Graffiti Should Be Considered Art Essay

Improved Essays
Can Graffiti Ever be Considered Art? Suppose that Leonardo and Monet, or any of the recognized artisans of Western European culture, were alive in the present day. Then suppose that one of these famous artists decided to make a masterpiece on the side of the house or on your wall in your neighborhood. Would Leonardo or Monet’s masterpiece be considered graffiti art or vandalism (Stowers)? Graffiti is a writing or drawing scribbled, scratched, or sprayed illicitly on a wall or other surface in a public place (Oxford Dictionaries). There are those that would consider graffiti not to be art and to be nothing more than a desecration of the urban landscape; however, graffiti may be considered to be an art form because it is an expression of culture, politics, and a creative use of enjoying the 1st Amendment right to freedom of speech; therefore, many people do graffiti just to express themselves. In the ruins of Pompeii, the word graffiti was first used for markings founded. Also a thousand of years ago, scribbling emotions on the walls had been a tradition in Rome. The romans used these scribbling emotions in and sometimes for local dialect such as, anti-government satire, …show more content…
Walk through an alley or a subtrain, you will see different art of graffiti. Also, you would see people, but mostly teens, expressing themselves by spray painting on the walls and shortly getting arrested for expressing themselves by using graffiti. Graffiti in an artist 's eye is more than art. It’s being able to show the world your thoughts. It’s being able to take a dull, black and white and traditional city, to become more colorful and different. Artists look at people that consider graffiti vandalism as closed minded people. Therefore, they should stop thinking inside the box and considered to think outside of

Related Documents

  • Decent Essays

    Martinez, José. “Know Your Graffiti: Art, Vandalism or Gang Device?” Home, 12 Mar. 2012, 12:11pm, www.oncentral.org/news/2012/03/06/know-your-graffiti-art-vandalism-or-gang-device/. Jose Martinez goes over how you can tell the difference between art work and gang tagging. He interviewed an LA police officer and a gang member on how exactly they represent gangs and their territory. Jose also says how gangs tag where people can read it and understand it.…

    • 1177 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Pompeii Research Paper

    • 814 Words
    • 4 Pages

    In related to studying people who lived a very long time ago terms graffiti (plural of graffiti) is a mark, image or writing, scratched or wrote into a surface. There have been many examples found on places & locations of the Roman Empire,…

    • 814 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The graffiti artists that vandalize people's property with spray paint, is considered an illegal use of graffiti. The graffiti artists that are allowed to spray paint walls or subways, for work and volunteer serves, can be seen as legal graffiti. The attitudes towards graffiti have changed because people think graffiti is an artwork, people are connecting with this art, and people think that graffiti artists need to be out there more in the world. One way the attitudes towards graffiti changed, is that people think that graffiti is artwork.…

    • 896 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    It can bring to life whatever they can create and design in one night for the world to see the next morning. With what I’ve gathered from Mike’s perspective on graffiti, I feel as if graffiti artists have a sense of freedom to fully express themselves. I respect what Mike is doing with this beautiful form of art to use it for good. On the other hand, some people have a pre-conceived notion that graffiti is distasteful, disrespectful, and useless. It is true that the negative side to graffiti are the few that vandalize people’s personal property and paint profanities, but for the true graffiti artists’ such as Mike, they can create something bigger than themselves and help the world to become a better…

    • 797 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    While some people see graffiti as vandalism and a nuisance, others see it as art, a way for people to express themselves and graffiti is even starting to gain legitimacy in the art world. “In spite of the facts that street art gaining popularity and appeal as a legitimate art form and mainstream culture; it is still a form of vandalism”(“Is Graffiti”). Vandalism is the destruction or damage of public and private property without permission. Most graffiti artists paint or tag without the properties direct permission to do so, making it illegal. “Graffiti is illegal and on offence under the Graffiti Control Act 2008 (NSW) and the NSW Crimes Act 1900”(“Graffiti Facts”).…

