Artworld: Graffiti Is Hot (Again)
Can I say it? I hate museum shows devoted to graffiti. I no more want to see such colorful scratches and scrawls indoors than I want to see a baseball game under a dome. Some things need sunlight for the proper effect. Thus, the news in today’s New York Times that “graffiti is hot” is not a story to be welcomed in my household. While I don’t want to return to the dirty, grungy days when graffiti covered every surface in Manhattan, I also don’t like a metropolis that is entirely scrubbed clean of life. The art-world lemmings may rush to see these new graffiti shows; meanwhile, perhaps the greatest graffiti display in the world is on the walls between the bikepath and a huge below-the-freeway wall in northern Manhattan. Someday, I’ll photograph it.
