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Council's graffiti artists vandalise park
1:44pm Tuesday 22nd January 2008
Comments (89)When town hall bosses unleashed graffiti artists to redecorate their park they may have been hoping for a Banksy-style mural on the cheap.
What they ended up with fell somewhat short - a vandalised playground and a clean-up bill expected to run easily into five figures.
Brighton and Hove City Council opened up Tarner Park in Brighton, to a group of spray-can Cezannes in the hope of creating an artistic masterpiece.
But council officials have admitted the artists "didn't play ball" and not only the park, but surrounded trees, hedges and streets were daubed in ugly graffiti.
Now - a whole 18 months later - the council has decided to spare the community more woe and has insisted enough is enough.
A spokeswomman for the council said: "We met us with the artists a year and a half ago and agreed to make the park a tolerated zone where they could express themselves.
"But within months, word got around and people were coming from other counties to spray the park. Drafts of people were coming by train with rucksacks full of spray paint.
"Soon it wasn't just the park that was covered but a whole trail along the streets, walls and hedges leading to the park.
"They covered the children's play facilities in paint so parents didn't want to let their kids go on them." When asked quite what the council's expectations had been at the start of the project, the authority pointed to the other "managed" graffiti areas in Kensington Street and at the New England Development by Brighton train station.
The spokeswoman said: "We quickly realised the difference between looking at designs, talking them through with artists and organising particular days for them to be painted with saying anything goes, we'll leave you to your own devices'."
The council is now facing an estimated bill of £14,000 to have the graffiti cleaned off.
The council says the clean-up will take about a month. David Roberts, managing director of M and D Ltd, one of London's biggest graffiti removal companies said: "It's a huge job. It will require high-tech equipment and I would give an estimated quote of £14,000 or more."
Tory councillor Geoffrey Theobald said: "The council is committed to taking a stand against all form of criminal damage."
The council now faces the problem of spreading the word that graffiti is no longer tolerated in the park.
The park still appears on websites like ifimages.com and YouTube as a place "where graffiti is allowed".
The authority said: "It looks like we will have to get a police patrol. Fortunately there is a police station nearby."
Your Say YourArgus
JOHNBOY, brighton says...
2:12pm Tue 22 Jan 08
Lewis RD Shop Proprietor, Lewes Rd says...
2:13pm Tue 22 Jan 08
Calling All Brightonians, here says...
2:16pm Tue 22 Jan 08
ac, b& says...
2:21pm Tue 22 Jan 08
Lord T; the ones on the occupied territories wall in Palestine there are/were authentic masterpieces ;)
Lord Tilford, of Tilford says...
2:48pm Tue 22 Jan 08
Lord T; the ones on the occupied territories wall in Palestine there are/were authentic masterpieces
Yeah? Who authenticated them?
mark, Brighton says...
2:50pm Tue 22 Jan 08
Tarner didn't work out, not only because it's location is more remote compared to some of the other walls but because it was a 'free for all' wall, anybody could paint there, which meant about 90% of what was down there you could appreciate but you had groups of younger, less responsible kids who went there with no creative ability and constantly tagged the play areas as well. So ity was ruined by the minority of kids who didn't understand what a privelege it actually was for them to have such a wall.
The only legal wall left (After Blackrock was boarded off and now Tarner) is just the Level skatepark, and that area's far too small to keep everyone happy. I think a new wall should be provided maybe somewhere out of the way of children or a nursery or somewhere where it would be easier to control and monitor.
jayne, hove says...
2:57pm Tue 22 Jan 08
Get rid of the drunks and the druggies and clean this city up or you lot (councillors) are out.
Lord Tilford, of Tilford says...
2:57pm Tue 22 Jan 08
Well duh, Brighton says...
3:03pm Tue 22 Jan 08
Bob, Pease Pottage says...
3:15pm Tue 22 Jan 08
Why not have Eubanks clean it off for his community service?
Lord Tilford, of Tilford says...
3:16pm Tue 22 Jan 08
soon-to-be-extinct notions of what constitutes art.
