Retrieving buffed graf with QR codes

Berlin-based artist Sweza has started an interesting project: on walls that have been buffed, he pastes up a QR code that links back to a photo of whatever was there before. Sort of a virtual geocached spin on the Graffiti Archaeology meme, one layer at a time: GRAFFYARD.

(via Art Crimes)

San Francisco outspends other CA cities on the buff

This article in SF Weekly brings up the issue of how much taxpayer money in San Francisco is wasted painting grey rectangles all over town, as compared to other California cities. It’s got a nice quote from Graffiti Archaeology pal Steve Rotman as well.

Full article after the jump.

Continue reading San Francisco outspends other CA cities on the buff…

Graffiti Archaeology at IDFA / Doc Lab

The International Documentary Film Festival of Amsterdam has selected Graffiti Archaeology to be part of their Doc Lab program for 2009. More about Doc Lab:

IDFA’s Doc Lab investigates the relationship between documentary filmmaking and new media. The program is open to all media that can be used to tell a documentary story. During the festival, Doc Lab presents films, web documentaries, and installations that innovate the documentary genre. Projects are showcased in the Doc Lab Media Lounge and in cinemas during a number of special Live Screenings and events. The theme this year is Live Stories, and the principal guest is Ira Glass.

So, if you’re in Amsterdam this week, stop by the festival and check it out!

Serge Gainsbourg’s wall

Serge Gainsbourg – animation des graffitis sur 5 ans du mur rue de Verneuil from Arnaud Jourdain on Vimeo.

This video, by Arnaud Jourdain, documents five years of the history of a graffiti wall in Paris dedicated to Serge Gainsbourg. What’s brilliant is the way he does it: instead of just playing back the photos in series, he isolates each individual tag, puts it on its own layer, and explodes the whole glorious mess out into space with 3D animation. It’s a beautiful, fresh take on the Graffiti Archaeology meme. The wall itself, with love notes and other hommages interspersed among the tags and wheatpastes, reminds me of the John Lennon wall in Prague.

What’s keeping me busy

Updates have been kinda slow on the site lately, mostly due to this new project I’ve been working on (see above). This is not a personal blog, but I had to post this shot here because of the sweet T-shirt Nate1 sent us from New Skool. Go check out his other wares, there are some excellent designs (I especially love the Krylon and headphones shirts!) Thanks Nate!

Bay Area Graffiti, the book

Photographer Steve Rotman (better known online as funkandjazz) has just released his much anticipated book, Bay Area Graffiti. It’s the first book ever to document the San Francisco Bay Area’s vibrant graffiti scene. Steve’s been a good friend and contributor to Graffiti Archaeology for years now, and his work is consistently the best of the best. Get the book! You won’t be disappointed.

If you’re local, there will be a book release party on February 6th, from 4 to 9pm, at 111 Minna, and on the walls will be artwork from a number of writers featured in the book. Don’t miss it!

more new layers: bluxome

Shown here: bluxome/eastA layer 14, October 5, 2008; piece by CHEZ.

Right next to Apex’s new piece is another huge, intensely detailed burner by CHEZ. Once again I was lucky enough to capture several stages of the work in progress to share with you here. Chez’s way of working with color here is something I haven’t seen before: overlaying a white-on-black backlayer with transparent colors for the fill. Check it out!

new layers: Bluxome

Apex has just finished an incredibly ambitious piece in the center of the Bluxome wall back here in San Francisco. It’s a third of a block long, and he used over five hundred different colors of paint to create it. It took him almost three months to finish, so I was able to catch several stages of the work in progress. I particularly enjoyed seeing the layering of color on color for the fill, and how he used the blank parts of the wall as a sketchbook for trying out different ideas. Check it out.

Pixação vs. Graffiti in São Paulo

Just weeks after the legalization of graffiti (and re-criminalization of pixação) in Brazil, there’s more news on the split between these two subcultures. Some pixadores were not too happy with the commodification of street art, so they got together to tag up an entire gallery, walls, paintings, prints and all. Read on to see the flyer they distributed to organize the event. (Via Wooster Collective.)

Update: Wooster Collective got the photos from the Gallery’s Flickr stream, and if you follow that link you can see a long list of comments from Brazilians who are fans of either pixação or graffiti/street art. There may be some interesting discussions brewing in there, so if I find any choice bits I’ll try to post translations here later.

Continue reading Pixação vs. Graffiti in São Paulo…

Undercroft saved by the Prime Minister’s office?

A recent edit to the Wikipedia entry for “Queen Elizabeth Hall” added mention of the Undercroft, and Graffiti Archaeology’s coverage of it. Also linked is an article in Time Out London that credits the Prime Minister’s office with saving the Undercroft from development into shops:

Are some government ministers secret skateboarders? We think they must be. Back in January, we reported on rumours that the underpass of the Queen Elizabeth Hall on the South Bank was set to be developed into retail outlets.

Last month Downing Street responded to the campaign with a statement that read: ‘The Southbank Centre (SBC) is an independent arts organisation and decisions about the undercroft are a matter for them. [But] any activity that engages young people can have a positive impact on society, and the skateboarding community that has grown up around the undercroft has brought together people from various backgrounds, created a vibrant public space and added real value to the lives of many young people.’

London’s skaters are delighted. ‘It’s rad, obviously,’ says skateboarder Ninian Doff. ‘If skaters left the South Bank now, it’d be like the Tower losing its ravens – the place would crumble.’

The next battle for the skaters is to get the area returned to the size it was before the SBC boarded up two thirds of it to use as storage during the redevelopment of the Royal Festival Hall.

Also be sure to set aside 23 minutes of your day to check out this excellent documentary about the space. It succeeds wonderfully at explaining why a shared public space like this, with its own organically-grown street culture, is so important to the life of any city.

(found via this photo on Flickr.)