"Robin May" wrote in message
.4...
"Richard J." wrote the following in:


Even if the graffiti perpetrators think they have some talent,
what makes them think it's legitimate to impose their designs on
someone else's property, which the owner has decided will be
painted in a particular colour? What really annoys me are
graffiti vandals who destroy the quiet dignity of a brick wall
that has stood for perhaps 130 years serving the people of London.
I don't care whether it's a mere tag or something more elaborate
and colourful. It's still criminal damage. Please don't be
tempted, Robin, to give the criminals the recognition they crave
by photographing their mutilation of our environment.

I think you may be misunderstanding me. I hate graffiti on trains,
stations and other similar things because that is done without
permission, messes up things that already look good and well designed
like a station or train and generally make things look worse. I noticed
some of TOX's graffiti at Canning Town today and it made me incredibly
angry because there was a station designed to look a certain way and
here some person had come and ruined that.

The bridge I'm talking about is not like that. It's an ugly concrete
structure and the work on it is better than art I've seen in galleries.
I'm pretty sure that it is authorised by the council or at the very
least known about and accepted. The graffiti on it is not threatening
or scary, it doesn't represent urban decay in the way broken windows or
walls covered in tags on council estates do. It looks like something
that members of the community have put a lot of time and effort into
improving the appearance of. This graffiti has more in common with
things like the (organised by the school) painting done by school
children on the side of Upminster Station than it does with the sort of
stuff done by people like TOX.

In that case it's not graffiti, it's art. I've just checked the definition
of graffiti in the New Oxford Dictionary, and it refers specifically to
*illicit* painting etc. in a public place. Your example is (probably)
authorised, and therefore not illicit.

I must admit that my refusal to call graffiti "art" is a deliberate attempt
to persuade people not to regard it as in any way valued by society.
That's not the case with your example.
--
Richard J.
(to e-mail me, swap uk and yon in address)