So to some, the title of this post may be understood, to others, it’s completely arguable. As I've been doing different articles for this site, I've been happening upon tons and tons of street sticker archives on the web. Now, I get into this stuff immediately…it’s artistic, usually pretty quick witted, pleasing to the eye, etc, etc….but last week, while scouring the web for some dumb link to give you one more reason to screw off work, the real importance of renegade stickers dawned on me...
So, I was trying to figure out where this whole phenomenon came from. It has roots in graffiti, but there's a completely different element to it. Tagging and other forms of graffiti have to be honed as a skill, the artist has to gain familiarity with the medium. There's also limitations on what an artist can do given the size of his canvas and, depending on where the art's going down, the safety of his (or her) location....the two definitely go hand it hand, but the stickers are something literally anyone could make for any reason....there's appeal in the universality of it...
The best I can guess is that it breaks down like this....Guys used to like to tag bus seats and trains, etc…but, since it’s illegal, and it’s hard to do much more than cheap scrawl on a moving vehicle, you evolve to the sticker. So, for the aspiring urban artist, this means popping over to the local Walgreen’s, picking up a pack of “Hello, my name is” stickers, or dropping by your local post office and picking up some wide white packing labels, taking those sweethearts home and staying up scrawling “phAkie”, “germ”, or “mackOner” until the crank runs out….then the next time you hit the PT (public trans), you’re bombin’ like Bush on every surface that will hold your name. You claim your turf, share your tag, and aren’t caught with those fat little markers the cops have so much trouble over….now, I know, this is sounding like a nuisance at this point, not much value right...which itself is arguable, BUT this is the important first step in the evolution...the difference in the way the "work" is made available to the public is an important one...
Over time, you begin to see a different sort of sticker popping up around town. For a while, it was mostly those ultra-clever-at-the-moment Andre the Giant stickers. Fronted by Shephard Fairey, behind his OBEY project, these graphic visions of Andre the Giant are pretty prominent in most major urban locations. Shephard Fairey then went on to espouse about the details of his phenomenology experiment…..ok…sidebar, real quick-like…. I’m not completely convinced the Shep actually conceived this idea and then executed with his Andre stickers or he capitalized on a fad and went on to explain it in quite an eloquent fashion. Bottom line, the second step in this evolution was realizing that the medium itself could serve aesthetical purposes and not necessarily have to convey a direct meaning, yet still touch/move people….
So…at this point, what you have is the emergence of an urban-styled art-based in graffiti in a medium that is reproducible and highly distributable. Through the emulation of this technique, you allow for bedroom artists to produce their art in an anonymous fashion. Circumventing to barriers to entry that exist in many art circles. It mirrors the generation that creates it and the movement that constructs it. I would argue, in some aspects, that the graffiti and sticker art of today is the “pop art” of our generation, sans Warhol and his idea factory….it’s a movement or people expressing themselves in a renegade fashion with almost no venue for criticism or praise...art in a vacuum...expression for the sake of expression...a medium utilized to convey feeling, messages of protest, amuse, defy…..
I guess when explained as it has been here…the “wow” factor of this whole movement is a little lost. However, I challenge you to think about how many quirky little stickers you see on an ATM or a street sign versus when might have appeared 4-5 years ago…I also challenge you never to look at them the same way again...it’s a movement; a voice of your generation…there’s a never ending list of these sites that catalogue different stickers from around the world. Most of the sites I’ve happened upon are British, which I’m guessing is a direct correlation to how British people, as a general stereotype, seem to view hip hop, a music tightly related to this type of movement, from much more of an artistic perspective...hence the interest in cataloguing...
Some ports for your perusal...
http://www.woostercollective.com/index2.html
http://www.invisiblemadevisible.co.uk/
http://www.stencilrevolution.com/homepage.php
http://www.streetstickers.co.uk/
there's *tons* more...hit me up with some of your favs..I'd love to checkum out
Posted by colin at July 6, 2004 08:03 AMI disagree that sticker art is more universal than tagging. Tagging, which I don't consider art, requires nothing more than a marker. Sticker art, the type that is printed, requires a computer and a printer, which isn't a stretch these days, but it's still less universal than a marker. Sticker art is more universal in that it takes less balls. Almost as far back as I can remember tagging, I can recall the occasional "Hello, my name is" sticker tag. Instead of being an evolution of tagging, I feel that that's an easy short cut that some taggers take, one that commands less respect for its relative lack of risk and spontaneity.
Next up: Shephard Fairey. I used to be amused by the Andre the Giant stickers until he started up a line of clothing and accessories utilizing that same image. The sense of wonder is long gone -- you can buy into the reality at American Rag, Villians, or at Obeygiant.com. Street art is starting to crop up in more "legitimate" art circles these days. It also has commercial outlets in the form of clothing or whatever. The next sticker you see might be less "art for art's sake" than a business card for another artist trying to make it. I have mixed feelings about that because there's a lot of shitty art out there. Bottom line, it's a mixed blessing. It takes up city resources to get it down; it leaves an ugly, cumulative gunky residue; by its placement, it often forces you to look at it; it looks a lot better on someone else's block than yours. But sometimes it's good.
Posted by: victor at July 7, 2004 03:24 PMwalked out of the milan train station last week and there it was...an obey sticker, bring me back to my hometown. SF it is.
Posted by: scott at July 7, 2004 03:35 PM