In society today, there is always the question to what kinds of drugs are acceptable for anyone. Growing up there is always the experimental phase or peer pressure where some individuals want to give into their curiosity and try new things for their first time. However, drugs are considered to be a social issue that has been prevalent for years.

Graffiti, another significant social injustice practice within our society, is an artistic form that allows any individual to express the way they feel about many social issues or even about themselves. Although most places prohibit graffiti, some places embrace the work as it can make the environment feel unique and lively. At Morningside Park located in Scarborough, Ontario, majority of the graffiti work is covered up simply because it is considered disruptive. However, not all the graffiti is covered up at the park depending on where it is located.

I believe this particular graffiti should be removed from the hiking trail mainly because of the message it portrays in the neighbourhood. It does not allow the space to feel safe and protected for those who are walking through the trail. The message of this work can be harmful considering the idea that it is promoting drugs in a negative approach.

When examining this piece of  graffiti, the emphasis on the word ‘OK’ is displayed as the main focus allowing for individuals in that space to interpret drugs as being tolerable. The main colors that were used for this piece of work ranged from black, white, and red. The red I considered to be most significant because some side effects of drugs can affect the eyes, turning them red. The characters added to the work allocate the work to be more detailed. This graffiti artist has displayed his work in order to make it a public message simply to make a point from his perspective of what is reasonable to do in this space.

Although the message is at the park, it is located close to my previous high school, West Hill C.I., as well as the neighbourhood, Mornelle Court, which does not have a good representation of space. When observing this graffiti, I was able to reminisce to when I attended the high school, and drugs were always an issue then. This piece of work reflects the change of the atmosphere of the neighbourhood it surrounds by presenting the issues of drugs to still be present. McAuliffe and Iverson (2011) discusses graffiti, as a trangressive performance in space; it tells us much of the ways space is configured, constructed and reproduced in the city. This graffiti represents the space of this park to be changing and not protected the way it used to be before. Crime and drugs have now become a main concern around that space. I think this artist used this graffiti to simply reflect how the space is being changed by individuals such as themselves and what they use the space to do.

Furthermore, the graffiti displayed at Morningside Park presents the idea of space to be used beyond leisure activities under park regulations. This mark of graffiti can be interpreted where some individuals of the neighbourhood can go to smoke illegally under the bridge since it is hidden by the forestry. When criminal acts are being acted upon in public spaces it can interrupt for how safe and secure people feel within that space. After observing this graffiti, I now see this space differently compared to how it was before. People will make use of public spaces differently than others; which all goes back to if it is socially acceptable or not. Norms and values is what makes each person to be unique, but that can become an issue when it comes to understanding graffiti in public spaces.

This graffiti at the park goes against the notion to making the public sphere multicultural visible (diversely visible maybe) and instead reinforces gender and class stereotypes. This can be supported through the images of the character drawn, which was a male, so it can be accurate to say it is from a male’s point of view instead of a female. Thus, this graffiti perpetuates gender roles simply because public spaces are more common for men to be seen in, and private spaces are for women. When work like this is continued, it makes it rather difficult for gender roles to be broken. It is simply the past following into the present. It can be seen that class is also reinforced simply because of the social location of the park. In the Ruddick article (1996) gendering and racializing identities function to constrain participation in the public sphere. The younger youth that live in Mornelle Court are usually victimized for the acts of the crimes within the neighbourhood because of the representation of the location being low income housing. By marginalizing those in the Mornelle neighbourhood, it reinforces the class divide of rich and poor. Morningside Park becomes the medium in which the social identities are both created and challenged.

When trying to understand how this graffiti shapes the area, it can be proven through the message it is portraying. The individual that marked the message can be trying to prove to society that drugs should not be seen as negative. However, when vandalizing a public park to prove it, then it can change the interpretation to how drugs can be viewed and the atmosphere of the space. Reuda (2015) discusses that Crisp indicates that ugliness comes with beauty when you allow the walls to be canvas for all to paint. Although most graffiti can have a pleasant aspect towards the art displayed and the meaning, when viewed to the public it may not always have the same effect that the artist was trying to portray.

Why I want to convince this piece of graffiti work to be problematic is considering the location it is presented in. The park is located next to a high school where a lot of adolescents attend. According to Lovata and Olton (2015) graffiti is contradictory; graffiti can be at the same time a snap shot, a witness of human experience, and an archive of these experiences. With that being said, students at the school may find this graffiti work to be encouraging at what occurs at the high school or an understanding of an ongoing issue. Graffiti to the students can be seen as an understanding of their human experience at the high school; whereas, other people of society might find it harmful because of the message it is instilling and socializing students to have a different perspective on drugs.

When looking at graffiti work it comes into question if it is a crime or an art. Simply there can be a differentiation of what can be seen as art and what vandalism is. This graffiti artist can understand his work to be art because it is coming from his perspective. However, once communicated to the public, the audience may have different perceptions and judgments to how this work should be viewed as positive or negative. This can be summed up by McAuliffe and Iverson (2011) when the question of graffiti is public or private, is a matter of the different audiences for whom graffiti is written and to whom it is accessible, and how these audiences are imagined and experienced. Based on discourse of the neighbourhood it gives the location a bad representation of how the space is being viewed and that impacts the work of the graffiti at Morningside Park.

From my understanding, the graffiti at the park will be covered eventually because many people will address the issues to the park officials that it should be covered up. I also support the  notion of the work to be covered up because of the ideas that it contributes to the park .

 

 

References:

Lovata, Troy, and Elizabeth Olton (2015). Understanding Graffiti: Multidisciplinary Studies from Prehistory to the Present. Left Coast Press Inc, p. 7-231.

McAuliffe, Cameron, and Kurt Iveson (2011). Art and Crime (and Other Things Besides … ): Conceptualising Graffiti in the City: Conceptualising Graffiti in the City. Geography Compass 5(3): 128–43.

Ruddick, Susan (1996). Constructing Differences in Public Spaces: Race, Class, and Gender as Interlocking Systems, in the People Place and Space Reader, p. 7-1.

Rueda, Manuel (2015). What happened when Bogotá decided to let graffiti artists do their thing. Fusion. March 3rd.