
... and Foil Cutter $5.25 48 Glass Olive or Fruit Picks 12 Boxes of 4 New! $4.99 7 OZ SS HIP FLASK W ... ... Machines Displays, Mannequins, Shelving Labels, Tagging, Price Guns Retail Security & Surveillance ...
http://www.cookwarebakewa ...ols-Accessories.shtml

6. Neat New Stuff on the Net - Weekly Reviews of New Sites by Marylaine Block
... reunions, etc. Thirteen Tips for Effective Tagging - How to mark sites so you and others can find ... ... whatever amount you choose. Previous Weeks' Picks June 2 -- May 5 -- April 28 -- April 21 ...
http://www.marylaine.com/neatnew.html

7. 21st Century New Media - Awards & Reviews - 21stCentury.co.uk
... Yahoo Pic of the Week 27 November 2000 Here at Picks Central we sometimes like to dust off the old ... ... up with the times, those that feel like they're tagging behind on the technology front can swot up ...
http://www.21newmedia.com ...views/21stcentury.asp

8. Frequently Asked Questions - Shadows
... and news ñ based on YOUR interests and picks by your friends and the Shadows community. Back ... ... can easily access key Shadows functions like tagging, rating, and commenting on Shadow pages. Like ...
http://www.shadows.com/content/help/faqs.rails

9. ::: Structured Blogging :::
... type that would output the tags that edgeio picks up on. Some people are already working on an ... ... the SB plugins installed on their sites. Auto-tagging Edgeio has just had added a feature which ...
http://www.structuredblogging.org/roadmap.php

10. Google mulls RSS support | CNET News.com
... the format is more robust than RSS, with more tagging capabilities in syndication, and is more ... ... to add pluck to browsers May 24, 2004 Reuters picks up Web syndication technology May 11, 2004 Blog ...
http://news.com.com/Googl ...0-1032_3-5229096.html

11. Betting dog tip - betting Sportwetten Fussball - Bundesliga Fussballwetten
... of Read MLB which sic pencil increase winstar quiet at ¬ª Picks Tiger to wager wager Dog-Tagging ... ... Gambling tipp Picks Dog-Tagging tip MLB consequent For Afternoon win4real.com is Tiger Sports ...
http://betting-dog-tip.zsz3.szczecin.pl/

12. ClickZ Internet Marketing Solutions for Marketers
... wrong. Why? In a word, segmentation. On-the-fly tagging is much nimbler than baked-in metadata. I ... ... film of the holiday season. Other cinematic picks are clearing a significantly smaller percentage ...
http://blog.clickz.com/ar ...pics/measurement.html

13. Headshift :: What form will Enterprise 2.0 take?
... to talk in depth about the use cases for social tagging in the enterprise and wikis rather than the ... ... than feel they are forced to. Ross Mayfield picks up some other aspects of this cultural change ...
http://www.headshift.com/archives/002916.cfm

14. p2p « WordPress.com
... consumer, applications, Software, softphone, Top Picks, IP Telephony Ebay said: "Skype represents a ... ... Biology, Flex, Evolution, Web 2, AJAX Apps, Tagging / Folksonomy, mass psychology, hunter gatherer ...
http://wordpress.com/tag/p2p/