Category: AR474

I have never thought of graffiti as performative. Yet, all of these articles draw a link between the event of viewing and the event of doing graffiti. In “Ancient Graffiti in Context,” Baird and Taylor attempt to define graffiti based on its context. They argue that, when analyzing graffiti, we must look at its location, medium, message, and the cultural and political narrative of the time. However, they take this definition one step further by arguing that the act of graffiti can be seen as an event. Baird and Taylor state that if the act of writing is an event, then graffiti is an object. Inversely, if graffiti is an object, then the interpretation becomes and event again. The use of the term “event” draws on the notion of graffiti as a performative act.

Kellum in her essay, “Spectacle of the Street,” also connects graffiti to the act of preforming. She argues that, in Ancient Rome, the street served as a place of performance and spectacle. She emphasizes the public nature of the street by pointing to the shrines and altars on the street, as well as the games, and sites of intersection. Kellum uses graffiti to understand the street and its performative nature. She points to the graffiti used on street signs and the graffiti at intersections to wish good luck and well being. She also points to the interactive nature of graffiti. She argues that the street is a place where one observes and is observed. Thus, when someone interacts with graffiti (reading it aloud) it becomes a public spectacle.

***added after class

Another common theme seen throughout these articles is the notion of space and place. All of these articles talk about the different locations of graffiti. I have always thought of graffiti as an illicit act on subway cars or in alley ways. However, all these articles point to different places where there is graffiti. In the case of the Frood article, the place of the graffiti is crucial to understanding the graffiti. Frood uses the location of the graffiti in the Egyptian temples to define the temple graffiti. Initially Frood hypothesized that the graffiti on the outside of the temple for non-elites to have access to worship. However, she later learned that the outside was not actually that accessible, and therefore, this graffiti was actually for, and by, the temple personal and the priests. The graffiti showed images of the rituals and practices of the personal and priests, thus bringing the inside to the outside. Like the street, which Kellum, discusses, the temple walls were also a fluid boundary. I think I want to write my research paper on five pointz and gentrification of this area. This essay will look at the relationship between the art and the surrounding place.

I have never thought about graffiti as a concept that transcends time, culture and space. For me, it has always been a somewhat modern action and form of expression. It has become so prevalent in our urban environment, and often is considered to “deface” walls and public spaces. Which is why it’s so easy for us to view ancient graffiti as something something similar. I really liked that all of these articles attempted to define graffiti what graffiti was/is in the beginning, and then went on to challenge common stereotypes of modern graffiti that we implicitly placed on ancient graffiti. As Baird and Taylor mention “it might be easy to view ancient graffiti as an illicit urban phenomenon which defaces property” (3). Baird and Taylor argue that viewing graffiti as acts of defacement leads to more misconceptions than revelations, as it will implicitly “demonize” graffiti. It takes away from what the artist/maker’s original intention might have been, which could have simply been to mark ownership over a pot or stall in a marketplace. Therefore, we cannot just assume that ancient graffiti was unauthorized or illicit. Additionally, Frood mentions that ancient graffiti was not made just by lower classes, but also by soldiers and even priests.

What I really took away from all of these articles, is how fluid and vague the definition of graffiti is. While in its simplest form, graffiti can be defined as markings that are scratched onto a surface/building, that are not technically supposed to be there in the first place. However, the definition really depends on the culture and context of the markings, which is why it is hard to have “graffiti” as a distinct category. As Baird and Taylor argue, “ancient graffiti are not necessarily defined only by their content or subject, nor by the surface onto which they are made, nor by the techniques with which they are produced” (5). As graffiti encompasses such a broad definition and inclusion of markings, it has largely led to the exclusion of graffiti from being viewed as historical “evidence” or even art.

As we mentioned on the first day of our class, graffiti is naturally intended to have some sort of audience. It is created for someone to view and interact with. It can be for everyone as there is no formal training, skill, or literacy required to “read” it. However, because it is so informal and is largely considered to image based, it leads to the “marginalization of graffiti as a form of evidence” (Baird, Taylor 8). Historians are more likely to accept something as evidence if it contains elements of written or verbal language. This is problematic to me because graffiti can be done by anyone for any reason. It is the most universal and inclusive form of communication. Ancient graffiti gives us a very personal look into individual people’s daily lives, and is not just representative of the elite and those who have gotten the chance to shape and write their own history. Because graffiti is not “supposed” to be there, we immediately connect ancient graffiti to our modern misconceptions and stereotypes of graffiti and disregard it as important historical evidence.