What? Are you saying that what people believe is art will be radically different in the future?
Those colourful murales are just big cartoons - no more artistic than the design on my box of cereal.
Well duh, Brighton says...
3:20pm Tue 22 Jan 08
What? Are you saying that what people believe is art will be radically different in the future?
Well, duh. Obviously. Look at Duchamp - many of your ilk cried foul when he exhibited Fountain for the first time, but now it is widely considered to be a breakthrough work. Your blinkered outlook on life only serves to separate you from the vitality of the changing palette of art. Come, join us! Feel the pulsating life of urban creativity! Cast away the pipe and slippers of tradition!
olithedrifter, says...
3:56pm Tue 22 Jan 08
Anon, brighton says...
3:59pm Tue 22 Jan 08
There is no such thing as graffiti being art, it is all vandalism and pure crap.
Jayne obiously is a master in the arts... you probaly think an unmade bed is an epic artistic expression, graffiti is a form of art, anybody who disbelieves this then they need a phycological check up to help them adapt to the times,
also graffiti isnt allways a "tag" of a name or something, some of the works are absolutly amazing,
hate to sound clich'e but check some banksy
JOHNBOY, brighton says...
4:11pm Tue 22 Jan 08
Spanish Gentleman, Down B&Q for some caustic soda says...
4:30pm Tue 22 Jan 08
I am convinced that the entire council is populated by real life Modern Parents from Viz.
Perhaps they could also allocate an area where teenagers could get drunk and fight in a safe environment and express themselves through fists.
It must hurt trying so hard to be down with the kidz and trendy and to have it blow up in your face. You have got the council you deserve some of you.
Roy at home, brighton says...
5:07pm Tue 22 Jan 08
fred, Brighton says...
5:25pm Tue 22 Jan 08
Matt, Brighton says...
6:01pm Tue 22 Jan 08
Geremy, Brighton says...
6:24pm Tue 22 Jan 08
What on earth are they wittering on a about, artists have been legally painting graffiti in tarnerland park since the early nineties ! The park has nothing to do with the Kensington Street and New England Development at all. Graffiti is a part of tarnerlands history, "We met us with the artists a year and a half ago and agreed to make the park a tolerated zone where they could express themselves.", what a load of rubbish. And Matt is absolutely right, without a legal place to paint, the graffiti that was contained in tarnerland park, will soon be coming to a wall near you.
tez, 663-132 says...
6:36pm Tue 22 Jan 08
Its seems that the council couldnt give a toss about who lives here. Tarner has been blessed for many years by some of the most talented artists in the world, many of them who actually live in Brighton and many of whom hold down repectable jobs, are internationally renowned artists, or actually get hired by the council as illustrators/designe
rs. So by all means sit in front of your telly, moan about your boss, walk the line, talk about it but never do it, we the outsiders will carry on regardless...
...Its been London-by-sea for many a year now and many pencil cases are getting packed and jumping ship.
Bye-Bye
Josh, says...
8:10pm Tue 22 Jan 08
How do you think the Aroe's, Vibes's, Rat's, Gary's etc got to where they are.
Through PRACTICE.
If you dont let kids and teenagers figure out what theyre doing how are they going to get good with no legal walls.
Oh well, off to London in a few years for Central Saint Martins
See ya!
Tom, Hassocks says...
8:19pm Tue 22 Jan 08
Graffiti isn't vandalism, it can be really tasteful. But when people who haven't thoght out what they're going to paint come along, then you get vandalism.
histrionic habit, Hanover says...
9:20pm Tue 22 Jan 08
me, brightown says...
9:36pm Tue 22 Jan 08
surely the council should be concentrating on removing other problems from our streets..
Jo Matthews, says...
2:14am Wed 23 Jan 08
How about questioning the costs of the clean up- what is this figure based on
Er, estimates supplied to the council! Looks like you need to try a bit of thinking for yourself - as you so ironically recommend to others.
JOHNBOY, brighton says...
