Why no graffiti pictures lately? Let me tell you why.
Europe was amazing for street art and graffiti tours. In some places, we had several tours to choose from with as many as 20 people on each tour. We even had tours that offered lessons on how to do your own art. Now that we have left and moved on, I haven’t been able to do any graffiti or street art tours. Turkey had little street art and no tours. Dubai had zero street art, no tags, nothing. I saw none in India but I wasn’t really looking, I was trying to survive from money shortage and cow poop abundance. We finally did find some graffiti in Beijing in 798 Art District area. It wasn’t a lot but it was some.
One of my thoughts has been that street art seems to flourish in areas that tend to be artistic or areas that tend to be financially or politically challenged. Months ago, when we arrived in Brussels Belgium and saw many areas covered in tags (black painted names or symbols), the first thing I thought was that a portion of the population felt disenfranchised and under-represented. Tagging is known for getting your name out into the world and letting people know you exist. In Brazil, there is a large amount of Pixo/Pichacao graffiti. Pixo is a specific type of graffiti described as a way the youth assert their existence and self-worth. It is plastered in as many places as possible and as high as possible. The person who gets the highest location or the most tags is highly regarded among his/her peers. In Brazil, there is a large divide between the wealthy and poor. Pixo is used to assert the dissatisfaction of that divide. So, when I saw the un-artistic tagging in Brussels, the first thing I thought was, there is a very unhappy portion of the population.
So now back to China. When we were in China, we did not see any tagging except in this one designated art district. This added to my other thoughts on graffiti and community and satisfaction and dis-satisfaction. My first thought was that the population must have a sense of satisfaction. Then my second thought was that the communist government might have a heavy hand in disciplining such outbursts. Then Bud shared a third thought as to why. He feels that it does not exist here because in China people are less focused on themselves and more focused on their community. He thought there wasn’t any tagging because when a person puts their country first why would they mark it up with selfish tagging. In China, it is not about getting your name out and being heard, it is about respect to your community and why would you put yourself first. So as of now, my questions about graffiti and street art are even more complex then when we began this trip. My little side hobby of graffiti searching has led me down the path of community vs individualism, wealth vs poverty, happiness vs discontentment and satisfaction vs dis-satisfaction.
The following is some of the graffiti art we saw in Beijing China along with, some of the other art saw in the 798 district. I have also added some of the Pixo from Brazil and some of the tagging from Brussels. Hopefully our future will have more graffiti and street art to be discovered. Bet
