Sunday, August 22, 199S - North Shove News - 3 north shore news GUNDAY FOCUS Public art or irritant, graffiti flourishes From paac 1 ple. The city spends upwards of $20,000 a year to wipe it off civic buildings and equipment. So fir, she can’t recall anvene being prosecuted and fined the full $2,000 allowed under the bylaw. “The police and courts don’t think of graffiti as a big priority. I's hard co catch any of these peaple, they usually do it at night.” As much as she thinks it’s ugh, Dean just can’ deny there ix considerable talent exhibited by graftitists. Some of these mysteri- ous people who work mostly in the dark of night can manipulate a spray can or marker with the same skill and dexterity as a sea- soned painter with a brush and palette. Some call it public art. Others say it’s a public nuisance. The big issue might simply be the canvas. Graffiti is plural for the Italian word graffite, which means scratching made on a surface. Graffiti has been a fact of fife for more than 5,000 years and it shows no signs of abating. In the beginning, it was contined to cave walls, but now it’s everywhere: alieyways, building facades, phone booths, newspaper boxes. Political slogans have been supplanted by the likes of ‘tags,” “throw-ups” and “nieces,” usually involving the artist’s pseudonym and unintelli- gible excent for those in the know. This form of graffiti is relative- ly young. Its roots stem from inner city Philadelphia and New York in the 1960s and has since become closely tied with hip-hop music. It has also been linked with gang culture of New York and Los Angeles ghettaes, When this modern graffiti movement began, teens used per- manent markers to write their names and street numbers, called tags. They soon graduated to spraypaint. Large, outlines of fat, cartoon-like letters called throw- ups were the next generation of tags. Larger throw-ups filled in with exotic combinations of colour and sometimes accompa- nied by characters are called pieces, short for mascterpicce. Tags, throw-ups and pieces spread across North America and into Europe during the '70s and *80s via exposure on ‘TV shows and movies. Styles also moved city to city via freight trains. Graffiti is nothing, new for the North Shore. The latest American and European styles are being imi- tated by local artists, who prefer to be called writers. They're part of a worldwide network that trades photographs of pieces, and gets published in magazines and on the World Wide Web. Jim Johnson collects photos, too. He has 500 shots of graffiti in binders in a shelf at the Lower Lonsdale Community Police Office. The volunteer runs the RCMP’s graffiti removal program and brings a camera with him on patrol. When he sees graffiti, he paints over it as soon as possible, Some building owners and utility companies even provide him with paint to use when needed. “We win most of the bartles, bur I don’s think we'll ever win the war on grafli- ti,” says Johnson. “The kids become more mature and become adults and aren’t interested in doing it, but then there’s a new crowd that comes along. “I can’t see what kind of satistaction they get out of it; a tag? A painting, yeah, but not just a squiggle that says I've been here. There must be something more pro- ductive they can do.” Johnson hasn’t caught anyone in the act, because he’s our there in daylight. One graffitist was caught by BC Rail police, red-handed, in carly 1998 inside a BC Rail tunnel near Lonsdale Quay. The 19-year-old was ordered to pay $149.80 to fix the damage and had to write a letter of apology, according to BC Rail spokesman Alan Dever. Many of BC Rail’s freight trains are dotted with pi Dever says it’s not a high priority for the provincial Crown corporation to clean slates on the outsides of freights. “It’s not isolated to BC Rail, nothing specific, we're not being targeted more than anyone else,” Dever said. “The most important thing is to make sure they’re mechanically sound and functioning.” Graffiti has been unfairly tagged as 4 criminals’ game, says North Vancouver Community Arts Council executive director Linda Feil, “When vou say graffiti to the guy on the street, he usually thinks it’s something illegal, but that’s not necessarily the case. It's a style of art,” says Feil, a style of art that should be celebrated as a means to fostering a healthy, cohesive community. Art, she says, is more than paintings of flowers and landscapes. “You can't deny creativity, it will find some sort of outlet somewhere. If you deny it, it just pushes it into different places.” Places that it’s not wanted. around North America. NEWS phote Sob Rschin A graffiti writer, who declined to give his name, worked on a piece Wednesday in the parking lot at East Esplanade and St. Georges in North Vancouver. Gratiiti artists and admirers come to the wall from Street writers part of a worldwide network of artists Bur a place where it is wanted — one of just a few anywhere — is the parking lot next to the vacant Pier 96 flea market building on East Espianade and St. Georges. It’s an outlet for writers to exhibit their talencs. A rare outdoor public art installation on the North Shore. And, believe it or not, a free tourist attraction.’ It’s a place where Gabriel Dubois and Ronnie Mejia come to create their own art and admire picces by their peers. “A lot of people come to this wall from all over, it’s probably one of the most famous walls in the city.” says Dubois. “People come down from California, Seattle, just to check this wall and do a piece if they can.” “It's considered a king wall,” savs Mejia. Dubois, 17 and Mejia, 18, have been writing for the last five years. They both spent hours with pen and paper, trving to mimic the styles chey saw in magazines and on local walls. ‘They graduated from tagging to full-blown pieces and have even been commissioned by TV production companies to create graffiti art backgrounds, “We just get off doing nice signatures,” says Dubois. “Some people sign paper, we like to go to a wall and sign our name and make it lock nice.” So nice that the “wildstyle” words are often gibberish to the untrained eye. Dubois and Mejia don’t sign their real names; instead, they use pseudonyms that identity them among the graftiti community. They didn’t want their graf-names printed for fear of peer crincism. Dubois says writers don’t do pieces for mass appeal. He prefers to write in hard- to-tind areas like derelict industrial areas or under bridges where it won't attract much attention from graffiti detractors. “¥ don’t like to destruct other peoples’ property. anything, we'll go to places See Move page 8 NEWS photos Paul NicGrath GRAFFITI comes in many forms and appears on many surfaces in North Vancouver and elsewhere. Trains and telephane bocths are popular with those who create “tags,” “throw-ups” and “pieces.” rd up: a graffiti glossary back to back: A wall that is pieced from end to end ail the way across. Also can refer to throwups that are one after another. blockbuster: Big, square let- ters, often tilted back and forth and in (usually) two colours. bomb: Prolific painting or marking with ink, To cover an area with your tag, throwups, etc. bubbie letters: A type of graffiti letters, usually consid- ered to be an older (and sometimes outmoded) style. Often used for throwup let- ters because of their rounded shape, which allows for quick formation. to buff: To erase. drips: Stylized drips drawn onto letters to add effect. Although inept paint applica- tion causing unintentional drips is considered the mark of a toy and is wack, stylized drips drawn on letters are acceptable. fade: To blend/blended colours. fill: The solid interior colour of letters on a picce or throwup. going over: One writer cov- ering another writer's name with his/her own, Also known as “X-ing out” or “crossing out”. king: The best with the most. piece: A graffiti painting, short for masterpiece. It’s generally agreed that a paint- ing must have at least three colours to be considered a piece. tag: The most basic form of graffiti, a writer’s signature with marker or spray paint. It is the writer's logo. throwup: generally only one or wo colours, 10 more. Throwups are either quickly done bubble letters or very simple pieces using only two colours. wildstyle: A complicated construction of interlocking letters. Often completely undecipherable to non-writ- ers. writer: Practitioner of the art of graffiti. — Source: Art Crime: The Writing on the Wall