9:59am Wed 23 Jan 08
Both Hovering, ex-Brighton says...
10:02am Wed 23 Jan 08
Roy at home wrote:Given where Tarner is, I guess the answer to Roy (& others)is: the Labour councillors who you booted out of office in May!
Which of our wonderful councillors,who voted for this artistic graffiti in the park, will donate some of their council expences to repairing the damage they have caused. Well!Well!Well! Hasnt it gone quite.
banksy, moon base alpha says...
10:36am Wed 23 Jan 08
Terry Walpole, Queens Park says...
1:21pm Wed 23 Jan 08
This is what happens when adults think they are down with the kids.
The Argus should publish names.
Can't Draw for Toffee, Brighton says...
1:44pm Wed 23 Jan 08
But daubing on walls, floors and play equipment is surely the pursuit of a 3 year old?
If you wish to commission a painting on the side of a building (what used to be called murals) then fair enough. But to give free rein to a bunch of unknown people is ridiculous.
As for the comment above on how all the other 'artists' became so 'good' - through practice - well, let them practice on canvas/paper/ the back of old cardboard boxes. And isn't that what most superior artists of the past did, paint on canvas / paper etc?? Accepting the odd Sistine Chapel for the truly exceptional...
Just another example of the world going mad
lucy, brighton says...
2:13pm Wed 23 Jan 08
Matt, brighton says...
3:12pm Wed 23 Jan 08
Can't Draw for Toffee wrote:
I'm no artist, I have to say. But daubing on walls, floors and play equipment is surely the pursuit of a 3 year old? If you wish to commission a painting on the side of a building (what used to be called murals) then fair enough. But to give free rein to a bunch of unknown people is ridiculous. As for the comment above on how all the other 'artists' became so 'good' - through practice - well, let them practice on canvas/paper/ the back of old cardboard boxes. And isn't that what most superior artists of the past did, paint on canvas / paper etc?? Accepting the odd Sistine Chapel for the truly exceptional... Just another example of the world going mad
As for the comment above on how all the other 'artists' became so 'good' - through practice - well, let them practice on canvas/paper/ the back of old cardboard boxes.
Have you every seen a pice of cardboard paper that is big enough for a piece of graffiti!?! Spray paint wont even work properly on these things it just soaks straight through. Most writers dont want to paint canvas, graffiti always was painted on walls and trains and always will be. Closing Tarner will not stop the graffiti its just going to be painted in other places
Mike, Sussex says...
3:25pm Wed 23 Jan 08
I cant understand why no one from the council was monitoring it. It sounds like they were left to spray for months before some dozy counciller woke up.
Of course as usual its very very easy to waste tax payers money.
How incredible that these officials can get away with such a disaster without even being named and shamed.
Geremy, Brighton says...
3:41pm Wed 23 Jan 08
Parent, Brighton says...
5:36pm Wed 23 Jan 08
ed, portslade says...
6:02pm Wed 23 Jan 08
dave, nowhere says...
7:03pm Wed 23 Jan 08
Obviously another wise choice by the council. not!
You stop the legal places, then BRING ON THE ILLEGAL GRAFFITI!
x
skint artist, says...
8:29pm Wed 23 Jan 08
histrionic habit, hellish hanover says...
9:30pm Wed 23 Jan 08
dcThrush, says...
9:24am Thu 24 Jan 08
martin woodhead, brighton says...
9:55am Thu 24 Jan 08
a little bit of control and the project might have worked a free for all was probably a mistake
flat foot soozie, hove says...
11:31am Thu 24 Jan 08
wavey davy, worthing says...
3:12pm Thu 24 Jan 08
you will never stop graffiti (check out some of the prehistoric art)but by removing legal places to paint your just driving even the legal painters back on to the streets.
oh and as for it costing ££!! how much? have they not heard of community service?
!JECH!, Hastings says...
11:45pm Thu 24 Jan 08
I hate the councils
Leave it as it is ERGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
!
there will be so much more graffit on the streets now.
