Graffiti Soho

Is graffiti considered art or blight on our urban communities? Graffiti today is more popular than ever, as seen in Calvin Klein’s billboard ad that appeared on East Houston and Lafayette celebrating graffiti. There are multiple private businesses that utilize graffiti for advertising purposes in which the visual displayed is art. The artist Mark Alequin, raised in the projects of the lower east side has been a graffitist since he was a teenager. He sells his signed graphitized MTA subway maps with the statement “Art or Crime” on Prince Street in SoHo. Discarding the fact that posting and graffiti is illegal, my own opinion is mixed. When the graphitized image is multilayered and aged overtime, it takes on a life of its own. Quite a bit of the street spray painted type, post, tags, and tattoos that one sees, on construction sites, security gates, poles, and on walls can be quite disturbing. Few are visually attractive and appealing to the eye. In some cases, not all, if viewed by an artistic eye the work may be considered as art. Consider your take on this while viewing Graffiti SoHo, a collection of documented post, tags, tattoos and graffiti on the streets of SoHo.