Comments on Wall at Brookland Metro serves as a canvas for a memorial - Greater Greater Washington

Comment by oboe

Fri, 11 Mar 2011 10:23:11 EDT

What's Lance's view on this? He comments on EVERYTHING else, kinda surprised to see that he doesn't have something to say here, too.

He's still on the fence, biding his time to see which side of the issue is most likely to piss off cyclists, pedestrians, and most importantly, David C.

Comment by Matt Johnson

Fri, 11 Mar 2011 09:26:50 EDT

@Geoffery Hatchard:
Nah. Graffiti isn't made out of overhead wires, so it's okay to have it in the Federal City.

Comment by Geoffrey Hatchard

Fri, 11 Mar 2011 09:24:54 EDT

What's Lance's view on this? He comments on EVERYTHING else, kinda surprised to see that he doesn't have something to say here, too.

Comment by Mike

Thu, 10 Mar 2011 22:17:33 EDT

Perhaps the ANC can ask the HPRB to designate it an historic tagging. There's a lot of that historic stuff going on in Brookland, you know.

Comment by kk

Thu, 10 Mar 2011 20:07:32 EDT

@ dan reed!

Doesn't matter anyone destroying or defacing other persons or companies property should be dealt with no excuses it is not yours so don't touch it. It does not matter what is painted/written you did not get permission of the owner.

If you want to go graffiti a wall go buy a damn building or workout something with the owner of a building; there is no excuse to touching others property and if someone did it to my property outside of DC they would shot or have their asskicked.

Comment by freely

Thu, 10 Mar 2011 15:32:43 EDT

@dan reed.

"It seems that if CSX is responsible for the wall, and they haven't done anything to clean up graffiti there for decades, then it's fair game"

Complete nonsense. CSX has more than 21,000 miles of track and 20 billion in associated infrastructure (bridges, tunnels, retaining walls) etc to maintain and spend their money on. Only god knows how many hundreds of millions it would cost them yearly to run out and paint over all the tagging on their property.

This would be like me coming by your house, arbitrarily deciding it looked run down and then using that ridiculous self created premise to justify making it look worse.

You can believe graffiti is art if you like, but keep it to your own property. Thats the only appropriate place for it. Personally I, along with 99% of the rest of the world thinks it looks like crap and gives places an unwanted run down ghetto feel. Hence the reason that these so called "edgy" and enlightened "artists" never tag their own property.

Comment by Alex B.

Thu, 10 Mar 2011 15:23:40 EDT

There's graffiti, and then there's vandalism.

Like the famous quotation from Potter Stewart about the difference between obscenity and pornography, "I know it when I see it."

I enjoy the Red Line's street art. I would also be pissed if someone just tagged my house. There's a line there between what I think is OK and what is just petty vandalism. I don't know if I can explain it, but "I know it when I see it."

Comment by horseydeucey

Thu, 10 Mar 2011 15:23:05 EDT

"Meh... publicising this kind of thing only perpetuates it's spread."

There are some of us who are more concerned with perpetuating the spread of wrong 'it's' usage.

RIP ST21

Comment by dan reed!

Thu, 10 Mar 2011 15:17:29 EDT

It seems that if CSX is responsible for the wall, and they haven't done anything to clean up graffiti there for decades, then it's fair game. I agree that it's not fair to graffiti a new building or someone else's house, but as far as private property is concerned, this is about as appropriate a place to graffiti as you can get.

Either way, I really appreciated this post, having grown up on the Red Line and seeing something new every time I rode it. The other day, I saw a new tag memorializing the artist's father. DC is a city of memorials. A tag for Michael Jackson isn't the Lincoln Memorial, but it still holds meaning for people. And it didn't have to spend years at an architect's desk or being debated by the Planning Commission or at fundraisers seeking donations. Someone just did it. If only more "legal" alterations to the built environment in DC came about that easily.

Comment by Will R.

Thu, 10 Mar 2011 14:33:45 EDT

I live in Brookland, and I like the graffiti not only at Brookland metro, but all the way down the ride line to NY Ave. I like that NE DC still has its rough around the edges look in some places. If the graffiti give you the perception that this is a bad area, then you are in the wrong part of DC. Move to NW.

Having said that, I would rather the graffiti be confined to the rail corridor on the vacant, derelict warehouses and CSX tunnels. I don't like it when I see it show up on buildings that people recently spent a lot of money to build, like the back of the new hotel at NY Ave. Not cool.

Comment by Ward 1 Guy

Thu, 10 Mar 2011 14:01:42 EDT

I posted on an earlier thread that a certain graffiti "artist" who writes his name all over the place tagged my house and a neighboring public building, both of which managed to remain unpainted brick for over 100 years.

Graffiti is vandalism and in some cases it can really rob a community of its treasures in a very tragic way.

Comment by andrew

Thu, 10 Mar 2011 13:43:50 EDT

The graffiti does not help fight the perception that this is a dangerous area.

Cover it up.

Comment by freely

Thu, 10 Mar 2011 13:37:04 EDT

Meh... publicising this kind of thing only perpetuates it's spread.

"Graffiti is art, graffiti is special", blah blah blah.

No it isn't. It's the destruction of someone else's property. I would have a lot more "tolerance" for stuff like this if these so called artist's tagged their own homes as well, but of course they would "never" do that.

Paint over it. This is as much of an eyesore as watching the redskins play.

Comment by spookiness

Thu, 10 Mar 2011 13:22:44 EDT

Its still just graffiti. Cover it up.

Comment by John

Thu, 10 Mar 2011 13:16:28 EDT

fyi...

http://cooldiscodan.net/

Comment by Tina

Thu, 10 Mar 2011 12:55:07 EDT

@JessMan -you beat me to it! (Cool Disco Dan ref.)

Comment by JessMan

Thu, 10 Mar 2011 12:37:32 EDT

Cool Disco Dan 4 life!!!

Also, a little bit down the tracks before you go into the short tunnel, there's a portrait of the Joker. Heath Ledger memorial?