Urban Art Association

The old argument was graf was being painted over by street art, with similar connotations as to its Legitimacy, stealing prime spots for self promotion. To me this just seems like chickens coming home to roost a little, as street art commercialised itself, it has pretty much lost the right to protest when someone paints over their 'advertising space'

'Inkie said: "I know Mark Wigan and Josh Stika well and they are both very talented and really lovely guys who aren't at fault here'

... so DM pay a couple of local known street artists to do their painting for them ... they glady accept the money did the painting but its not their 'fault' ...

... it's hardly as if DM pasted up a giant poster on the wall through some ad/poster agency ... it's already been graff'd ... so Inkie gave me them the publicity they had hoped for, I suppose ...

... anyway ...

... cows produce 40% of all of methane gas by farting and burping all day and are one of the main sources of greenhouse gases producing climate change ...

... virtually everything that we do produces waste one way or another ...

... and DMs last longer than other shoes and therefore overall produce less toxins than other makes of shoes ...

... let's all wear flip-ploppi's

If dm asked indie to do the ad it would be a different conversation


Just nonsense

While I dont like seeing them either if it was a private wall and the owner agreed to let them paint the ad, I dont see the problem. There are a fair amount of 'private' walls in Williamsburg/Greenpoint that are 'rented out' and usually painted by skyhighmurals.com / colossalmedia.com
these building owners usually allow artists to use other walls for street artists etc.
iwould rather see these types of ads then the crap that they used to paste up. Have a feeling that im prob in the minority here but thats my 2 cents.

... bet i do ...

let's ban all PVC and where it is used by anybody ...

'According to www.pvc.org, PVC was used in the soles and uppers of modern shoes to provide a synthetic alternative to traditional leather, often allowing for more cost-effective production and innovative styles through its capacity to be moulded into shape. However, campaigners had been calling for phase-out of PVC for many years due to fact it creates and releases one of the most toxic chemicals – dioxin.

We have the same with globalstreetart and a few others. My take is that While privately owned was probably left and over time taggers have just assumed it a public space and therefore part of their territory.
I don't know but would seem to be more of a misunderstanding - maybe they should have cleaned it down and kept it blank for a while to signify it was in fact private space before trying to put a corporate funded image up

Whilst understanding your position (at least from a strictly aesthetic perspective), my own stance is the opposite: I would much rather see crap, pasted-up ads than street-art-style or graffiti-style advertising.

The impact of corporates deliberately trying to muddy the distinction between outdoor art and advertising is in my opinion an insidious one. This includes using mediums traditionally associated with street art or graffiti, like spray paint, as well as the forced association of placing such ads in close proximity to existing street art and graffiti. It's an attempt at cultural appropriation and it should be resisted — even if simply out of principle, i.e. regardless of whether or not an act of resistance may be seen as futile.

I'm very familiar but uncomfortable with the different rationalisations often advanced to excuse and help legitimise these outdoor advertising commissions carried out by artists.

For such cases, I believe compromise is in fact culturally harmful and that it's preferable for positions to remain polarised.

I would therefore actively encourage anyone to dog, go over or destroy these ads. And to keep doing so until companies and brands start to question the commercial viability and public-relations impact of marketing themselves in this manner.

The issue has previously been touched upon at various times, including on the LONDON Street Art thread. It was more recently discussed at greater length in another thread for a London wall painted by Dan Kitchener (regarding which I was pleased to find the Sony logo subsequently buffed, perhaps by Kitchener himself).

... Goodwin's Law ....

There are no public walls, private sector bought the UK long ago. ;-)

Surely companies have been paying for adverts to be painted on walls since long before graffiti existed as a movement in any recogniseable form?

I think I posted a pic a few moths ago of building site hoardings with the vinyl branding plastered all over then and they had a number of street artists imagery incorporated into the background.

The fact they are still there makes me wonder if the artists gave their permission and wasn't just a plain case of image theft

Streetart is (sadly) becoming a mainstream tool for many aspects of corporate promotion and regeneration

Maybe they just want to work in a building that doesn't look like a bank. Or maybe they're grafitti artists themselves. I do the job they do, and still love street art. Some of my friends in the industry are old school graf writers. The two things aren't mutually exclusive.