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These paintings have been cut out of a larger painting which was
painted and hung on a concrete block wall titled “The Joneses Too”,
which is part of a body of work from 2007 where I looked at culture
makers and markers.
Fences
and walls are loved by graffitists but the cause of much angst for
the owners of these ‘blank canvases'. I
am trying to understand each of these subsets of our society, the
youth and the older sector of property owners.
The
touch of embroidery on these framed paintings symbolises a hopeful
realisation from the fence owners, who normally just whine and pontificate
about the graffiti when it is done to them, that although graffiti
is normally seen as an act of pure vandalism, it might be a cry
for attention from these angry young men just expressing their emotions
first and foremost, without secondary thought that they may be hurting
others.
Differences
between languages and culture, depending on how they are articulated
and received, may be a cause of much misunderstanding and intolerance
within our community.
I
stencilled names of artists that I saw as having been influential
to the culture of street art in history and also of artists that
have been influenced by street art and artists. I painted as one
would on a war memorial. The red picket fence palings have been
used to symbolically tick off the hundreds of anonymous graffiti
artists, to whom, whether we like it or not, have helped to form
the society we live in.
The
resulting framed paintings are seen as random snapshots, similar
to a family wall of portraits (hence the odd mix of frames), of
a society seeming to be sitting on the fence looking at the smoky
past or contemplating the direction of their future.
Is
art not the expression of emotion, especially coming from a primary
level, with paint or pen onto a ‘canvas' something to be read and
valued?
Grafitti, as in all art, does not connect with everyone but does
it still have something to say to some one?
To
suppress expression does not bear thinking about, as what would
the real last straw be?
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