Im coming over to paint illegal on on your walls windows everything gonna destroy it all now, now you will see what vandalism is.
oh god, all over the shop says...
6:01am Fri 25 Jan 08
argus is awful, brighton says...
6:04am Fri 25 Jan 08
But within months, word got around and people were coming from other counties to spray the park. Drafts of people were coming by train with rucksacks full of spray paint.
"Soon it wasn't just the park that was covered but a whole trail along the streets, walls and hedges leading to the park.
"They covered the children's play facilities in paint so parents didn't want to let their kids go on them."
oh my god people are getting together to do something artistic?
Children scared by words written on the playground equipment.
GIVE ME A BREAK!!!!
Lord Tilford, of Tilford says...
2:12pm Fri 25 Jan 08
Why should these talentless vandals, who only seem to have reached the level of education where they can write their name badly and colour it in without going over the edges - achievable by most averagely intelligent 4 year-olds - be provided with ANY areas where they can indulge their destructiveness? Should councils also provide fake bus-stops so they can kick those in and leave the real ones alone?
Thankfully, most vandals/graffiti painters grow out of it eventually, unless they're really, really thick and immature. The ones that persist should be heavily fined if caught.
Lord Smetherington, now, when did i put that kettle says...
5:01pm Fri 25 Jan 08
louie, Brighton says...
6:21pm Fri 25 Jan 08
honestly who can decide what is art and what is not? If you dont like it dont **** look at it!
But if you go round moaning and paying for our legal spots to be taken from us were just gunna paint more illegals as there is no where else for us to place our ART.
the people who do tag on the play equipment are the pikey little youts that pick up used cans. They **** us off as much as they **** of you haters.
so now the council have payed stupid amounts of money to clean up a legal painting spot which will therefore cause them to pay more of the tax payers money to clean up illegal work.
well done brighton council i salute you in your naive narrow minded actions
happy happy, nazi germany says...
11:53pm Sat 26 Jan 08
i love ignorance.
i believe both
IGNORANCE
and the
ARGUS
to be indisputable human rights.
Burn all that I dont understand.
fartyfartyfartyfarty, prisoner cell block h says...
12:49am Sun 27 Jan 08
Paul Oldman, Brighton says...
6:23pm Mon 28 Jan 08
I came onto this forum to read about the general public's views on the subject and have been shocked at the ignorance of many of the posts that I have read on here, especially from seemingly intelligent people who can't seem to differentiate between art (be it of a high standard or not) and vandalism and then exploit the fact that the opression of this artform over the last 40 years has forced Grafitti to become synonymous with vandalism. It's (sadly prevalent) views like this that are ultimately responsible for the level of spray and pen vandalism that there is today.Is it any wonder that many Grafitti artists have become criminalised (more so may I add, in towns and cities where there are no legal spaces) and the lines between Graffiti and vandalism have become so blurred? What many people don't seem to understand is that Brighton has got a very active Graffiti community, the cream of whom have been able to develop their skills to such a high standard that they now receive commissions from all over the world and no longer revert to painting illegally in order to vent their creativity and get their material seen by the public. The majority of the rest hone their skills in legal spaces. Thanks to the provision of legal spaces over the last 20 years Brighton has nurtured a community of hundreds of Grafitti writers (of mixed abilities), the majority of whom have thankfully never become criminalised or opressed by fascist authorities. But do you think that these artists are just going to stop being Graffiti artists because their canvas has been taken away? How many artists or musicians do you know that would be anywhere near complete without the capacity to satisfy their creative urges irrelevant of the level of competing professional or personal commitments? Worse still the social impact of this naive move by the council will see aspiring new artists who perceive breaking the law in order to partake in Graffiti as the norm, this will surely have social repercussions beyond vandalism.
