Man, could ChiChi 133 mess up a mailbox with a Sharpie. And let Cliff 159 anywhere near a stopped subway car and everybody was going to know about it in a big bold puffy-lettered way for months to come.
Both young men are featured in Style Wars, a 1983 PBS documentary about graffiti artists and what turned out to be the roots of hip hop culture. Now these kids just look adorable, making their crazy little self-glorifying marks in that retrospectively innocent world. Who was George W. Bush? Just the vice president’s hard-drinking, underachieving brat of a son.
The video itself is amusing and energizing. If you enjoy it–and you will–there’s more taggin’ fun after the jump. It’s our little tribute to the remake of The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3, which we’re hoping to see and write about over the weekend (even though Tony Scott sucks and the tenor of the reviews is not encouraging). While this remake takes place in the graffiti-free era, the original came from NYC’s period of heavily decorated train cars.
From ‘Style Wars’ - a beef:
If you start feeling inclined to watch the whole program, here’s the opening segment:
More here.
June 12th, 2009 at 4:21 pm
well played. this might be my favorite movie. ever.
June 12th, 2009 at 7:42 pm
Wow, paying tribute to a bunch of vandals. Yeah, that’s a great idea.
June 18th, 2009 at 12:28 pm
I worked for the New York City transit system for five years in the 1980s. With a great deal of hard work and a lot of money, we drove those fu*king vandals off the system. Why ANYONE, whether PBS, the New York Times, or some fashion mag, would glorify what they did as “art” is a complete mystery to me. It makes me sick to my stomach, in fact.
We considered using dogs, and even electrifying the stored cars so the vandals would shock themselves to death. The lawyers talked us out of that idea.
June 22nd, 2009 at 1:14 pm
Ha! Go ahead, get sick to your stomach.
Ya know the phrase “You may have won this battle, but you’ll never win the war.”
YOU WILL NEVER WIN YOUR WAR ON PUBLIC ART.
Goddammit, I love graffiti! Great film.