What is art? What is graffiti? Webster’s Dictionary defines graffiti as “markings, as initials, slogans, or drawings, written, spray-painted, or sketched on a sidewalk, wall of a building or public restroom, or the like”. Controversies that surround graffiti continue to create disagreement amongst city officials/law enforcement and writers around the world, who wish to display and appreciate work in public locations.
Graffiti is a rapidly developing art form whose value is highly contested, even reviled by many authorities while at the same time being subject to protection, sometimes this happening within the same jurisdiction. In many locations, city officials/law enforcement has seen a decline in what was escalating graffiti as they have created “legal” graffiti walls for the work to be displayed. It is still a crime if you are caught putting it up on the walls, however it will not be painted over by the city if nobody sees it done. Other cities continue to wage the war on these public displays, completely rejecting the idea that graffiti may be art that could be appreciated.
Another type of graffiti that began in 2005 is quickly becoming recognized as art. Known by several names—yarn bombing, yarnstorming, guerrilla knitting, urban knitting or graffiti knitting is a type of graffiti or street art that employs colorful displays of knitted or crocheted yarn or fibre rather than paint or chalk. An act of artistic vandalism yarn bombing, adapting a term for plastering an area with graffiti tags has become the goal of many knitting groups worldwide. While other forms of graffiti may be expressive, decorative, territorial, socio-political commentary,
advertising or vandalism, yarn bombing was initially almost exclusively about reclaiming and personalizing sterile or cold public places, it has since developed, with groups known as fiber artists creating graffiti knitting and crocheting worldwide, each with their own agendas and public graffiti knitting projects. Some cities consider yarn bombing to be vandalism, while others coordinate a citywide art festival with the knitters and celebrate art. What was once a random act of guerrilla knitting is now coordinated on a single day to plaster the world with yarn. So I say to you, “Happy International Yarn Bombing Day!”
As a knitter, I know just how much time, effort, and money that is put into projects such of these—however to what purpose? Therefore, I took some time to email many of the groups who openly organize to participate in yarn bombing. My question—what happens to the knitting you put out in the public? Some answered that it frayed and then just blew away, others that the city cleaned it up and sent it on to the dump. So why put all that time into a project that would end up in the dump?
Finally I got an answer from a group in London called Knit the City. They have a theme to what they knit—a story line if you will. Their projects are all knit in pieces that are scarves, blankets of all sizes and knitted animals. Their knitting have paper tags attached that say “Take me home” and the public is encouraged to “steal” the knitting during the week it is allowed to stay up. I later found that this method was practiced in many of the foreign countries where yarn bombing is practiced; however, I could not find a group in America who follows this method.
So why the waste? The knitted graffiti could still be art and yet useful too. We have so many people who could benefit from having something warm to wrap around themselves. Is yarn bombing graffiti or art? As art is in the eye of the beholder, I leave that up to you. However, that being said, could you at least make it useful to those in need?
