images ARE names in the street. same thing.
heres an essay i found that you will find interesting
Melbourne and a Zero Tolerance Graffiti Policy
This position paper outlines and objects to the Melbourne city Council’s zero tolerance graffiti policy.
Melbourne City Council commissioned Alison Young, Head of the Department of Criminology at Melbourne University to draw up a draft graffiti strategy last March. Young recommended that there should be tolerance zones in Melbourne where artists would be at a lower risk of being arrested, and that zero tolerance policies often fail.
The Council rejected this recommendation and instead doubled its anti-graffiti budget. Many areas across Melbourne both in the inner city and the suburbs have been ‘buffed’, that is the art has been painted over with a dull grey paint. Last month the Government announced it was spending over one million dollars to clean up the graffiti along the train line at North Melbourne.
The Council believes that graffiti started in the 1960’s with a tagger name ‘taki 183’. However, the word graffiti actually comes from the Latin, graffito – meaning to scratch and has been around since long before the invention of the aerosol can.
There is no one graffiti policy across Melbourne. Each council in the city has its own policy and its own view. The Melbourne City Council itself has funded and bought pieces of the street art that it is now outlawing.
There needs to be some sense made of their graffiti policy and some middle ground found.
The main point of this paper is to give the artist’s a voice and to give the councillors and Council an overview of the real issues.
It also represents the building owners and the general public that do not want graffiti removed.
In addition, it provides real options for creating a balance between zero tolerance and anarchy.
Melbourne City Council’s view
The Victorian Government and the Melbourne City Council believe that creating tolerance zones and zero tolerance areas will deter would be offenders, yet have rejected this option. The Council defines graffiti as, “tagging and/or stand alone stencilsâ€. The Graffiti Management Plan 2006 sets out guidelines for building owners and sets out the Council’s stance on graffiti.
Examples:
This is an example of a tag this is an example of a standalone stencil
“At the core of this Plan are the principles of rapid removal, education, prevention and enforcement. To be successful, the Plan requires a collaborative approach involving the City of Melbourne, residents and property and infrastructure owners, the State Government and its agencies, neighbouring municipalities and other stakeholders.â€
The Plan states that owners must remove graffiti within 24-48 hours once reported. The owners are generally responsible for the cost of the painting. When repainting a large area it is possible that a painting permit will have to be acquired from the Council before building owners can repaint the graffiti.
If an owner wishes to keep a mural on their wall, they will have to go through a process the same as a planning permit, and shop owners around the site will be able to argue against the mural. If an owner is ordered to remove a mural and does not they will be given written notice. This will be a ‘Notice to Comply’ issued under the Activities Local Law referring to clause 9.2 (B). It will give the owner / occupier / manager a further period (usually one week) to remove the graffiti.
If after this time the owner does not remove the work, the business will be issued with an infringement notice. If the owner does not remove the graffiti, the Council will remove it in accordance with its powers under the Act ivies Local Law.
The Council will also work with the Victorian Police photographing works and working to catch and prosecute offenders.
A group of lobbyists who call themselves R.A.G.E – Residents Against Graffiti Everywhere - are working towards a graffiti free city, and towards catching offenders. R.A.G.E is “lobbying for safer cleaner suburbsâ€. Their research states that caught offenders are usually in the possession of or under the influence of drugs or alcohol and can be violent.
However, there are many people and organizations that feel that graffiti is an art movement; similar to a movement like Dadaism and feel that it is culturally significant. The National Trust has in the past considered classifying graffiti of historical significance and as worthy of preservation.
Within the Melbourne City Council, there is opposition to the zero tolerance policy. Green’s Councillor Fraser Brindley opposes the adoption of the policy and sees it as “sanitizing the city for the Commonwealth Games.â€
Anne McDonald, the National Gallery of Australia’s curator of prints and drawings sees stencil art as, “the contemporary equivalent of the political posters of the ‘70s and ‘80sâ€. She makes it a point to drop by Hosier Lane and Centre Place to see how the scene is progressing and says that the gallery is considering ways to incorporate stencil art into the collection.
There is also the fear that by creating zero tolerance areas artists will resort to tagging which only takes 5-10 seconds. Tagging the main form of graffiti that the Council is trying to combat and eradicate. By creating a policy which means that artists will not have the opportunity to do their work properly the Council is creating an atmosphere where spray can tags are all that will be painted.
