JSO arrests "SIMON", major graffiti vandel.

[Dog Walker]

Early Thursday morning, JSO arrested Bryson Dale Bowman, 22, while he was putting up one of his distinctive, metallic paint SIMON tags.

Bowman, the son of the owner of Jaguar Bail Bonds, has so far been charged with two counts of felony criminal mischief and seven counts of misdemeanor criminal mischief.  More charges may be filed as information comes in from other parts of the city about damage there.

A JSO spokesman says that Bowman has done over a hundred-thousand dollars worth of damage in the City.

Bowman was released on $25,000 bond from Jaguar Bail Bonds.

[Timkin]

YaY!!!!!!! Now if they could get the taggers  "Sike" and "Atari" ........   I think these two characters have tagged on just about every side of the city.. for sure they have tagged the Parkview  Inn,  various spots in the Regency and down town areas .

[buckethead]

Do these guys do any interesting work, or just tag their brand name all over the place?

I've not noticed any graffiti I considered worth tolerating locally.

[Timkin]

tags...everywhere .. and seems they love tagging buildings.  If you want to see 40 years of graffiti , visit School 4 . its completely covered inside. Now they are working on the outside.  Some may consider it art.. tagging buildings , dumpsters, whatever, is, at least to me, a nuisance at best.

[buckethead]

Not all graffiti is created equal.

[redglittercoffin]

Have loved Banksey for a long time -- have a great little coffee table book of his stuff.

...the irony.

[buckethead]

A different guy:


Anothern:


Whole nuther dood:

[Dog Walker]

You ever notice that these "artists" never put their stuff on their own houses?

These punks in Jacksonville are just writing their names on everything.  How cool! (NOT!)

[Bativac]

Graffiti is a little more complicated than all that, and tagging is a part of the graffiti culture.

There is a huge difference between a vandal and a graffiti artist, and the vandal who disrespects the well maintained areas of private property without permission is a very very small percentage of the kids and artists who produce 'spray' art.

We solved a lot of this problem 18 years ago by providing free areas for taggers and graffiti, with pretty spectacular effects.

One old abandoned yard, and all the walls behind five points.

As a result of having legal places to spray, the tagging pretty much disappeared in riverside.  Because there was a common ground for older people and younger spray artists to mix and mingle, the worst behavior was mitigated or modified.

For example, the spray tags were replaced with stickers that could be removed much more easily. 

A couple of years ago, Five Points barricaded in the walls, and repainted some of the biggest murals with some bland yuppie gay color.

As a result, the tagging began to appear again.  Now its everywhere.

I suspect that the solution we implemented a few years ago should be reinstituted.

As an illustrator, I agree with this idea. Give kids (well, and adults) a place to do this stuff legally and it won't show up on private property (which in my view is definitely vandalism, I don't care what the message is). When I was in high school, a teacher once confiscated my sketchbook. So I drew in my notebook. That, too, was confiscated. By the end of class I had desecrated an entire desk with weird artwork. I was required to clean the desk and a note went home to my parents. My dad's response was "why'd you take away all of his paper if you didn't want him drawing on the desk?"

Though the rogue nature of some graffiti is part of the point of the artwork...I don't see how tagging in and of itself is a viable artistic statement. Looks like old fashioned vandalism to me.

[Timkin]

Same here. I don't like everything in sight tagged. 

[Dog Walker]

They have tried "free" or "legal" walls in lots of cities.  They have inevitably been failures and help spread graffiti in the areas around the walls.

This from the graffitihurts.org web site.  Graffitihurts is a division of Keep America Beautiful, Inc. and is supported mostly by Sherman Williams Paint, the makers of Krylon spray paints.  There is a lot of academic research to support this position on their really good web site.

Communities that have tried "legal" or "free walls," or areas that permit graffiti, typically find them ineffective, including over a dozen cities in California, Illinois, Connecticut, and other states.

While well intentioned, legal walls often cause more harm than good, and tend to attract graffiti vandals from outside the city. They may appear to work at first, but after a period of time, the surrounding areas also become covered with graffiti.

With a legal wall, governments or businesses essentially sponsor graffiti in an effort to rid a community of graffiti. This sends a mixed message. Data also shows no decrease in arrests for graffiti in cities where there are legal walls.

Communities that want to create a "legal" wall should be ready to take responsibility for any number of adverse effects, or liability and negligence issues. Following are just a few to consider:

    Who will monitor the wall?
    Will it be repainted regularly to provide a fresh "canvas"?
    What if someone writes obscenities on the wall? What action would be taken?
    What if the graffiti moves to walls nearby or surrounding the "legal wall"? Who will pay for removal? Who will ensure the safety of those removing graffiti?
    Who is allowed to use the "legal wall"? Will they be required to wear face masks? How will any "rules" be enforced?
    Are there laws in place that restrict possession of graffiti implement by minors? Who will enforce these?
    If you have any new data or information on legal walls, please e-mail Graffiti Hurts®.

[Dog Walker]

YaY!!!!!!! Now if they could get the taggers  "Sike" and "Atari" ........   I think these two characters have tagged on just about every side of the city.. for sure they have tagged the Parkview  Inn,  various spots in the Regency and down town areas .

Atari (with the anarchist's A circle first letter) has tagged a couple of my buildings.  If I catch him before JSO does I just might take his thumbs as trophies. 

(I'm just joking guys!  I would actually just say really ugly things to him then follow him home with spray cans of my own!)

[Dog Walker]

Well the backside of the shops in 5 Points have in effect been a free wall for the last three years and the trash has spread all through the area.  Take a look at it from Oak Steet sometime and tell me if it is art.  Some jerks even broke into the courtyard at Underbelly's and tagged over the wall art that Emily Moody had made space for there.

Soooo much respect for someone who is trying to do something neat and different in the neighborhood.

City of Jax did a good job of refurbishing the famous 5 Points Beacon and some jackass tagged it in the first week after that.  Every trash can, traffic signal control box, store window, mailbox, newspaper box, gas bottle, light pole, storefront, expressway wall and dumpster in Riverside is tagged repeatedly despite the presence of a de facto free wall in the area......actually, BECAUSE of the presence of the de facto free wall.

99.9% of the stuff that appears in Jacksonville is crude tags, pasters and balloon letters all of which is pure vandalism.  And I haven't seen the other 000.01% yet.

None of it even begins to approach the artistic merit of something like Josh's awesome commissioned and paid for piece on the Lomax Street side of Fans and Stoves.  Commissioned and paid for by RAP, and approved by the building owner BTW!  Now THAT piece is art!

[Timkin]

I think every tagger , and , well every would-be artist has tagged somewhere in or on Annie Lytle School.

[Dog Walker]

If I put my tattoo on someones skin against their will it is assault.  If Leonardo DiVinci painted the Last Supper on my wall without my permission, it is vandalism.  Artistic merit has NOTHING to do with it.

If you want to be an artist, buy your own damn canvas.  If you want to be a muralist, get permission or buy your own wall.  Notice that none of these creeps tags their parents' house, do they?