What Do Graffiti Artists Want?

“I did it for the fame; that was basically it. Yeah, that’s the number one answer, it’s the fact that just because of your name you get respect, you know. Fame and respect, there’s the two driving forces.”

-Acrid, Street Artist interviewed in The Graffiti Subculture: Youth, Masculinity and Identity in London and New York by Nancy Macdonald.

Along with previously performed studies such as the ones in this interview, our group's observations showcase how graffiti artists differ from street artists due to their purpose in creating their products. The purpose of street artists can be elaborated upon in the following post. The purpose of graffiti artists within this subculture is to gain fame and reputation- some forms of cultural capital they can use to benefit themselves.

Cultural capital is defined as “symbolic and interactional resources that people use to their advantage in various situations.” (Conley, 495) In regards to this particular subculture- the cultural capital is a form of‘objectified’ cultural capital because it requires a significant amount of time to acquire. (Conley, 495)

The Graffiti Subculture: Youth, Masculinity and Identity in London and New York helps explicitly define this purpose:

 “Gaining respect, fame and a strong self-concept is openly expressed as a writer’s primary objective and the subculture is fully set up to support this goal.” (Macdonald, 66)

The idea of the self-concept was evident for our group to observe simply along our study of Guadalupe Street/‘The Drag’ and the surrounding West Campus streets. Several names in graffiti tags kept repeating to the point they became easily recognizable. These name/tags were always in the same style of font; it was made apparent they were done by the same artist.

The most commonly occurring among these names were: ‘Suckey’,  ‘Regore’ and ‘Kasper.’ There was never an accompanying picture or message attached to these tags. The names/graffiti tags were mainly along sidewalks, walls and especially street signs and light posts. These are the areas persons will most commonly observe while walking along these public areas. While our group was observing and looking for graffiti and street art, we did not ever find ourselves going more than a few feet before encountering another tag. The simple location placement of these tags made it possible for us to distinguish that ‘Suckey’, ‘Repore’ and ‘Kaspar’ were graffiti artists and not creating street art.

-Some of the recurring tags of the graffiti artist 'Suckey'-

By making their names or symbols the recognizable tag, their intent was made clear. As aforesaid, they were attempting to gain fame through their cultural capital of recognition, as the purpose of the graffiti artist in this subculture dictates.