 

 

I found these chapters and articles to be insightful in their attention to the multifaceted and various ways in which ancient graffiti is/has been defined and materialized. The dialogic nature of these articles, made concrete in the specific occasions of intertextual citation, brings to mind our discussions on discourse and the way in which academic literature respond to, contradict, and build off one another. These articles contradict and complement one another through the definitions they support and discard.

A definition on which the readings seemed to find consensus was loosely based around marks made in unexpected places (Baird and Taylor 4). Deviating from the definition of and assumptions for graffiti within our contemporary social imaginary, this “definition” made room for broad, contextual, holistic study of textual and pictorial imagery in unassuming locations. Nevertheless, while this definition perhaps enabled Frood, Baird and Taylor, and Olton to explore and study the contexts, implications, and interpretations of graffiti in their field-sites, this definition is challenged within the context of Pompeii. As explored in Kellum’s article, the Roman “street was the pivotal performative arena in a visual culture where viewership was active…” (Kellum 283); the performative quality of visual culture and graffiti in the street aided in the construction of and performance of subjectivities. Not only was graffiti expected, but it affirmed individuality and identity within the framework of a performative social “stage” (287).

Among the articles, however, a source of unity appears to be the emphasis on decoding graffiti via a word and image approach that heeds the dialogic relationship among images. Graffiti “can be viewed in dialogue with one another as text and image,” write Baird and Taylor (Baird and Taylor 8). Similarly, Frood writes of the way in which secondary images “activate and enliven” primary (read: official) images (Frood 293).

In emphasizing a context-driven interpretation of graffiti, these texts point toward a key function (whether intentional or in its aftermath) of graffiti-as-event: that by scratching into a surface, its writers-artists engage in actions of place-making (Frood 298). In applying the functional effect of place-making to my own research this semester, I hope to explore the affective experience of place, dynamic and rendered a site of (discontinuous) communication through palimpsests of graffiti.

Post-Discussion Response

In this section of seminar, student presentations on critical theories spanned Feminist theory through Post-Structuralism. Many of these theories seek to give a voice to those voices often under or misrepresented by challenging the cannon and the glorified “masters.”

Our discussion on artistic “genius,” including the identities and conditions that enable their elevation to the cannon inspired me to think beyond art and art history. In addition to glorifying their “originality,” “creative innovation,” “tortured-ness” and isolation, the recognition of their artistic “genius” stands upon the hierarchical nature of binary oppositions as they relate to identity: these artistic “geniuses” represent identities with access to power: straight, white, cis-gender men, middle-elite class (bourgeoisie), European, with access to education and networks of economic exchange. These identities, and the projection of “innovation” onto their characters, have enabled them to be included in the cannon.

As discussed in seminar, post-structural theorist Michel Foucault questioned the construction of power. His line of inquiry includes: How does knowledge secure power? Mobilizing this question, I locate a line of tension in our conversation and discourse that seeks to include marginalized artists and voices into the narrative. How does knowledge secure power? The majority of the theorists included in D’Alleva’s text are straight, white, cis-gender men from “Western” nations, highly educated and well-connected. That they might argue for a reading of art and literature that emphasizes sub-altern voices and production while embodying the structures of power that have kept those voices and production in the margins is both ironic and contradictory. But it does not come as a surprise.

What forms of art are considered to be art? Feminist and sub-altern scholars have emphasized the ways in which women’s art has been historically deemed as “craft,” thereby “less-than.” The same questions applied to art history from sub-altern and Feminist theory are relevant in academia. Knowledge secures power as texts are presented as historical “truth.” How is knowledge secured? Who has access to education? What forms of knowledge are considered to be knowledge?

