Om Arkivet. Staffan Jacobson,
fil.dr.
Inventering, Spraykonstarkivet. 20/1 2000
A brief History of The first graffito done 3.500 years ago at Sakkara,
Egypt.
The very first graffito was probably done 3.500 years ago by an
ancient tourist near by the Sakkara Pyramid, and it goes, with scribbled
hieroglyphs: ”I am very impressed by Pharaoh Djosers´
pyramid.” Graffiti has been a common every day life phenomena
especially since the days of Ancient Greece. The Vikings, too, left
graffiti names with runes from England to Constantinopel. 1593 The catacombs of Rome were built during the 1:st and 2:nd century
A.D., then forgotten and later rediscovered. The first one to investigate
graffiti in a serious way was the Italian Antonio Bosio. His ”Roma
Sotteranea” was written in 1593, published in folio format
1632 and holds a systematic description of official and non-official
inscriptions in the catacombs of Rome, complete with maps over the
”secret tunnels”. Bosio also left his own signature in
the Priscilla catacomb, but he never used the very word ”graffiti”.
1731 The pseudonym Hurlo-Trumbo published ”The Merry Thought”
in London 1731, a poetic record of glass window and bog-house scratchings,
not an investigation. 1856 The archeologist Raphael Garucchi was the prime one to use the
word graffiti when he researched the ”Graffiti de Pompéi”
1856, and the purpose was to divide official cursive inscriptions
from common peoples inscriptions on ancient monuments in the city
buried by the volcanic outburst of Vesuvius in the year 79. Pompeii
was for a long time forgotten, rediscovered and plundered from 1748
and professionally excavated from 1860. Today 3/4 of the city could
be seen. 1874 Withrow, W.H.: The Catacombs of Rome. Nelson & Phillips, N.Y.
1874. p. 59, 60, 130, 148, 174, 175. b/w ill. 1904 The work Anthropopytheia was published by F.S. Krauss in Leipzig
as 10 yearbooks 1904-1914. Latrinalia etc is documented and discussed
from a folkloristic point of view. 1914 Calonne-Beaufaict, M. de: Les graffiti du Mont Gundu. Revue D’Etnographie
et de Sociologie, No 3-4, Mars-Avril 1914, p. 109-117.
The linguist Allen Walker Read published ”Lexical Evidence
from Folk Epigraphy in Western North America” 1935, a field
study of language in graffiti and with a great further influence. 1937 Helen Tanzer described ”The Common People of Pompeii”
from graffiti examples. 1946 Article ”Transit Association Ships a Street Car to Shelter
Family of ’Kilroy Was Here’ ”. The New York
Times, Dec 24, 1946, p. 18. (On James J. Kilroy, Halifax, Massachusetts). 1947 Article ”Who Is ‘Kilroy ?” The New York Times Magazine,
Jan 12, 1947, p. 30, (James J. Kilroy, Halifax, Massachusetts, in
his own words on the origins of the “Kilroy was here”
graffiti.) 1956 Brassai´s( Guyla Halasz, 1899-1984 ) photos of graffiti
scratchings on Paris´ house fronts were shown at MoMA, N.Y.
1956-57. 1964 Brassai´s book ”Conversations avec Picasso” was
first published by Gallimard, Paris 1964. 1968 In the transition phase between TG and TTP during the turbulent
late sixties we will see researchers as Robert Reisner, who hold
the first university lectures on graffiti and published 4 compilation
books 1967-1974 who gave TG an air of cultural entertainment, French-American
William McLean who in Encyclopedia Universalis band 7, p. 849.854,
Paris 1970, made the first theoretic scientific overview and history
up to 1968.... b) Tags/Throw-ups/Pieces.
....and the teacher and activist Herbert Kohl who carefully
studied the embryos of TTP in his article ”Names, Graffiti
and Culture.” in Urban Review, April 1969, vol 3, nr 5, p.
25-37 and book: ”Golden Boy as Anthony Cool.” A Photo
Essay on Naming and Graffiti. Dial Press, N.Y. 1972, which built
a much valuable base for further research. 1971 Article ”The Aerosol Autographers - Why They Do It”
by Sandy Padwe in Philadelphia Inquirer Magazine, May 2, 1971, pp.
