Graffiti Art in NYC
For our class project I think it would be interesting to study graffiti art throughout different neighborhoods. The graffiti art that is present throughout New York City can be seen as a large portion of city culture. Not only is graffiti self-expression, but it is also a representation of various types of people in specific neighborhoods. Each graffiti design means something, and different types of graffiti could signify different aspects of New York culture, such as social movements, art appreciation, and even gang affiliation.
The project would be an analysis of graffiti in neighborhoods such as South Houston, Williamsburg, Astoria, and so forth. I think that it would be good to look at graffiti art throughout almost every borough so we could think about the associations that people in each neighborhood have with graffiti messages. We could learn about the cultural prominence of certain groups in different neighborhoods based on graffiti art and whether or not there is gang affiliation within that neighborhood that coincides with the type of graffiti that is tagged there. The neighborhoods could be broken up into groups and each group would focus on getting pictures of the art, and try to understand the correlation between the placement of the graffiti with the culture of that neighborhood. I believe that since each neighborhood is broken up into specific ethnic communities, the ethnicity of the people will guide their culture. Thus guiding their opinions on gang life, art in general, and whether or not art is a large part of that specific culture.
It would be interesting to connect a culture with the type of graffiti that they make. I think that each culture throughout the city exudes different values, and some neighborhoods will have less graffiti art than others. We could use the graffiti as a connection to the income of certain neighborhoods, or we could connect graffiti prominence to gang affiliation. There are various paths we could take in discussing the prominence or lack thereof of graffiti in various neighborhoods throughout the city. There could also be a discussion of “Five Pointz” that was recently demolished in Queens, and how this is an aspect of New York City culture, as well as the loss of culture with its destruction. We would just be focusing on the overall aspect of art throughout the city and how graffiti is a part of street culture, however we would also tie that into economic background of the neighborhoods we research, or to social and ethnic background of that specific neighborhood.
