Anti-Healthcare Reform Graffiti and Smashed Glass Lack Artistic Merit

Art Review by Julie Jigsawnovich

I recently reviewed the graffiti installation foisted upon former presidential candidate Mehdi Karroubi's home in Tehran while Iranian police and Iranian security forces looked on. Now I turn my attention closer to home, to the spate of glass smashings and the woefully inept graffiti plaguing political and government offices in the United States around the time of the recent vote on Healthcare Reform.

"DORKS" seems an appropriate tag for the toy graffiti writer whose awkward lettering on windows of the Knox County Democratic Headquarters in Ohio belies a complete lack of understanding of the importance of style. Although he may not have grown up anywhere near a subway train, handball court, or gang jacket--prime urban canvasses upon which this contemporary artform first bloomed--that's no excuse! There are plenty of documentaries and books from which to copy from the masters, and then add new innovations.

Perhaps contributing to obvious problems "DORKS" had in executing his piece is the fact that he chose an uneven surface to hit. His "D" seems intimidated by the wooden piece above it, he gains stride with the "R", drops the ball with a pathetic "K" and trails off with a wimpy "S." And "S" is such a hot letter, so beloved to many graffiti writers! "DORKS'" "S" makes me shake my head in disgust.

Yes, location is everything, but even within the outlaw world of graffiti, there are certain codes of conduct. I'm not sure that placing such a lowgrade work in such a visible place really does much to further "DORKS'" cause, especially since we have to guess at what his cause really is, and why he might believe in it. Plus, "DORKS'" placement of his miserable folly on political headquarters is likely to result in a crackdown on graffiti in general--at least in that county. This would surely bring hate upon him from any serious graffiti artist whose goal is to create masterpieces.

Now, let's examine the smashed glass windows and doors of elected representatives' offices. These pieces up the ante in terms of performance. Breaking glass is not only much louder than the application of spraypaint, is it even more associated with crime than with free speech. Graffiti may be destructive or constructive, depending on the skills of the author, and where it is placed, but breaking glass is almost always considered destruction.

photo: smashed glass at Rep. Gabrielle Gifford's (D-AZ) Tucson Office

Yet, there are exceptions. The glass in Marcel Duchamp's mixed media piece, The Bride Stripped Bare by her Bachelors, Even (The Large Glass) was accidentally broken while in transit. Duchamp is reported to have commented with satisfaction, "Now the work is complete."

But the smashed glass windows of the following representative's offices were not in transit, they were apparently not broken by accident, and their destruction lacks artistic vision. Amanda Terkel of ThinkProgress.org reported that, "On the morning of March 19, someone threw a brick through the front window of Rep. Louise Slaughter’s (D-NY) Niagara Falls office. Monroe County Democratic Committee officials also said that a brick shattered the glass doors at their party’s headquarters in Rochester, NY on Saturday or Sunday. Someone reportedly threw a fist-sized rock threw a fist sized rock through the front window of the Hamilton County (Ohio) Democratic Party headquarters Sunday night after Congress passed the landmark health insurance overhaul. Caleb Faux, the party’s executive director, finds it 'hard to believe the incident wasn’t related to the legislation’s passing.'" And out west, "The glass front door of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords’ (D-AZ) Tuscon office was 'smashed out' a 'few hours after she voted in favor of health care reform,' said Giffords’ spokesman C.J. Karamargin."

In summary, while it has been interesting to compare street art and performance art with acts of political vandalism and destruction by non-artists whose goal is apparently to terrorize specific political figures who expressed their views, serious street artists and performance artists more frequently seek to enlighten than frighten. I will close with a very positive street piece by the talented young Iranian artist, ICY. The child depicted holds the Farsi/Persian word for "Peace."

                                                                                                                                                                

Iranian Street Art: ICY Melts My Heart

by Julie Ashcraft A.K.A. Jigsawnovich


Artist ICY seems to have a heart brimming with the highest form of human love, and it gently reaches out from his art to connect with viewers. Even officers from the LAPD admired his works on paper at the opening of the From the Streets of Iran exhibit at the Crewest Gallery in Los Angeles, California. This may break stereotypes, since ICY got his start as a graffiti stencil artist. ICY told me, "About two years ago, I was working my stencil, Boy in Mindful, in a crowded street of Tabriz, Iran--when suddenly police officers arrested me and took me to a police station. They detained me for about 20 hours. But because this work was not political, they released me."

Undeterred, ICY's work has grown increasingly political, in that it advocates peace from within the context of a regime holding weekly chants demanding death to several countries. For marches celebrating the 30th anniversary of the Islamic Revolution in Iran, ICY made a cardboard cutout painting of a chador wearing woman carrying a child who holds the Persian script word, "Peace." He put this painting on a stick, and it was carried in the marches. I asked him how people there responded. ICY replied, "Some of the people like it, but there are lots of people that reject us and works."

A Tabriz postal worker recently prevented ICY from mailing several paintings to the Crewest Gallery, because the paintings had the color green--associated with the Iranian freedom, democracy and human rights movement. Ironically, a painting by ICY's younger brother, SOT, depicting a man using blood-red paint to cover a stencil of Mousavi's face, successfully made it to the gallery--as Raja Abdulrahim reported in the Los Angeles Times. After suggesting to ICY that perhaps he could enclose his paintings inside more conventional paintings, and attempt to mail them again, I asked whether he did. ICY replied, "No. I sent just two of them, Peace Girl and War against Peace. Protest and Freedom are still in Iran."

Noticing that his fellow artists in the exhibit are all male, I asked ICY whether there are any female Iranian street artists. ICY replied, "Not now, but 5 years ago one female artist, 'Salome,' did some graffiti writing in Tehran."

ICY's work is shown together with work by SOT, FRZ, MAD and CK1 in the exhibit, From the Streets of Iran, which continues through September 26th at the Crewest gallery in Los Angeles. For more information, please visit
www.crewest.com