Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Graffiti in Pomona, Fighting Fire with Fire?


From the Street
Originally uploaded by andrewkanzler
Along Holt, west of Hamilton, on the north side of the street, I ran into what looked like a Bar-B-Q and a large group of Graffiti artists.
I recognized one of them, it was "Worm" I mentioned him in a previous post about graffiti
Worm+Friend
Worm invited me into the fenced off area to come check out the activity, (the figure next to his tag was by a friend of his, I forget his name, but he gave me his real name anyways which I am reluctant to publish for safety reasons) there were a LOT of people, quite a bit in fact, and a lot of faces I hadn't seen before.

Skull
This guy even came out from the San Fernando Valley (if I remember correctly)
Filming Neko

There was even some semi professional filming going on of the artist Neko.
Many of these artists are extremely talented, and if you go back to my previously mentioned old post on Graffiti, and take a look at the photos and then go and visit the location you will notice that the graffiti looks almost exactly as it was back in October. It was not written over or tagged over with the type of Graffiti(or tagging) I might find on my sidewalk (which lacks artistic talent) And as you can see by these photos Graffiti has it's own kind of community, much like us bloggers who all have blogging and a sense of community activism in common, or maybe those involved in neighborhood watch programs, or even book clubs as a community. The only difference is these people belong to an "underground" community. What happens is at some point is that many people how do graffiti develop a level of respect for those that write graffiti with a certain amount of artistic value.
What's interesting, and I sort of follow this, is that Southern California Graffiti has always lacked in artistic value. San Francisco has long been a hub for great Graffiti artists and as we all know New York as well as it is the birthplace (See: Style Wars)
GoodStuff
What would you rather have? This? or
Graffiti on my Sidewalk
This?
I'm not exactly sure where this is going, but if the greater community recognizes the talent of these people and encourages the "quality" type of graffiti over the other there is a chance that the bad stuff may become less. Pomona may also become a well known mecca for street artists. With our Artist's colony how can we pick and choose and exclude those that "commit" art because it is different? It may in fact be a solution to making the city clean.

Did anyone notice the new Mural at Dynamic Grafx at 1192 N. Garey? That was done by a Graffiti artist, unfortunately I didn't get a shot of him working on at as I was in a hurry and driving. (maybe I'll get a shot of the finished product) But take a look at the work on Garey it might be something more relevant than what we take it for

9 comments:

me said...

graffiti vs. tagging = big difference. I noticed the people down on Holt a couple weeks ago, but my husband didn't want to stop and take pictures (they were being filmed that day too). It looked they had been given permission to use the side of that building. I hope they will continue to ask other businesses in Pomona if they can use neglected walls to put more color and art. I think it looks great! The tagging, on the other hand, is like scribbling. btw, Ren photographed the mural on Garey for me and it's on my blog, but the photos transferred over real small.

G of P

Andrew said...

you're right, sometimes I forget to mention the difference, but the Law considers tagging and Graffiti the same thing. It seems like tags don't go over Graffiti work here in Pomona which is a good thing. I'm not sure if the writers ask the businesses if they can do it or not. but they obviously don't seem to mind. the crowds draw inevitable attention.

Skrip said...

I've always been an advocate of differentiating Graffiti Art & Tagging. Tagging is trash. Although there are some artistic forms of it, in general, by tagging we mean the moronic scribbles by low IQ vandals who have no sense of art or purpose. Graffiti Art can be a beautiful thing, when done in a legal manner. There are times when it is not legal an it can also be a nice thing such as an abandoned building with an art piece that almost creates a lost urban art garden. But in places where it is allowed, artists can take their time to create master 'pieces'.

Unknown said...
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Unknown said...

I took some pictures of these guys awhile back when they were doing their thing here down on 2nd st. great work.

dynamic grafx said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
dynamic grafx said...

had to delete comment regarding my building (dynamic grafx) had a lot of complaints......if you have any questions, feel free to come by, or call us at 909-397-9101....trying to promote the art of graffiti to open peoples eyes...

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graffiti can help the community to be clean but it is so disrespectful if this people who make that use this to express what they think and sometimes it's good because that take people out of drugs.

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