Graffiti is art that is written, painted or drawn on a wall or other surface, usually without permission and within public view. Graffiti ranges from simple written words to elaborate wall paintings, and has existed since ancient times, with examples dating back to ancient Egypt, ancient Greece, and the Roman Empire.
Sticker art is a form of street art in which an image or message is publicly displayed using stickers. These stickers may promote a political agenda, comment on a policy or issue, or comprise a subcategory of graffiti.
Leonard Hilton McGurr, known as Futura, and formerly known as Futura 2000, is an American graffiti artist.
Stencil graffiti is a form of graffiti that makes use of stencils made out of paper, cardboard, or other media to create an image or text that is easily reproducible. The desired design is cut out of the selected medium and then the image is transferred to a surface through the use of spray paint or roll-on paint.
Lady Pink, born Sandra Fabara (1964), is an Ecuadorian-American graffiti and mural artist.
A number of words and phrases that have come to describe different styles and aspects of graffiti and its subculture. Like other jargon and colloquialisms, some of these terms may vary regionally, taking on different meanings across different cities and countries. The following terminology originates primarily in the United States.
Cost is the tag name of a graffiti writer who, from the early 1980s to the late 2000s, blanketed New York City and the surrounding metropolitan area with his wheatpaste stickers, spray paint tags and paint-roller pieces.
Meek is a notable street artist operating out of Melbourne, Australia, and specialising in the subgenre of stencil graffiti.
Leon Reid IV, also known as VERBS and Darius Jones, is an American artist widely credited as being among the pioneers of 21st century street art. His brief creative output is marked by numerous phases, several of which are known by separate alter-egos.
The Splasher is the name given to one or more street artists operating in New York City starting in late 2006 and continuing until June 2007. The Splasher was a serial vandal who splattered other works of street art with paint, thus earning the title of "Splasher." The Splasher also left manifestos pasted alongside their graffiti.
SAMO is a graffiti tag originally used on the streets of New York City from 1978 to 1980. The tag, written with a copyright symbol as "SAMO©", and pronounced Same-Oh, is primarily associated with the artist Jean-Michel Basquiat, but was originally developed as a collaboration between Basquiat and Al Diaz.
RISK, also known as RISKY, is a Los Angeles-based graffiti writer and contemporary artist often credited as a founder of the West Coast graffiti scene. In the 1980s, he was one of the first graffiti writers in Southern California to paint freight trains, and he pioneered writing on "heavens", or freeway overpasses. He took his graffiti into the gallery with the launch of the Third Rail series of art shows, and later created a line of graffiti-inspired clothing. In 2017, RISK was knighted by the Medici Family.
BNE is an anonymous graffiti artist known for stickers that read "BNE" or "BNE was here". He has left his mark in countries throughout the world, including the United States, Canada, Asia, Australia, Europe, and South America. "His accent and knowledge of local artists suggest he is from New York."
Graffiti in New York City has had a substantial local, national, and international influence.
Lock On is a genre of street art, where artists create installations by attaching sculptures to public furniture using lengths of chain and old bike locks. The installations themselves are referred to as "a Lock On" (singular) or "Lock Ons" (plural).
Mook is the vandal moniker used by a Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania man Michael Monack and a Portland, Oregon man Marcus Edward Gunther.
Bisco Smith is a New York-based contemporary artist with roots in music and graffiti. Bisco works in a variety of formats, including canvas and large outdoor murals, and is recognized for his lyrical approach to deconstructed expressionism characterized by gestural marks and abstracted text that embody the energy of a moment. Using music as his muse, he approaches each canvas as unique opportunity to channel the expression of his inspiration by stripping his compositions to their fundamental essence of motion and rhythm. Bisco's works, painted predominantly in black and white, embody the creative spontaneity that exists at the intersection of music and paint.
Danielle E. "Utah" Bremner and Jim Clay "Ether" Harper VI are American graffiti artists, called the "Bonnie and Clyde of the graffiti world". They have tagged trains and buildings in over 30 countries on five continents, and have made books and videos about their exploits. They have also been arrested, fined, and served multiple prison sentences for vandalism. Their use of social media has been used as an example in a book about graffiti artists, and they have been the subjects of a video exhibit and a song.
Tags are one of the primary forms of graffiti, along with throw-ups and pieces. The act of writing a tag is known as tagging.
