A Unofficial Anthropology of Hip Hop: March 2016

"Street artists engage in activism in a unique way: by moving their art out of the museum and into ordinary life, street artists do not merely comment about the state of the world; they intervene and change our world with their works. Inserting art directly into the real world (not the artworld) allows street artists to actively construct a different world to inhabit. Street art is designed to cross the boundary between art and an actual act of protest – that is its point!

This activism is made possible because of its aconsensual methods of production. No matter what style, medium, or political agenda, all street art is made without consent of the property owner. This aconsensuality transforms the art-making process into an act of
political and social protest. It is the umbrella concept under which the diverse facets of street art come together into a single, unified group that does justice to the social, political, intersectional, environmental and legal aspects of street art.

Street art is a sign of the times – where consumerism has become a forced way of life, where the artworld’s institutional pressures suffocate emerging artists, and where marginalised artists struggle to make their voice heard, street art represents an unexpected opportunity to opt out of the artworld system altogether. But these artists are not going underground; they are taking to the streets! There, they have the freedom to create their own art, in their own style, on their own terms. Street art presents a new alternative path for artists – one that allows them a chance for authentic expression, an opportunity to develop a set of alternative customs, traditions and norms that operate alongside, but definitely far away from, the “official” code articulated in art schools. The street is a logical escape from it all."

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by Dr. Sondra Bacharach, Victoria University of Wellingtom

A Unofficial Anthropology of Hip Hop

Friday, March 18, 2016

Art in the Streets

J Pink