Even as proponents of graffiti, we realize that those who get caught vandalizing deserve an appropriate level of punishment and so it’s good to hear that the idiots kids who crappily tagged a bunch of property in Central Park won’t be going jail, but will be doing community service instead. Their task? 200 hundred hours of horseshit shoveling. |NYP|
Photo: Jen Chung/Gothamist
After all the talk about saving Banksy’s recent IKEA piece, its owners have finally spoken up by ripping out the work. Hansom Premix, the company which owns the South London wall that Banksy vandalized, have cut and carted the painting away “to save it from further vandalism.” They’re not the first: other unintentional Banksy owners have put their property up for sale lest thieves take it for themselves. However, they are the only Banksy preservationists taking such extreme measures to save a defaced piece that was never intended to last. |Sutton Guardian|
Banksy preservationists continue their futile attempts to selectively curate illegal street art. Last month, the Croydon Guardian bemoaned how Banksy’s IKEA painting was “‘tagged’ over by vandals,” failing to report the criminal nature of the “world’s most famous street artist’s contribution” to the south London neighborhood. At the time, Sutton Council was holding a vote to exempt the piece from their zero-tolerance graffiti policy, and is now considering its restoration according to the BBC. But without establishing a more equitable policy for all unsanctioned art, the council’s so-called “democratic” decision to make Banksy above the law is a surefire inspiration for continued attacks on his work.
Photo by 303db
Graffiti writers have responded to Sutton Council’s request for feedback on Banksy’s recent vandalism, tagging over it with their names and “real graffiti.” The Croydon Guardian reports that the IKEA painting has been “ruined by louts,” and is so incensed by this attack on Banksy’s illegal street art that they’re soliciting information on the “envious graffiti artists” who are responsible. |Croydon Guardian|
Photo by 303db
A forthcoming documentary focuses on anti-graffiti zealots who commit the same crimes they crusade against. In “Vigilante Vigilante,” San Francisco filmmakers Max Good and Nathan Wollman successfully stalk and unmask a local man, known as the “Silver Buff,” who “surreptitiously spray paints metallic silver blobs over existing graffiti, almost always doing more damage than was there to begin with.” Along the way, the filmmakers also profile other prolific graffiti-hating vandals including New Orleans’ “Gray Ghost,” Fred Radtke, who was recently busted for vandalizing a legal mural and ordered to get permission to paint on other people’s property. Watch a preview from “the battle for expression” after the jump. Read more »
Just days before the 8th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, a homeless woman was arrested for her smashing salute at a Staten Island memorial. 56-year-old Kathryn Cronin faces up to four years in prison for allegedly attacking two granite plaques with a metal pipe. |NYDN|
What could be more bizarre than a group of moronic teenagers in Virginia using sod at an elementary school to spell out the letters “KKK” and make a big ol’ swastika? One of them was black. Outlandish or par for the course? If both the right and the left can toss around the Nazi symbol slipshod at town hall meetings on health care why shouldn’t African-Americans? |NBCWashington|
News reports are suggesting the Mosquito, the age discriminating anti-loitering noisemaker, isn’t so good at discouraging vandalism. A month after Tokyo park officials installed the device delinquents smashed a toilet, but it’s possible the vandals simply braved the high pitched noise long enough to act out their annoyance or they’re too old to be affected. |Pink Tentacle|
Most blamed the attack on Banksy’s paintings earlier this week on vandals with paintball guns, however the illegal paintings were actually marred with paint filled balloons. A British paintball company issued a press release this morning to stop everyone from scapegoating their beloved guns, which “only fire small balls of harmless, fully biodegradable gelatine and certainly could never be loaded with a balloon.”
“Paintball is a popular, well organised section of the leisure industry in the UK, enjoyed by young and old and ought not to be inaccurately connected to acts of vandalism in this way.”
They’re totally right: paintball guns should only get credit for spectacular acts of vandalism they’re used in, like the billboard attack after the jump. Read more »
Hours after shooting up one of Banksy’s murals, unknown vandals struck again, firing shots at the millionaire street artist’s “Mild Mild West” piece in Bristol. Similar to yesterday’s attack on his “Windows Lovers” painting, blue paintballs were splattered across the work—earlier this year it was splashed with washable red paint by Appropriate Media. While a local politician was busy cleaning off the ‘Lovers’, the People’s Republic of Stokes Croft got to work cleaning the latest barrage.
Photo via BBC
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