16/10/24
Unit 1 / Methods of Investigating
Notes after tutorial 3
Between 2nd and 3rd tutorials I dissected and categorised a full set of 47 graffiti tags from my chosen site:
The tags were categorised by medium, colour, location, orientation and length. The statistical results were as follows:
Results from a total of 47 tags:
MEDIA: Spray paint 34, pen 10, paint 3
COLOURS: Black 28, red 8, yellow 3, pink, 3, purple 1, blue 1, green 1, white 2.
VERTICAL OR SLOPED. Vertical 22, sloped 23, flat 2.
WHICH FACE? NW 1, SW 29, NE 7, NW 6, SE 2, TOP 2
Looking more deeply, I queried whether there was a way of distilling my results into a single tag that was representative of the tags on the entire ramp. To do this, I had to consider it more visually, qualitatively. I looked rti find the right balance of some of these common factors:
• playfulness with typographic conventions like baseline and tracking
• legibility
• length
After finding what I considered to be the most representative tag on the ramp, I felt there was another level of investigation to explore. I wanted to connect to the subject more directly, so I measured the tag, marked an area in which to place it, sourced the materials and began experimenting on both vertical and horizontal surfaces.
This brought a connection with the subject I did not experience using other methods. After multiple experiments, I made deep conclusions about how a tag is executed and the skill it takes to do so.
Armed with this new connection, I looked again at the tag selection and created a visual glossary of the tags on the ramp:
I was able to make practical and social conclusions based on a connection I found between the sense of ownership of tagging something, and its meaning in the community, a group of people claiming a space as their own to realise its benefits to all its users. Earlier interviews and general research provided informative context here, particularly audio and transcript. Conclusions pasted in here, word form below:
FINDINGS
PRECONCEPTIONS AND ASSUMPTIONS
– It is just a skatepark
– A place of antisocial behaviour amongst particularly young people
– Graffiti is vandalism
– Graffiti is indecipherable
– Graffiti is easy to do yourself
METHODS
– Sketching, recording sounds and notetaking all had different value in recoding the site and its users
– Photographing proved the most insightful and effective method
– Digital dissection allowed me to narrow my focus over time
– It produced an evolving data set that I returned to make evaluations and conclusions
– Process has shown that I have had an indirect impact on the form of the tags
GENERAL
– Dissection allows dense areas of graffiti to be categorised
– The breadth and visual value of graffiti becomes clear through dissection and categorisation
– The language is English
– Uses Latin characters and symbols
– Throw-ups take the most surface area despite small number
– Three personified forms
– Three stickers
– Complete lack of posters/“paste-ups”
– Spray paint or pen
– Most graffiti executed on concrete
– Some graffiti executed on metal areas
– Graffiti on the rear has suffered the most because of grass and moisture
– Graffiti resting on concrete base has not lost degraded because of moisture
– Some small interesting graphics done in pen
– Degradation over time due to weathering
– Graffiti evolves as new items are added
SPECIFIC TO TAGS
– More tags than any other form of graffiti
– Legibility is mixed suggesting encoding
– Majority executed in spray paint
– Thicker lined tags commensurate with spray paint or paint
– Thinner lined tags commensurate with pen
– Black dominant colour
– More typographic forms than graphic or abstract
– Tight tracking
– Mix of upper and lowercase
– Often ignore a baseline
– Symbols and graphics can be incorporated with characters
– Underlines provide added emphasis
– Tags require skill to execute
– Tags are executed quickly because of spray paint
– Lines suggest both flowing movements and shorter bursts
– A tag acts like a signature
– Tags are visually impactful when isolated
– Tags are impactful when they are involved with other graffiti
– Layering of tags and other artwork implies community and hierarchy
– Tags mostly are singular not plural
– Most tags situated on south west face of ramp
– Largest surface area for more people to see the graffiti
– Recreation of the tags enable me to connect with the subject more deeply
SOCIAL
The critical investigation of this single ramp within the skatepark has questioned my assumptions about them as a public space and the graffiti that typically covers them.
The ramp acts as a canvas, on which a deep ecosystem of marks in various media exists. It simultaneously evolves and decays. Executing graffiti is both a specialised skill and a claim to the physical space.
There is a clear link between the tagging, the ownership it implies and its importance in the community.
Through interviewing various stakeholders including local councillors, parents, skaters, photographers, park rangers and founders of the Frome Skate Park Project, I have concluded that the skatepark is a multitude of things to different people:
– A place to skate, though poorly designed and insufficient, according to skaters
– A place for physical and mental wellbeing.
– A place where young people may not feel as judged as they do elsewhere in the community.
– A place for artists, though they ‘need more walls to paint on as the old ramps have become layered from at least 5 years of solid painting’
It is not just a skatepark.
CONTINUED STUDY
By reenacting more graffiti marks and interviewing local artists, deeper links could be established between the marks themselves and their social context. More qualitative, visceral research methods like copying could encourage a deeper emotional understanding.
The taggers’ work reaches far beyond the skate park.
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NOTES FROM AFTER PRESENTATION
I printed and mounted the work in 7 A1 prints, so that we could engage with the tags at scale and in broad context. I showed almost all of my findings and it was received well.