For centuries people have been scribing one thing or another on hard surface using many methods however when it comes to ‘modern graffiti’ the general consensus is that the first exponent by the name of Cornbread started off tagging on the walls of Philadelphia actually trying to attract the attention of a girl in the late 60s. Tagging culture spread like wildfire through the 70s becoming ever more creative and adorning walls and subway cars across cities globally.
It was inevitable that this developing art form would come to be a key ingredient and one of the pillars of hip hop culture.
We need you!
I spent countless hours with my plain papered hard back books, pencils and edding fine liners creating piece after piece after piece! I was in a small collective called the NFA (I know this sounds a bit militant but it really isn’t) which stands for the New Frontiers of Art. A group of three budding street artist that rarely had the chance to realise our creations in a real world setting. We were lucky enough to be able to paint pieces for real at our local skatepark and a few subways for community art projects. We didn’t have the balls to break through fences and jump any rails to get to our urban canvasses.
Now, the reason I need you readers is to help remind me of two particular books that were everything for graf artists in the late eighties. I would love to get my hands on them again!
The rights and wrongs
We could argue the rights and wrongs of graffiti and my personal opinion is that pieces can be works of art in their own right and often are more widely accepted and even commissioned but tagging isn’t for me and essentially is what has caused most of the issue. Well, that and painting the entire sides of trains (windows and all) lol.
