Graffiti World
by Howe Sim
As with
photography, I am passionate about travelling, because it affords me the
opportunity to experience foreign cultures and environments. I consider myself fortunate in that I have
been able to visit many countries outside of my own. Through my travels, my
eyes have been opened to the many differences that exist among nations. At the same time, I have learned of
similarities in cultures that otherwise seem vastly different. One such
‘universal’ is the presence of street art or ‘graffiti’ in urban centers.
Thought to be derived either from the
Greek γραφειν (‘graphein’, meaning ‘to
write’), or the Italian graffiato (‘to scratch’), graffiti has been
traced to ancient Rome and Greece, when pictures and writings were carved into
walls without the owner’s permission.
Modern day graffiti is said to have traced its origins to the 1970s in
New York and Philadelphia, where the first contemporary street and stencil artists
used it as a means of protest, spreading political propaganda, or simply
self-expression. Since then, the
graffiti phenomenon has spread to the rest of the USA, and further afield, to
Europe and, more recently, South America and Asia.
It was
largely fortuitous that I first began photographing street art on my
travels. It was typically in larger
urban centers where I would often stumble across large and often elaborate
‘pieces’ (graffiti jargon for masterpieces). After a while, I realized that
there was not one large city I had visited that had not been targeted by
graffiti artists, even in the more conservative-minded Asian countries.
Before
long I became fascinated with the more complex and what I considered more
aesthetic pieces. Whenever I landed in
a new city, I would actively seek out such examples of street art. In some cities, such as Rome and Naples,
finding such pieces was just a matter of looking around, as graffiti seemed to
be everywhere. In most cases, however, I would have to travel to lower-income
neighborhoods, or to train station yards and subway depots.
Often,
the pieces I photograph are around only for a short time, as many cities have
instituted aggressive anti-graffiti campaigns as well as community ‘cleaning
squads’. Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on your stance on this
so-called art form), the graffiti culture continues to proliferate at an
amazing rate, so I will always be able to seek out and enjoy the work done by
its practitioners.
