Guide to Street Art: New York City
New York City has some insane architecture that already give its skyline artistic merit—but it’s the street art, decorating all extremities from roofs to bodegas to subway tunnels, that really keeps the City covered in color and maintains its artistic integrity. Lace your kicks, look out for cops and shake up your paint can—we’re throwing up our tag in the NYC graffiti game.
Brief History
The NYC street art craze began in the late 1960s when a teenage foot-messenger known best by Taki 183 started to spray his name all across northern Manhattan. Although it’s said that another graffiti writer, Julio 204, brought tagging to Manhattan, Taki 183’s fame and a New York Times cover story are credited for inspiring others to test their hand at painting up the city’s streets.
While some were “getting up” slowly, others “bombed” ‘hoods to get their names out there quick (like the walls of a Lower East Side tenement building circa 1991) Bombing hit a heyday in the early 70s and remains popular today.
Moving art installations were created when artists took their talents to the subways. With competition for recognition rising, artists worked at night alongside rats while tagging subway cars to move their fame throughout the boroughs. Subway cars were covered in top-to-bottom murals, a large-scale design pioneered by the artist known as Super Kool 223 and mastered by the infamous graffiti quintet, The Fabulous Five.
Just as shit got really interesting, the Clean Train Movement of 1989 decommissioned any train with graffiti on it—leading to poor enough service that the graffiti masters eventually stopped. The MTA is only now realizing how much it pissed off its art-appreciating riders and recently launched public art promotion, a PG attempt at “cleaning up” graffiti by replacing it with city-approved art. Luckily, regardless of the legality, underground artists continue to thrive above-ground. Street art in New York continues to grow, spanning vertical space from high up on rooftops, to the ground level and down into mole people territory.
Artists You Should Know
Either known for pioneering a certain style, collaborating on elaborate murals or just covering a lot of city space, in NYC, keep your eyes on the look-out for these guys:
Tracy 168: Known for creating Wildstyle graffiti by fuzing block, bubble and curling lettering styles.
Fab 5 Freddy: Notorious for merging the hip-hop nation with the graffiti underworld of New York. Although it has long been said that graffiti is simply a visual representation of hip-hop, according to Freddy, both are separate artistic forms of counterculture.
Dr. Revolt: Another old-school artist, the “doctor” painted up subways cars with the best of them. His mainstream claim to fame: He designed the logo for Yo!MTV Raps. Word to your mother.
Cortes: Best recognized for his metallica-esque skulls and sharp angular lettering, Cortes continues to impress spectators at 5 Pointz with new pieces and a recent collaboration with Meres, another popular NYC graffiti artist.
Tats Cru (aka The Mural Kings): Muralists (the original 3 were from the Bronx) that have been painting up large NYC walls and subways for 25 years. Artists continue to join the crew every year, painting larger and more elaborate murals, competing in graffiti battles and even taking part in a documentary to promote their craft. A famous member of the “Cru” was Fat Joe whose tag name was “Crack”.
Cope2: From the South Bronx, Fernando Carlo has been at it since the late 70s and you can find his bubbled-out name just about anywhere from Soho billboards to video games and chucks.
From time to time, world-renowned artist Banksy pops into the city to stencil up building sides or sneak his dark humor into museum installations.
OTP Tip: For great videos documenting tons of NYC graffiti in progress (with a bit of Kim Kardashian’s booty), check out Mr. Dutch730. You can also navigate around the NYC section of Graffiti.org for a little more visual stimulation.
Finding Street Art
From personal to political, various meaningful pieces cover the city from sewers to delis to bridges to your hostel to our house and back. You’re bound to find at least simple tags on any given street block or subway station, and with graffiti becoming more mainstream, advertisers are even commissioning artists to create intricate murals on for their projects. Until last year, there was a graffiti supply store (Alphabeta) in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, where artists could stock up on otherwise illegal contraband and practice on the shop’s mural wall. Realistically, there is no need to look for graffiti in NYC; it will find you. Should you feel like getting in the thick of it, check out:
5 Pointz
On the ground-level, when it comes to sheer abundance, Queens is the king of New York graffiti. The 5 Pointz studio in Long Island City is a living graffiti collage, where artists produce attention-grabbing pieces on and in this abandoned warehouse. New York City is often referred to as the center of the world and it’s only fitting that the greatest international graffiti artists would want to leave their mark. Forget the Empire State Building… get your ass to Queens!
The Graffiti Hall of Fame
This wall, wrapping an old playground on 106th and Park in Harlem, has been in a state of artistic evolution for three decades. Home to Graff Wars and live graffiti battles, the biggest names in New York street art venture to this famed wall to throw up their pieces.
Train Windows
The best graffiti window-watching can be done from the G train as it emerges above-ground over 5 Pointz from Brooklyn to Queens (stops: 21 St.-Van Alst until the last stop, LCL-Court Sq.) The Q train also has great graffiti scenery if you take it down to Coney Island and look at the outdoor subway walls.
Street art is a unique form of counterculture and expression that continues to evolve in its short life span. So peek out the train windows and keep your eyes wide open turning street corners. If you’ve got something to say with spray, grab a couple cans and join the late-night party. If you get caught, you never heard of us.
A mind and body traveller who thrives on recollection and anticipation, all the while decorating the crossroads.
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Wow, love this! Street art is one of my favorite parts of a city–really reveals the culture. Great photos!
Street art is so cool! And this guild’s legit.
I can’t even fathom the great info I read on this blog!