* Excerpts from Rammellzee's ICONIC TREATISE GOTHIC FUTURISM at Joseph Nechvatal's blog.

There are many different types and styles of graffiti and it is a rapidly developing art form whose value is highly contested, reviled by many authorities while also subject to protection, sometimes within the same jurisdiction.

The student protests and general strike of May 1968 saw Paris bedecked in revolutionary, anarchist, and situationist slogans such as L ' ennui est contre-révolutionnaire (" Boredom is counterrevolutionary ") expressed in painted graffiti, poster art, and stencil art.

In 1979, graffiti artist Lee Quinones and Fab 5 Freddy were given a gallery opening in Rome by art dealer Claudio Bruni.

In plotlines mirroring the negative reaction of non-commercial artists to the commercialization of the art form by companies like IBM ( and, later, Sony itself ) the Rakugaki Ōkoku series ( 2003 – 2005 ) for Sony's PlayStation 2 revolves around an anonymous hero and his magically imbued-with-life graffiti creations as they struggle against an evil king who only allows art to be produced which can benefit him.

Marc Ecko, an urban clothing designer, has been an advocate of graffiti as an art form during this period, stating that " Graffiti is without question the most powerful art movement in recent history and has been a driving inspiration throughout my career.

Modern graffiti art often incorporates additional arts and technologies.

Many contemporary analysts and even art critics have begun to see artistic value in some graffiti and to recognize it as a form of public art.

With the commercialization of graffiti ( and hip hop in general ), in most cases, even with legally painted " graffiti " art, graffiti artists tend to choose anonymity.

Being a form of visual art, it might also be said that many graffiti artists still fall in the category of the introverted archetypal artist.

The developments of graffiti art which took place in art galleries and colleges as well as " on the street " or " underground ", contributed to the resurfacing in the 1990s of a far more overtly politicized art form in the subvertising, culture jamming or tactical media movements.

These movements or styles tend to classify the artists by their relationship to their social and economic contexts, since, in most countries, graffiti art remains illegal in many forms except when using non-permanent paint.

A 2006 exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum displayed graffiti as an art form that began in New York's outer boroughs and reached great heights in the early ' 80s with the work of Crash, Lee, Daze, Keith Haring and Jean-Michel Basquiat.

In Australia, art historians have judged some local graffiti of sufficient creative merit to rank them firmly within visual art.

Between March and April 2009, 150 artists exhibited 300 pieces of graffiti at the Grand Palais in Paris — a clear acceptance of the art form into the French art world.

In 2009 graffiti artist " Scape " published " GRAFF ; the Art & Technique of Graffiti ", the world's first book dedicated to displaying the full techniques of creating graffiti art.

Controversies that surround graffiti continue to create disagreement amongst city officials / law enforcement and writers who wish to display and appreciate work in public locations.

The brothel at CIL VII, 12, 18 – 20 contains over 120 pieces of graffiti, some of which were the work of the prostitutes and their clients.

Her work focuses on beauty and design aspects of graffiti as opposed to Banksy's anti-government shock value.

However, in the last couple of years the British graffiti scene has been struck by self-titled ' art terrorist ' Banksy, who has revolutionized the style of UK graffiti ( bringing to the forefront stencils to aid the speed of painting ) as well as the content ; making his work largely satirical of the sociological state of cities, or the political climate of war, often using monkeys and rats as motifs.

Stanley's graffiti at Persepolis, IranIn 1867, Stanley was recruited by Colonel Samuel Forster Tappan ( a one-time journalist ) of the Indian Peace Commission, to serve as a correspondent to cover the work of the Commission for several newspapers.

These include peaceful protest, refusal of work, squatting, economic sabotage, dumpster diving, graffiti, culture jamming, ecotage, freeganism, boycotting, civil disobedience, hacktivism and subvertising.

Bakshi also hired graffiti artists and trained them to work as animators.

This includes the destruction of art by clearing and construction work, erosion caused by excessive touching of sites, and graffiti.

Examples include situations in which the line between graffiti and " guerilla " public art is blurred, such as the art of John Fekner placed on billboards, the early works of Keith Haring ( executed without permission in advertising poster holders in the New York City Subway ) and the current work of Banksy.

Interactive features include the weekly Showdown competition, where users can win an exhibition spot, the Online Studio for creating art ( each month a critic selects a winner in whose name a £ 500 donation is made to a children's charity ) a Crits section in which artists can comment on each other's work, and the Street Art section for graffiti, murals, and performance art.

Her work has provoked a negative reaction from some feminists due to the portrayal of women in her graffiti.

Miss Van is just one facet of the thriving graffiti scene in Toulouse, but she has probably gained the most worldwide acclaim for her work.

