All the artists did in putting their graffiti on the Modern Wing was show their ignorance about art. Renzo Piano’s architecture is all about simple clean lines and forms. Every element of the wing was carefully thought out – every angle, color, line and stone considered. Thoughtlessly painting brightly colored forms on the exterior of a building that is all about being subdued, showed complete disregard for the artist behind the building. If this action was supposed to be a representation of where graffiti is headed, it caused me to greatly reduce my respect and enthusiasm for the art form. Furthermore, the Art Institute is a private institution struggling to make ends meet in a bad economy. Now they are threatened with the expense and threat of the Modern Wing being permanently compromised. And graffiti artists have undoubtedly lost the respect of the major institution of the city I assume they were hoping to eventually gain the favor of.

There are plenty of places in the city where graffiti would be appropriate and welcome — the Art Institute and other privately owned buildings are not among them. I think it would be healthy to brainstorm some ideas of where graffiti might make a positive mark on our city.

One place that occurred to me is the scaffolding that adorns so many of our buildings across the city. Lynn Becker, architecture critic for the Chicago Reader, wrote two interesting posts on the subject of scaffolding and its potential for greatness. One post in his blog was about a scaffolding competition: http://arcchicago.blogspot.com/2010/01/scaffolds-slum-up-chicago-streets-has.html

And another was about an example of scaffolding getting decorated and beautified by artwork: http://arcchicago.blogspot.com/search?q=scaffold+salvation

I think graffiti could easily be used to beautify the city in this manner. It’s about time that graffiti artists and the city began working together. However, if graffiti artists continue to target significant pieces of architecture, or private property in general without permission, I will start siding with the city against graffiti artists’ efforts.

You want to be respected as artists, make art. I would stop and stare at any one of those pictures on the site I just shared (and there are a lot more graffiti art sites I realize) but would not look twice at the stuff displayed here.

Purely my opinion, I am not a graffiti artist, I just enjoy the work done.

I understand your frustration and what seems to be the general mindset of your peers. But there are very few writers who’s goal is to force you into misery. No one is specifically targeting you and trying to make your life worse. You’re doing it to yourself by making it seem that way. At the end of the day, graffiti is still pretty harmless. You can remove it with a roller in seconds and no one is being physically or financially torn because of it. I personally wish they would arrest every one that wears Ed Hardy jeans and flog them for rediculousness. But that’s just because it’s annoying to me, not because they’re harming anyone or inherently a douche. Graffiti is hardy sadism – it’s more just like the Lost Boys from Peter Pan.

My work goes all around this subject (check:http://urbanheatmap.blogspot.com/), as a researcher a producer and creative protagonist. The reflexion until now led me into the conclusion that there are several fronts that must be worked simultaneously to deal with this issue, this fronts are:

1 transmit to the responsible technicians (architects, designers, engineers …) that this kind of manifestations (not only graffiti) are effective realities like other construction and management constrainments (ex: the rain, the wind…) this way they could act in full knowledge and not only put it in the same drawer (vandalism) that broken glass. Ignore, incorporate, defend, and others are possible postures, but the most important it’s to be conscient of the decision.

2 talk, talk, talk, give space to dialogue, improve participation, involve into the community all the ones that what to make creative and positive inputs into the public space, discuss in conferences, talks, workshops, spread the knowledge about how it works, clarify the preconceived notions trough multidisciplinary and socially unsegmented forums, publications, inventories, historic references, improve research and non commercial communication.

3 incorporation into the urban landscape giving conditions for big productions, at the same time defining policies for small interventions, cleaning fast and protecting (point 1) all the surfaces that are for some reason aren’t suitable, promoting the positive practices trough honest freedom.

All the artists did in putting their graffiti on the Modern Wing was show their ignorance about art. Renzo Piano’s architecture is all about simple clean lines and forms. Every element of the wing was carefully thought out – every angle, color, line and stone considered. Thoughtlessly painting brightly colored forms on the exterior of a building that is all about being subdued, showed complete disregard for the artist behind the building. If this action was supposed to be a representation of where graffiti is headed, it caused me to greatly reduce my respect and enthusiasm for the art form. Furthermore, the Art Institute is a private institution struggling to make ends meet in a bad economy. Now they are threatened with the expense and threat of the Modern Wing being permanently compromised. And graffiti artists have undoubtedly lost the respect of the major institution of the city I assume they were hoping to eventually gain the favor of.

There are plenty of places in the city where graffiti would be appropriate and welcome — the Art Institute and other privately owned buildings are not among them. I think it would be healthy to brainstorm some ideas of where graffiti might make a positive mark on our city.

One place that occurred to me is the scaffolding that adorns so many of our buildings across the city. Lynn Becker, architecture critic for the Chicago Reader, wrote two interesting posts on the subject of scaffolding and its potential for greatness. One post in his blog was about a scaffolding competition: http://arcchicago.blogspot.com/2010/01/scaffolds-slum-up-chicago-streets-has.html

And another was about an example of scaffolding getting decorated and beautified by artwork: http://arcchicago.blogspot.com/search?q=scaffold+salvation

I think graffiti could easily be used to beautify the city in this manner. It’s about time that graffiti artists and the city began working together. However, if graffiti artists continue to target significant pieces of architecture, or private property in general without permission, I will start siding with the city against graffiti artists’ efforts.