Throughout my academic career, I have encountered Sigmund Freud several times. However, his “penis argument” was new to me. I had never heard of this part of his Oedipus vs. Electra complex, and found his argument to be very…quaint. It was so interesting to learn how easily he categorized the world. For someone who had such advanced ideas in the 19^th century that emphasized the experience and psyche of the unconscious individual, it is contradictory to have such a narrow opinion of male and female gender and sexuality. As D’Alleva says, his theories “reflect Freud’s experience of nineteenth-century bourgeois male culture, not the range of human experience.” He claims to understand and speak for all, but ends up missing so much. Freud places the penis at the very center of all of humanity’s sexuality, what we all apparently strive to have/attain, which consequently belittles the female clitoris and vagina. Which really, just exhibits the pattern and power of ‘the man’, something that has become such a dominant theme throughout our history.

It is interesting to study Freud within the discipline of art history, as he is usually more relevant within the fields of psychology, political science and philosophy. Additionally, his low opinion of women and their sexuality is an interesting component to add to art history, which already struggles with the lack of great female artists. So many women were denied access to education and artistic training, mainly because they were not wealthy white men. As D’Alleva mentions, Freud has had many critics for the great majority of his theories, but yet some of his arguments in art history remain uncontested, as he attempted to psychoanalytically explain great artists like Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci. Freud’s approach to art history consists of psychoanalyzing the artist’s intentions, personality and works. Most art historians do not use Freud’s pathographical approach (with good reason), as it is incredibly difficult already to figure out an artist’s conscious intentions, never mind their unconscious intentions. However, it is certainly intriguing to read Freud’s attempts to understand these complex artists.

Chapters 4-6 in D’Alleva’s Look! Again, provide another interesting look on some of the most important foundations of art history. Focusing on the section on structuralism and post structuralism specifically (for the purpose of my short class presentation), I want to take this opportunity to reflect on a few specific pieces of D’Alleva’s arguments concerning these movements.

Between my senior capstone art history class and this class alike, the ideas of synchronic and diachronic aspects have presented themselves week after week in my reading. In this section in particular, myths are questioned using synchronic and diachronic approaches, and this breaks the form of structuralism into a more digestible format when compared to other theories of art history. I find it fascinating how structuralists could argue the need for rigidity in structural norms within culture, while individuals such as Levi-Strauss argue that the “structure” can also be looked at in this manner of synchronic vs. diachronic.

As Strauss says “myths are important because they provide a logical model capable of overcoming contradiction”, others argue that from this results the death of the author. Interestingly, I would disagree and prefer to blend the approaches, as the “number of codes available in the artist’s or author’s culture” seem to be something, that in my mind, can be undercover by the author via myth decoding.

Although this topic becomes increasingly “meta” the more that one divulges into the details, it is interesting to ask if structuralists and post structuralists can potentially work with each other instead of against each other. Offering each other solutions (at least potential) for the shortcomings and criticisms of each theory.

I found the discussion of the gaze to be extremely interesting. D’Alleva defines the “gaze” as a “process of looking which includes a network of relationships” (106). According to D’Alleva, the gaze is a powerful way to assert ones authority. D’Alleva then goes on to discuss the gaze in terms of film theory, which made me think back to discussions of the gaze that I had in History of Photography sophomore year.

In History of Photography we read a chapter titled “The Photograph as an Intersection of Gazes: The Example of National Geographic.” This essay written by Catherine Lutz and Jane Collins discusses the multiple layer of “gazes” apparent in a photograph. Lutz and Collins argue that there are 7 different kinds of gazes for National Geographic photos: photographers, institutional/magazines, readers’, non western subjects gaze, gaze of the western in the photo, the gaze returned or retracted from the mirrors that many non westerners hold in photographs, and our own, academic gaze. Although these 7 gazes apply directly to National Geographic photographs, they still help to expand on D’Alleva’s arguments about the gaze. Lutz and Collins takes D’Alleva’s discussion about the gaze one step further by showing the complexity and interconnectedness of the gaze. While D’Alleva uses film theory to discuss the experience of viewing, Lutz and Collins uses a specific source, National Geographic,  to understand the relationship between the subject, the artist, the viewer, and society at large.