8-10, 12, 44 on the origins of TTP with interviews of Cornbread
and friends, 1:st graffiti writers ever. 1973 Norman Mailer/Jon Naar/Mervin Kurlansky: The Faith of Graffiti.
Alskog Publ. N.Y. 1973. An early photo record and essay. 1974 David Ley & Roman Cybrivsky : Urban Graffiti as Territorial
Markers. Annals of the Association of American Geographers, Vol.
64, nr 4/1974, p. 491-505. Qualified and unusual thesis which among
other things deals with the transgression from traditional gang
graffiti to graffiti loners, kings and crews. 1982 Craig Castleman: Getting up. Subway Graffiti in New York. MIT
Press, Cambr. Mass. 1982. 1983 deAk, Edith: Train as Book, Letter as Tank, Character as Dimension.
Art Forum, May 1983, p. 88-93. Essential interview with Rammellzee
on graffiti theory. There is a reminiscence of Jean Baudrillard
(1978) texts here. The revolution of the letters, their individualities
and the symbolic, not the phonetic function of the signs are put
in an underground, science fiction coloured art context. 1984 Hager, Steven: Hip Hop - the Illustrated History of Break Dancing,
Rap Music and Graffiti. St. Martins Press, N.Y. 1984. p. 12-30,
58-80. Hager makes the first attempt to a TTP graffiti history in
the hip hop cultural context. 1986 Kreuzer, Peter: Das Graffiti Lexikon. Heyne, 1986. This very broad
survey of the graffiti field as a whole is done as a dictionary
and continues the history writing task up to 1986. 1987 Skyum-Nielsen, Anna: Graffiti - en kriminologisk undersøgelse.
1987. The first European study on who the writers really are, done
by a young female Danish lawyer. Long and qualified interviews.
The conclusions in short are that the Danish writers are no hardened
criminals, no junkies, not dangerous, but ordinary young middle
class people with artistic ambitions and a certain sub cultural
life style. 1989 This year was a break through for TTP graffiti research, with
two highly skilled art history Ph.D. dissertations: 1990 Miller, Ivor Lynn : Aerosol Kingdom. Yale University, 1990. With
emphasis on the cultural background and indigenous character of
TTP. Followed up by several articles.
Lenore Feltman Proctor : Graffiti writers - an exploratory personality
study. Doctoral diss. in psychology, Pace University, N.Y. 1991.
By psychologists profiles it confirms that ”the writers”
are more original and creative than other compared youngsters. 1992 Brewer, Devon: Hip Hop Graffiti Writers Evaluations of Strategies
to Control Illegal Graffiti. Human Organisation, Vol. 51, No 2,
1992, p. 188-196. Important comparison between traditional police
work graffiti prevention and legal graffiti prevention alternatives.
The latter are found to be more cost-effective and less harmful
as they also provides new opportunities for writers. 1993 Ferrell, Jeff: Crimes of Style. Urban Graffiti and the Politics
of Criminality. Garland Publ. Inc., N.Y. 1993. 236 p. Criminology
study out of the graffiti culture i Denver, Colorado. Analyses the
way the authorities construct the image of their ”enemy”,
the writers, and the result of a massive anti-graffiti campaign.
Facts on the so called connection between graffiti and drugs/serious
crimes. 1996 Jacobson, Staffan: The Spray-Painted Image. Graffiti Painting
as Type of Image, Art Movement and Learning Process. Art History
Ph. D. dissertation. AAA, Lund University, Sweden 1996. TTP as a
concept dividing it from other types of graffiti. The meaning of
the pictures is penetrated by combining art history and youth research
methods. The dancing wild style letters are the main contribution
from the youth culture to art history. The Thomas Ziehe theory of
a ”unusual process of learning” is applied to the praxis
of TTP.With a large bibliography; eventually seen as the most intrinsic
study of TTP so far. 1998 Merle, Florence: The International Graffiti Movement. Ph.D. Diss.
in Anthropology, Princeton University 1998. With European approach.
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