Graffiti, almost as ubiquitous as outdoor advertising, but not nearly as repulsive, is nearly everywhere you look.   And if you have perceived an increasing wave of graffiti in recent years, you would be correct.   - And the tide is still coming in.   

The video outtakes shown here and below are from Spray Daily (spraydaily.com), a pro-graffiti website.   The seven-minute video is of heavy graffiti activity in and around the train yards in Italy.

      While graffiti has been with us since the cave man, the last few years have seen an exponential explosion of graffiti.   With it, there has been an exponential gushing of publicity and opinion.   And in this modern day and age, this tsunami of publicity and opinion on all things graffiti comes primarily from 3 sources - newspapers, television and the Internet.   And most of what comes to us through newspapers and television is recapped on their own newspaper and TV Internet sites.   The difference, of course, is that graffiti, or news about graffiti, which ends up on the Internet will stay there indefinitely, where yesterday's TV news (or feature), and yesterday's newspapers are, well, 'yesterday's newspapers'.   The Internet has unquestionably become the 'force multiplier' when it comes to publicizing so-called 'street art'.

      But the newspaper and TV Internet sites are not the only graffiti sites out there in this, our etherial wilderness.   There are enough independent dedicated Internet graffiti sites out there to choke a horse.   The Midnight Hour not included.   And we have noticed that the various Internet sites, all inclusive, fall into three basic categories : Anti-Graffiti websites, the so-called Graffiti Reporting & Features sites and Pro-Graffiti sites.

      The Anti-Graffiti sites are virtually all the same - each warning that graf vandals are law-breakers - and punishment could include stiff fines and possible jail time (true).   There is always the hint, the implied warning, that graffiti is gang-related and is spread by immature, maladjusted youth, and is the primary contributor to their urban blight.   And then, there are the outrageous claims of costs to the various municipalities to clean up graffiti.   One documentary recently stated that London, England spends 1 Billion Pounds Sterling per year to clean up graffiti.   We are not saying that the Administrators in the capitol city of London are full of a common barnyard material commonly used to make plants grow, but we hereby make a counter-offer to the city of London - we will clean up your graffiti for 100 Million Pounds Sterling per year, and we hereby guarantee we will do a better job.   OK, then, over to you, London.....

      Graffiti Reporting & Features websites, as mentioned above, are for the most part the Internet arm of either newspapers or TV stations / cable news outlets, and usually toe the line on the evils of graffiti vandalism, with an occasional feature on graffiti being put under the gavel at a major auction house, or being shown at a prominent art gallery, or political graffiti deemed newsworthy in some war-torn nation somewhere on the planet.

      However, the lion's share of graffiti websites is of the Pro-Graffiti ilk, and they come in all flavors.   Graf websites, in addition to displaying the latest spraycan vandalism in their own districts as well as elsewhere on the planet, are also involved in direct marketing : selling spraycan paint, sometimes in bulk, along with various nozzles to fit on those spraycans.   Also for sale are graffiti coffee table books, zines, graf posters, items of silk-screened clothing -usually T-shirts and hoodies for the hip-hop crowd (this is a partial list only).   Not to mention the publishing of personality profiles of local and international "graf stars".   They solicit photographic contributions from graffiti artists (show us what you got), and advertise upcoming graffiti-related 'street events'.

      Further, running just below the surface, and this is what has been going unsaid, GRAFFITI HAS GONE COMMERCIAL - and we are not speaking here of those 1% who are able to sell their pieces -or reproductions of their pieces- at auction houses, or show their pieces in respected museums of art.   Reproductions of graffiti pieces marketed on the Internet appear on a wide range of street paraphernalia, such as skateboards, et al.   They inspire tattoos (which, commercially, only benefit the tattoo artist).   There are organized big-money events sponsoring graf crew spray-down competitions, with winning crews receiving various and substantial prizes; there are sponsored mixed graffiti/ skateboard/ modern-breakdancing 'events' drawing thousands of competitors, wannabes and spectators...........   Many 'legitimate' artists are now seeing the commercial advantage in 'admitting' that they were, or still are graffiti artists, while, contrarily, many graffiti artists are now being contracted to produce their brand of 'street art' as part of legitimate advertising campaigns.   As mentioned in our earlier articles, many townships in North America and Europe are now providing "legal walls" for graf artists to spray their hearts -and venom- out (which, in theory, would save the various municipalities big bucks on clean-up activities).   Several major newspapers have created "Graffiti In The News" categories for graffiti and graffiti features - Googleable, of course.   Graffiti artists are now being brought in by virtually all the major film studios to produce their 'urban blight' at strategic filming locations.   -And where, curiously, the movie moguls are requiring graf artists to sign copyright waivers- hey, when in doubt, follow the lawyers....

      Like it or not, art's red-headed stepchild, that in-your-face love/ hate thing sometimes referred to as art brut, street art, or 'the withered arm of modern art', is becoming more 'legitimate' by the day.....