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A Work By Team Robbo |
Often referred to as graffiti, tagging, or more negatively
as vandalism, street-art has been around for 40ish years as it was birthed in
the 70 but only gained a real popularity in the mid-80’s. Recently documentaries
such as “Exit through the gift shop” have brought attention to the subculture
and personalities of street art. I find that not only is this art and interesting
visual style, but it is an important demonstration of the power in blending
pictures, text and color into one piece. The piece by Team Robbo, is in the
style of more traditional graffiti, whereas the piece by Banksy is what some consider
to be “post-graffiti”. I argue that the same goal is intended for each piece
though how it is achieved varies greatly. For both of these pieces, the main choice is typography. In the Team Robbo piece, each letter becomes onto itself an image - and in some cases can be replaced by images as seen
here. This is reminiscent of the heavily stylized lettering that would begin each chapter
in old books. To those that follow styles like Team Robbo’s, the execution of
this text; including color, shape, and its relationship to other letters and the
backing, it’s execution and even the choice of placement all add together to
build up the “street cred” of the piece and author.
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A Work By Bansky |
In Banksy’s piece the use
of a simple typeface reinforces the message by linking it to other simple
graffiti that carries social motivation. The sparse use of
colors is typical of a Banksy piece, but the red lettering on a white
background and placed next to a black rat causes the words to really stand out
and draw attention. But how do these very differing styles of typography align?
Simply put, both of these pieces have been shaped by decisions to draw a large audience,
one to build street cred, the other to spread the message. While the Team Robbo
does this through a large, colorful, and eye-catching style, Banksy takes a
simpler approach and uses two colors to the same effect.
Just as an aside, they once even had a
graffiti-off as they fought over the same piece of wall. The progression pictures area great demonstration of how though style differs the message and drive can be the same
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