No, what i envisage is a barrage of illegal Graffiti and not just a return to how things were before legal spaces were introduced, but a far worse and more costly response from the Graffiti community (many of whom may never have or never would have painted illegaly) An uprising fuelled by the much larger contingent of writers born of the legal days and the general feeling within graff circles (legal or not) of a need for protest. All of this in addition to the minority who actually are vandals who ar probably responsible for the majority of the said vandalism and care nothing for the culture or foundations of Grafitti and are giving the Artform a bad name. Yes I agree that the heritage of Grafitti (although it did produce some amazing art)isn't the most honourable of stories as far as the law goes but like it or not it has become a culture probably more universal and appreciated than most other visual art movement today and the climate that you currently see in Brighton and Hove today (before Tarner becoming illegal) was probably the best of a bad situation, in the context of the law.
It has taken almost 20 years to get brightobn to a point where the vast majority of graffiti is legal but I regret to say I feel that it could be much longer to before we see a return to a predominanlty legal graff community if the spaces are taken away.
a, a says...
8:08pm Mon 28 Jan 08
Lord Tilford wrote:you barstads. my friend used to spray. and i know the only way to get better than "mediocre" is to practise
\\\\\\\"a group of spray-can Cezannes in the hope of creating an artistic masterpiece\\\\\\\" - naive or wot? Has anyone ever seen any graffiti that was better than mediocre?
Barry Bischov, Brighton says...
11:08am Tue 29 Jan 08
Lord Tilford wrote:THE THOUSANDS OF ART COLLECTORS AND FANS THAT ARE PAYING THOUSANDS OF POUNDS JUST FOR A SILKSCREEN PRINT (NOT EVEN AN EXCLUSIVE ONE AT THAT)OF THOSE IMAGES.
Lord T; the ones on the occupied territories wall in Palestine there are/were authentic masterpiecesYeah? Who authenticated them?
YOU MAKE ME SICK IT'S BECAUSE OF PEOPLE LIKE YOU THAT A MASSIVE AMOUNT OF THE POPULATION FEEL ALIENATED AND INTIMIDATED BY THE ART WORLD AND AVOID HAVING AN OPINION ON ANYTHING ARTISTIC THROUGH FEAR OF BEING BRANDED WRONG. WELL HERE'S SOME NEWS FOR YOU CAN'T ARGUE WITH ART, I WOULD NEVER DREAM OF TRYING TO DISCREDIT ANYONES ARTISTIC PREFERENCES BECAUSE I WOULD NEVER WANT TO EMBARASS MYSELF BY APPEARING AS IGNORANT AND DOGMATIC AS YOU HAVE SHOWN YOURSELF TO BE.
Paul Oldman, Brighton says...
11:25am Tue 29 Jan 08
Lord Tilford wrote:Should councils also provide fake bus-stops so they can kick those in and leave the real ones alone?
Graffiti is nothing more than vandalism, pure and simple. Comparing it to works by great artists or even prehistoric cave drawings just shows an ignorance of art. It\'s not cultural, it\'s not artistic and it\'s not particularly difficult to do - anyone with a few spray paints can write a big word or draw a cartoon. Expressing yourself!? Don\'t make me laugh. Why should these talentless vandals, who only seem to have reached the level of education where they can write their name badly and colour it in without going over the edges - achievable by most averagely intelligent 4 year-olds - be provided with ANY areas where they can indulge their destructiveness? Should councils also provide fake bus-stops so they can kick those in and leave the real ones alone? Thankfully, most vandals/graffiti painters grow out of it eventually, unless they\'re really, really thick and immature. The ones that persist should be heavily fined if caught.
I CAN SEE WHERE YOU'RE COMING FROM BUT,
YES, THE SHOULD IF KICKING IN BUS STOPS WAS AN ESTABLISHED ARTFORM APPRECIATED BY MILLIONS.
I suggest that you take a long look at your own comments before you start to dismiss a whole global movement of being 'ignorant of art'.
It might interest you to know that a massive proportion of the local Grafitti community feel just as angry about the few VANDALS that have spoilt it for the rest who are ARTISTS.
I feel sorry for you.....
Lord Tilford, of Tilford says...
2:04pm Tue 22 Jan 08