They pack up and leave when they hear noises, thinking it may be the police ; it turned out to be a rogue graffiti artist known as Spit who defaces Ramo's work ( and the work of other artists ) by spraying his tag over it.

His father Domingo ( Shawn Elliot ), who despises his graffiti, wants him to find honest work, while his girlfriend Carmen ( Saundra Santiago ), the mother of his son, longs for them to be together as a family.

As they work on the second side of the car, Ramon hears noises, and they discover the rogue graffiti artist Spit, defacing the completed side.

One of the most distinctive features of Futura's work is his abstract approach to graffiti art.

While he is primarily known as a graffiti artist, much of his work is as an illustrator and graphic designer of record sleeves, first becoming involved with The Clash ; producing a sleeve for their " This Is Radio Clash " 7 " single and handwriting the sleeve notes and lyrics sheet for their album Combat Rock.

Compulsory unpaid work includes up to 300 hours of activities, such as conservation work, cleaning up graffiti, or working with a charity.

He was a repeated contributor to American Speech by 1931 ; his first extended work, Lexical Evidence from Folk Epigraphy in Western North America: A Glossarial Study of the Low Element in the English Vocabulary, was privately published in Paris in 1935 since its description of bathroom graffiti was considered too racy for American publishers.

" The skateboarders, musicians, graffiti artists and gay people in Mr. McGinley's early work ' know what it means to be photographed ,' said Sylvia Wolf, the former curator of photography at the Whitney, who organized his show there.

From the nineties to his death, Golub's work shifted toward the illusionistic, with forms semi-visible, and appropriated graphic styles from ancient carvings, medieval manuscripts, and contemporary graffiti.

The areas underneath some bridges have become makeshift shelters and homes to homeless people, and the undersides of bridges all around the world are spots of prevalent graffiti.

The four main elements of Hip Hop culture are graffiti, DJing, breakdancing, and MCing ( rapping ).

Stickers and other adhesives are not considered graffiti.

Here, " qu " is pronounced " co ." The 83 pieces of graffiti found at CIL IV, 4706-85 are evidence of the ability to read and write at levels of society where literacy might not be expected.

There are also examples of graffiti occurring in American history, such as Signature Rock, a national landmark along the Oregon Trail.

However, there are many other instances of notable graffiti this century.

Bands such as Black Flag and Crass ( and their followers ) widely stenciled their names and logos, while many punk night clubs, squats and hangouts are famous for their graffiti.

There are also a large graffiti influences in Southeast Asian countries that mostly come from modern Western culture, such as Malaysia, where graffiti has long been a common sight in Malaysia's capital city, Kuala Lumpur.

While certain critics from within graffiti culture consider this lazy, stickers can be quite detailed in their own right, and are often used in conjunction with other materials.

Gang members use graffiti to designate membership throughout the gang, to differentiate rivals and associates and, most commonly, to mark borders which are both territorial and ideological.

By making the graffiti less explicit ( as adapted to social and legal constraints ), these drawings are less likely to be removed but do not lose their threatening and offensive character.

The theory is that when an offender is caught putting up graffiti, they are not just charged with one count of vandalism ; they can be held accountable for all of the other damage for which they are responsible.

Many restrictions of civil gang injunctions are designed to help address and protect the physical environment and limit graffiti.

When the police use search warrants in connection with a vandalism investigation they are often seeking judicial approval to look for items such as cans of spray paint and nozzles from other kinds of aerosol sprays, etching tools or other sharp or pointed objects used to etch or scratch glass and other hard surfaces, and permanent marking pens, such as markers or paint sticks ; evidence of membership or affiliation with any gang or tagging crew, paraphernalia to include any reference to “( tagger ’ s name ),” and any drawings, writings, objects or graffiti depicting taggers ’ names, initials, logos, monikers, slogans, or mention of tagging crew membership ; any newspaper clippings relating details of or referring to any graffiti crime.

Aside from serving their functional purposes, gas masks are also used as emblems in industrial music, by graffiti taggers because the mask protects them from the graffiti canister's toxic fumes, and by Urban Explorers venturing into environments where hazardous materials, such as asbestos, may be present.

Magda Sayeg is credited with starting the movement in the US and Knit the City are a prominent group of graffiti knitters in the United Kingdom.

The term may also be used for information that is hand-recorded in other ways than writing, for example inscriptions that are chiselled upon a hard material or scratched ( the original meaning of graffiti ) as with a knife point in plaster or with a stylus on a waxed tablet ( the way Romans made notes ), or are in cuneiform writing, impressed with a pointed stylus in a flat tablet of unbaked clay.

The two leering, cretinous faces are synonymous with mischief, and appear almost logo-like in advertising and even graffiti.

* Anti-graffiti coatings are used to defeat the marking of surfaces by graffiti vandals.