A new book details how graffiti artists have become more inventive as the corporate world has tried to muscle in

Published on Monday 20 December 2010 11:07

In 21 February 2007, Sotheby's in London auctioned three works by graffiti artist Banksy. The pieces sold for over £170,000.

• A work by Banksy on the Israeli West Bank Barrier in Palestine. Banksy has become one of the most acclaimed urban artists.

The following day, the artist, who has managed to remain anonymous, despite his rising fame, updated his website with an image of a scene from an auction house showing art enthusiasts bidding on a painting bearing the legend "I can't believe you morons actually buy this s**t."

In the few years since Banksy's work entered the mainstream, graffiti has, more than ever, been embraced as a legitimate art form. Work by notable artists sells for thousands of pounds, murals on buildings are protected and graffiti artists are often celebrated, not vilified for their output.

A new book, Trespass: A History of Uncommissioned Urban Art by Carlo McCormick and Mark and Sarah Schiller explores some of the best examples of urban art around the world to date, from installations to graffiti and performance art.

What all the pieces have in common is that none was commissioned. Indeed most are photographed very soon after completion since their creators have no idea how long they will survive.

Some last hours, others days or weeks before they are removed or painted over by other artists. Some still exist, untouched by others or even protected by the authorities.

The book opens with a quote attributed to Queen Mary which alludes to the title: "There's only one thing I never did and wish I had done: climbed over a fence." The artists featured have climbed over hundreds of fences. They have evaded authorities and been chased by police. They have hidden in bushes and risked prosecution. Yet their motives are not financial, even when, as in Banksy's case, their work is of considerable value.

"I was 16 years old when I first trespassed onto some railway tracks and wrote the initials of the graffiti crew (of which I was the only member) on a wall," says Banksy in the opening pages of the book.

"Afterwards the most incredible thing happened - absolutely nothing. No dogs chased me, no thunderbolt from God shot down to punish me, and my mum didn't even notice I'd been gone. That was the night I realised you could get away with it.

"To some people breaking into property and painting it might seem a little inconsiderate, but in reality the 30sq cm of your brain are trespassed upon every day by teams of marketing experts. "Graffiti is a perfectly proportionate response to being sold unattainable goals by a society obsessed with status and infamy."

Of course graffiti is not a new phenomenon. Examples can be found on ancient Roman and Egyptian buildings, on the ruins of Pompeii and the Catacombs of Rome.

Maeshowe, the neolithic chambered cairn on Orkney features extensive graffiti carved into the rock by Vikings over 800 years ago. Inscriptions include the words, "Ingigerth is the most beautiful of all women" next to a crude carving of a slavering dog.

In the 1970s graffiti became a movement, associated with hip hop culture, particularly in the US, and was seen everywhere from the walls of disused buildings to subway cars.

In the mid-Eighties, stencils were introduced, meaning artists could work quickly, repeat their work easily and reduce the risk of being caught.

By the turn of the century, however, large corporations had caught on to its potential as a marketing tool. These were the very corporations which many artists were attacking in their work, yet from Sony to IBM they utilised graffiti to advertise their products.

In Trespass, artists go far beyond the definitions of graffiti as we understand them. They cover entire walls with enormous murals which span several storeys.

They fire arrows into the fabrics of buildings. They sabotage signs and put stickers on street furniture. One photographer, Chad Nicholson, enlists several pairs of identically-dressed twins to sit opposite each other on a subway carriage, creating a perfect mirror image.

A sculptor, Nele Azevedo carves figures out of ice and leaves them sitting on kerbs. Guerilla gardener Richard Reynolds plants lavender and sunflowers in neglected urban spaces in London. A number of artists create colourful knitted "jackets" for pieces of dull street furniture.

Billboards and other forms of advertising are popular targets, cleverly altered to convey an artist's anti-capitalist stance. A Nike ad is changed so that the company's famous "swoosh" logo appears to be strangling the model.

A Marlboro sign is doctored to read "Marlbore". New York artist Ji Lee pastes cartoonish speech bubbles onto ads for passers-by to fill in as they please.

"For those most concerned with the ill that trespassers represent, be they activists or artists, it might help to consider this: graffiti, protest, and aesthetic intervention all work in opposition to authority," writes Carlo McCormick, one of the book's authors, "because restrictions on free expression and movement will inherently be viewed by a segment of the population as an invitation, the act of trespass can be understood not simply as a challenge to the rules but also as a challenge to the authority upon which they are founded."

With the dawn of the internet and access to cheap digital cameras, artists have been able to share and publicise their work instantly. And no matter how quickly the authorities remove it, their work finds a permanent place on the internet.

Through such exposure, graffiti artists' work has found an army of fans who sympathise with their political message or simply appreciate the aesthetic. And some morons even shell out thousands of pounds for the privilege of hanging it on their walls.

Trespass: A History of Uncommissioned Urban Art is published by Taschen at 27.99.

This article was first published in The Scotsman, 8 January, 2011