Graffiti is art

When I told my grandpa that graffiti is art, he practically choked on his morning coffee, spending the next five minutes yelling about the costs of vandalism and sanitation. It took me the rest of the morning to make him understand there’s a difference between stuff splattered illegally onto walls and graffiti, the art form.

I’m an artist, both traditionally and in literature. And growing up, I had the privilege to go to an art gymnasium where I studied painting. So, I meet all kinds of different artists, one of whom just happens to be a graffiti artist. And yes, she is the one who created the artwork you see (the image is from her website, copyright is hers). Amara Muñoz is a friend and a graffiti artist who makes a living from her art. If interested, you can see her website and other artworks here.

As Amara and I talked about her work, we got deep into the misunderstanding her art form suffers. Graffiti has sadly come to be associated with vandalism to the extent that when Amara is job-hunting, she avoids using the word graffiti in her dealings with the clients. This isn’t just sad but seriously harming a fantastic art form.

Now, there are graffiti artists out there who would argue the term can only be used for artwork involving lettering, but that's a discussion for another time. What I want to focus on is how we can help correcting a wrong provided by society. We can help by stop using the art form’s name as an umbrella term for what people see drawn on houses. Instead, remind people who say "graffiti is ruining our streets" that there’s an art form with that name that doesn’t deserve the lousy slogan shoved at it.

Trying to open peoples’ eyes is something I deal with in my writing all the time. I try breaking slogans, branding and misconceptions, so we have a chance to make up our own minds about things. Because how can we, if not presented the whole picture?