Graffiti Movement in New York City

In general, graffiti was used primarily by political activists to make political statements and for street gangs to mark territory. That movement went from Los Angeles in the late 1930s to Philadelphia during the late 1960s. Shortly after that, street gangs used the same method to tag their names all over New York City.  The artists enjoy being accredited for the work they do especially if they risk life and limb getting it done. One of the first taggers in New York City was Demetrius. A Greek-American teenager from Washington Heights who wrote, “Taki 183” his nickname and street address. On July 21, 1971, The New York Times wrote an article about him, titled “ ‘Taki 183’ Spawns Pen Pals” in which he says how he writes his name wherever goes including subway stations, inside subway cars, all over the city, on walls along Broadway, al Kennedy International Airport, in New Jersey, Connecticut, and other places because it is something that he had to do. Thousands of people saw these tags and this sparked the interest of many young people to start their own “tagging”.  The goal was to get as many tags as possible. Tags can be seen in dangerous subway tracks that requires a man to be in and out of there in minutes considering that these tracks are long and dark. A lot of artists were inspired to do the same. Their goal was to gain fame and recognition of how many tags they put up, where the graffiti is, and the size and style of it. Every artist had their own style and executed it proudly covering as many surfaces they can. In a documentary by Fleisher and Lovino, an artists called Blade became one of the kings of the 2 and 5 train lines from late 1974 to 1981 by painting over 3,000 subway cars during that period.

Works Cited

Fleisher, Alan, and Iovino, Paul. Classic Hits: New York’s Pioneering Subway Graffiti Writers.

        Poland: Dokument Press. 2012. Print.

"'Taki 183' Spawns Pen Pals" . nytimes.com. 21 July 1971. PDF. 27 Nov 2017.