Hardcore graffing comes from the Afro-Latin diaspora, primarily. Anglos can be a part of that experience, but, in my opinion, it's as an outsider. It's the outsider experience...which modifies the experience and turns the experience itself into an in/outsider experience, which is the whole "it flops inward on itself" postmodern event. But anyway, if you want to see a real comparison between bored, White rural kids and the difference between bored Black or Latin urban kids (whose graffiti I've been blogging on for the past month or so), here it is, in spray paint. Anarchy life, man.
Why are young White people so obsessed with anarchy? It probably has to do with evil old England dominating, killing & colonizing the bone-scraping Celts of astronomy and plowing all the old agrarian-ancient Druid folk traditions under, into the dirt of a corrupt, divine monarchy hell-bent on proselytizing the world with its show of power, commerce, and global gentrification. It all started with the Irish - my people. From there, things just got worse and worse for the world. And so, deep down inside, maybe White people loathe ideas of power and control, not only because their ancestors were so victimized by it, but also because, as Whites, they loathe themselves for what their people have done/are doing. It's all unconscious stuff, as it must be.
Then again, maybe I'm wrong. I mean, despite our race or religion, don't we all have an inner-anarchist? Maybe that's what the Wild Style is about, in part: Obliterating the old methods of control. Of image, of language, and of people. Not talking about it, just doing it. The medium as the message. Perhaps, skill and mastery aside, perhaps there's not much difference between these two pieces of graffiti after all. Anglo, Black, Latin, Asian...nobody - esp. a young person - wants to be tyrannized by the insidious thing called Control.
Whoever did the "Anarchy Life" piece here also included a cartoon figure of some kind, as well as a pentagram. I figure the artist to be a local 14-year old boy, probably a headbanger skater. Hates school. He's dabbling in drugs, too - just Mary Jane for now, which he gets from his older brother. His parents are divorced, and he and his brother live with their mom in a trailer park. He loves his mom. hates her boyfriends, except for the one that dumped her last month. Attachment disorder resultant. He's slowly turning into a young man, but there's still a fair amount of kid left in him. The cartoon head, with its dead/stoned "x" eyes signifies the death of the infantile. The fact that the face is also smiling is either a cool pose of some variety, or a sign that, despite his losses, the artist is nonetheless ready to drop out, turn on, and take on the world with his hardcore antics. He's bored as well, in other words, and probably scared. What he needs is a world that makes sense. What he's got instead...is anarchy life.
Tellingly and fascinatingly, the star pentagram floats off to the left, as a counterbalance to the "dead head." At first, it's easy to dismiss this as another punk rock cool pose signifier. But, no, that pentagram's well over 3,000 years old, and it has been used as a sign of divinity, grace, alchemy and soul-power within the contexts of many a culture and religion around the world. Whether or not he knew that (and I'm assuming he didn't - at least, not consciously), he has nonetheless placed it as an alternative energy or force acting in a kind of complementary opposition to the "dead head." The dichotomy here is "drop out versus fight the power." I'd say that this artist has plenty of hope of realizing his own power, if the right causes and conditions come together. And I hope they do. That'd be a nice, happy ending to Anarchy Life.
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