RASH a documentary that aired on ABC in April this year and was featured last year at the Melbourne International Film Festival talked to many locals in areas where there is a large amount of graffiti. The general consensus was that people do not like the messy ‘tags’, one man said, “if I can walk to work every morning and see a new stencil that makes me think about something and really ponder it, then I guess they’re achieving what they’re supposed to.â€
The book ‘Stencil Graffiti Capital: Melbourne’ created huge controversy. At the opening night for the book where many of the photos from the book were being sold, there were at least four undercover police to try to catch out the street artists.
Melbourne is known across the world as the number one place for graffiti and street art, which is an added tourist attraction for people. One former Mayor of the City of Yarra suggested printing a street art guide for tourists to show them all the best spots.
Melbourne prides itself on its reputation for culture and the arts yet prohibit one of the things that makes it most famous.
Suggested solutions to the Issue
As suggested in Alison Young’s research there needs to be control areas for graffiti art. By creating zero tolerance zones, the Council is going to create even more damage. If the Council removes the art from sites around the central business district such as Degraves Lane, Hosier Lane and Croft’s Lane the Council will be ensuring that there will be a backlash by both graffiti and stencil artists.
These areas are culturally significant, not only to the public but also to the artists and these should not be touched. The City Lights projects, exhibitions and events such as the NEXT Wave Festival utilise these lanes and their individuality throughout the year.
The Victorian government and the Melbourne City Council fund many of these events. During the redevelopment of the city square, a Melbourne artist DEST painted a wall of the construction zone. This wall was taken down and bubble wrapped by the Council for preservation.
In 2005, Arts Victoria funded the Melbourne Stencil Festival, which is an exhibition for more than a week of stencil art with guest speakers and demonstrations.
The Council does not have one concrete view on this policy. They are saying that they have zero tolerance yet funding and even buying works by street artists. The Council needs to work together with the artists and the individual council’s that want to keep the art.
The Council also needs to consider the business owners who wish to keep the art on their walls and give them greater rights and the ability to keep it. The Council itself has however kept murals on hoardings and other areas because it realised that it wouldn’t get tagged on or more graffiti added to it if there was already ‘aerosol art’ on it.
The Council needs to give the policy more consideration, simply adding more money to the budget to paint over graffiti is not a solution. Graffiti will not go away purely by painting over it, the taggers and artists alike see this as giving them a fresh canvas.
However, the Council could adopt selective buffing, by repainting ‘bad’ graffiti and keeping the aesthetically pleasing graffiti the Council would be able to have some kind of quality control.
The Council cannot continue to fund and buy graffiti and stencil art if they are not going to allow it to be on the street.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the Melbourne City Council’s zero tolerance graffiti policy is destined for failure. They are only ensuring that there will be more graffiti by trying to remove it. The Council has a hypocritical policy on the issue as not all council’s within Melbourne agree with and abide by the policy.
There needs to be further consideration of tolerance zones and the ability of private owners to keep work that they like.
The Council will not be able to fight graffiti alone, it will cost too much and aggravate the public whose money the Council is spending. There needs to be consultation with the graffiti artists and options provided such as funding. Council’s that implement graffiti friendly programs that allow for education and areas where artists are allowed to paint tend to have more success in dealing with graffiti problems. There cannot be a holistic view on dealing with graffiti. Where zero tolerance may work in one area, it will not necessarily work in another.
References
Gabriella Coslovich, The Age, ‘Our Colourful Underbelly’, 4 December 2005
Ashley Frost, 2003, ‘Graffiti and Public Art’, presented at the Graffiti and Disorder counsel.
Nicholas Hansen, Rash, Documentary, Distributed by Madman, 2005
Melbourne City Council:
Graffiti Management Plan, The City of Melbourne, 2006
Graffiti Facts, The City of Melbourne, 2006
Alison Young, Graffiti Strategy, Draft for Consultation, 2005
Websites
http://blogs.theage.com.au/yoursay/arch ... ffiti.html
http://www.rageaustralia.com
http://www.casey.vic.gov.au/mediareleas ... ?Item=6290
http://www.theage.com.au/news/arts/our- ... tml?page=6
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/ ... 42116.html
therer is also the full draft you can download here, with ALL the options they didnt consider...
http://www.melbourne.vic.gov.au/info.cf ... 8&upg=1800
