Graffiti Writing as Creative Activism: Getting Up, Sheeplike Subversion, and Everyday Resistance

Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 81 (2):239-249 (2023)
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Abstract

Is graffiti writing creative activism? In this paper, I challenge commonly held beliefs that graffiti writing is politically inert. On the contrary, I argue that graffiti writing is an example of creative activism. Rather than being a narcissistic form of vandalism, primarily directed at increasing one’s fame in front of an esoteric group, that is, fellow writers, writing is a form of everyday resistance allowing its practitioners to challenge authoritarian power. In questioning dominant hierarchies, graffiti is a powerful tool to help correct a specific instance of spatial injustice: the unequal distribution of access to urban surfaces for self-expression in the city, where corporations and political elites hold an unjustified monopoly over visual communication.

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Andrea Baldini
Temple University (PhD)

Citations of this work

The Aesthetics of Creative Activism: Introduction.Nicholas Holm & Elspeth Tilley - 2023 - Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 81 (2):131-140.

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References found in this work

Homo sacer.Giorgio Agamben - 1998 - Problemi 1.
Street Art and Consent.Sondra Bacharach - 2015 - British Journal of Aesthetics 55 (4):481-495.
Assessing Socially Engaged Art.Vid Simoniti - 2018 - Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 76 (1):71-82.

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