Wednesday, May 10, 2006

Graffiti as Conversation

Sometimes the graffiti in Winnipeg is purely destructive, like spraypainted squiggles on a snowbank (yes, it has happened). Sometimes it is bizarre and mysterious, like "Murder Capital" and "Stand Tall", and "Baby Mama" stenciled around the city. Sometimes it is affirming and even sweet, like the various "I love you"s found throughout the city, not to mention "Forgive Her". Sometimes it is worth quoting for months, like "Sam Katz Eats Babies".

I like it when it is a conversation. There is a bus stop on the walk from church to home where someone wrote "Hang Dykes", and someone else wrote "... and homophobes." Although I can't say I approve of violence, it's neat to see conversations carried out anonymously, over months.

There's a traffic box that had "Happy is a choice" written on it for months. Eventually someone wrote "Directions please" underneath it. A few weeks after that, a third person added directions to the nearest church.

I think that's cool.

Sam Katz eats babies.

1 comment:

Elliot said...

Somebody was walking around with an Army-lettering-style stencil that said "Think for Yourself," no doubt a smug teenage radical of some sort. They spraypainted it all over the place, on parking signs, and the sidewalk.
Someone had painted the word "God" onto a sign in blue-green letters. Well, of course, the radical stencil-man came along and spraypainted "Think for Yourself!" over it.

But I think it backfired on him (or her). Because the 'God' is painted freehand, and it glows through the other graffiti. The "Think For Yourself" is a rigid, Army-lettering stencil, and if you look around you'll see a dozen identical messages everywhere. So I think it ends up subverting itself and saying "Think for yourself... just like all the other cookie-cutter radicals!"