    • 757 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Graffiti Is Vandalism

    • 377 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Lastly the graffiti is being sold without the knowledge of the artist causing a stir. Graffiti is vandalism because it’s on private property. It’s not fair for the owners of the property to have their property destroyed. “I find it offensive to call these ‘guys artist’ Tyson said ‘I don’t think they deserve to be called artist when there’re destroying public property’ (Phat X. Chiem)…

    • 377 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Graffiti can date back up to 40,000 years ago with juvenile cave drawings found all across the globe. Many show crude depictions of human genitalia and other inappropriate descriptions. In some cases people see graffiti as art, but in many cases people see it as vandalism. Graffiti negatively influences many communities across the U.S. Graffiti can be expensive to clean up, is used as a tool by gangs, and diminishes a community’s natural beauty.…

    • 828 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Graffiti Movement

    • 154 Words
    • 1 Pages

    While the origins of graffiti are tags, murals, and stencils plastered around…

    • 154 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    With many people against graffiti and not letting graffiti artists do murals in their property, graffiti artists also known as taggers go out and tag wherever they want, making it a crime. I don’t ask for you to take any actions forward graffiti art but to actually take your time and analyze what the graffiti piece signify and not only judge it, in most cases it was done illegally but really think how it would be if there were legal places where graffiti artist could express their thoughts…

    • 673 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    I believe graffiti is a type of art that’s either good or bad, because this type of art can be represented as good imagery or bad inference for people. I do support the fact that’s it art but some imagery does show bad images like gang tags. Thought I see more good than bad on this type of art because graffiti is a painting on a wall and it depends what the artist design is going to be. Graffiti is a form of expression from many generations like teens and young adults and it show mostly urban life in large populated cities and small towns. Many graffiti artists do make images that many find disturbing and sometimes gang related, but these artists are showing their art skills in these designs that many people find offensive.…

    • 216 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Graffiti Is Art Essay

    • 1251 Words
    • 6 Pages

    They love their work and want to share it with everyone, not just the people that can afford a $15 ticket to spend a day in a museum. Finally, graffiti is considered art because it is on the street as stated in the quote, “People are used to seeing graffiti art in public spaces, after all, that 's what makes it graffiti.” (Sanchez, Noel). Graffiti is on the streets so it gives people all over a message, or even to put a smile on their face. The artist wants everyone to see it and enjoy it just by taking a…

    • 1251 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Street Art Essay

    • 1586 Words
    • 7 Pages

    Graffiti was once labeled as street art which was frequently a prominent problem in urban cities; defacing or “tagging” public and private property was against the law. As time as evolved, so has the street art culture. Today, street art is one of most sought after and creative outlets for local artists. The culture around street art can be interesting in the fact that artists build their names and reputation with one piece of work at a time; sometimes when it starts to take over the city it gets the attention it has been wanting. Street art is now very innovative featuring many different art styles and often makes a commentary on a social issue and if it does not, then it was created to help change the city.…

    • 1586 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Graffiti In Schools

    • 393 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Graffiti is an art not many people can say that they have perfected because it is straining for most people. Even though graffiti can be vandalism, is can be a way that many people express themselves. Graffiti could be a problem in many schools, but fixing this problem could be as effortless as letting students define…

    • 393 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    I interviewed 20 students at Miami Dade College, 10 male and 10 female at random. The broad question that I asked was, “Do you think graffiti is art or vandalism?” 60% of people believed that graffiti was art. I noticed that there were a higher percentage of Blacks and Hispanics that believed that graffiti wasn’t vandalism than the other races. This supports the finding that graffiti is found more in urban communities.…

    • 1423 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Graffiti Vandalism Essay

    • 1065 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Graffiti, a well-known act of vandalism. Many people have an understanding that graffiti is a "gang mark" or some disgraceful paint on your local shop wall. The following essay will show that graffiti can be art instead of crime. Every year many unjustified cases are filed against so called “criminals” who are simply expressing themselves, here is an example.…

    • 1065 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays

Related Topics