Good reads

 There have been a number of books written to document the way that graffiti and hip hop interconnect and transcend their own boundaries. these are some of them...

Gotta get to The Mecca

 



 Hip-hop has become such an integral part of our society...so accepted as an art form like any other...that it even has its own projected facility. There are colleges where one can earn an accredited degree in hip-hop. Google Maps even has a function that will direct you to some of the most influential sites in New York that hip-hop has to offer. The streets have made their way into galleries, showrooms in Las Vegas and even The White House.

Across the Pond

Britain

   Hip-hop culture and graffiti spanned not only decades of successful integration here in the U.S., it also was able to span the globe. All around the world, young people gravitated to the art forms rooted in the streets and were captivated by the sights and sounds afforded to them by The Four Elements.

Canada

   There was no border that the culture failed to knock down. Even some of the most staid regimes were forced to deal with the hip-hop/graffiti phenomenon.

ChinaKorea

The Four Elements

   The reason I am so intent on linking hip-hop to graffiti is because of the influence this cultural shift had on my life. As a young teenager, I was overwhelmed by the vitality and intensity of hip-hop. I could sense that it was a social upheaval connected to art...kind of like jazz music in it's hey-day. I knew that it was not a flash in the pan (as many claimed it was) and that it would change the world. And it did.

   The fact that many of The Elements have become legitimized gives you some perspective on the strength of the culture itself. Although graffiti was an entity unto itself before being co-opted by hip-hop, it did receive notoriety like never before once it became an Element. You can hear the music in other artists compositions, on every radio station and in the commercials.The fashion is making its way back into the lexicon. If you want a DJ to entertain at your event, you'd better expect him to show up with two turntables and a microphone. All of the tenets of the hip-hop have made it into the modern era and graffiti is a foundational part of that.

Fat Caps (Pt II)

   Altering the look of your bombing by changing caps became common practice early on in the game. As this video shows, the look of the paint line could be altered from the standard factory look with the simple switch of a cap. There are a number of variables that have to be considered...whether you need a male/female cap to fit the can you're using, what type of piece you're putting up, the surface the paint will be on. A huge piece will be better served by using mostly fat caps, a quick bomb might use a skinny cap, etc.

   The equipment used in any endeavor is just as important as the operator. Graffiti is no different. 

Fat Caps (Pt.I)

   When a graffiti artist decides to go out to bomb, a whole horde of factors come into play. One of the most important factors is the paint.The way the paint appears on the surface is controlled in a number of ways...the talent of the artist, the surface itself and the flow of the paint from the can. That's what we're gonna talk about for these next couple of blogs.

   Early on, graffiti artists wanted a cleaner, broader flow of paint to come from the can. The factory caps were built to spread paint over a wide surface so, in order to get a good line, you had to hold the can closer to the wall and try to control the flow by steady, medium pressure. This was a drag.
   The way to counteract this was stumbled across fairly early. Taking the caps off of other spray cans...oven cleaner, deodorant, spray glue...and putting them on the spray paint cans was an easy fix.

Once this method of adjusting the flow of the paint became standard, all types of adjustments could be made to the appearance of the paint flow. All the skills that were developed before cap flipping came into play could be applied to even further change the way that bombers could make their art look. There were no parameters to the effects that could be accomplished once the flow of paint could be controlled with equipment.

Cover Me

   In 1979, The Sugar Hill Gang released Rapper's Delight, the first hip-hop single to break into the top 40. The cover art for the album and the single were both rooted in graffiti.

   Rapper's Delight is widely credited for bringing the hip-hop phenomenon from its insulated community to the masses.

  

 The early album art for most hip-hop records was largely graffiti based, as evidenced here by a legendary Philly emcee, Schooly D...

and by another groundbreaking group, EPMD...

   Since these groups were all marketing their products to urban youths, they understood that the way to get their attention was to market their product with familiar art. This also was one of the ways that graffiti became legitimized; many advertising executives saw the art form as an effective way to target this consumer group.

Code of the Streets

I write a rhyme in graffiti and / every show you see me in...
Deep concentration 'cause I'm no comedian...

   Rakim wrote the lyrics to I Ain't No Joke in 1987 during the height of the hip-hop revolution. He was one of the pioneers of the art form and understood it as well as any. When he composed his legendary poetry, it looked something like this...

   The Four Elements of Hip-Hop were all interconnected. The dj's & emcees were focused on making music that you could dance to. The dancers brought cardboard cutouts to break on filled with graffiti. The graffiti artists were able to share space on the stage with the acts performing at some of the biggest shows in the history of music. The culture belonged to everyone and no one was more important than the other.



   Movies like Beat Street...

and Wild Style...

...brought the culture from the streets to the big screen and introduced the masses to all of The Elements at the same time and showed their interconnectedness. All of the people involved were able to express themselves through art and continued to further the culture.

A little history...

Cornbread once told the story that he tagged an elephant at the zoo

     

   Cornbread and Cool Earl are the two men most commonly associated with beginning the phenomenon of graffiti art in America. They are two young Philadelphians that got started in the early 1960's, trying to get attention from girls in their neighborhood.

   Once they got started, their legend grew all over town, eventually spreading to New York City. Some of the first taggers in NY were  Taki 183, Julio 204, Frank 207, and Joe 136. These four started an intense rivalry amongst themselves and sparked the same intensity all around the city once other youngsters joined into the practice of tagging. 

   Graffiti was used to make political statements (by unions, community politicians, etc) and to mark gang territory. There began to be some distinctions made in bombing styles in order for the artists to make names for themselves.

The use of crowns, stars, wild styles of writing and and changes in scale marked some of the changes that would come about in the early 80's. Another crucial development was the linking of the artform to the hip-hop movement. it brought a sense of greater legitimacy to both genres while allowing for a crossover effect. Those who lived the life of a bomber might not know what it was like to be a b-boy and vice versa.  

From the Top

  



   When I was a teenager, the hip-hop phenomena came into being. Even though graffiti was not singular to hip-hop, the intensity of the four basic elements of the culture...the vocals, the music, the fashion and the art...fascinated me and I became a true believer. The art was based in the street, as were the rest of the traditions, and I was hooked as soon as I started putting pen to paper. 

I was never a pro, but I can get down a little

 I used to write with a couple buddies of mine all the time. I never was one to hit the walls with high intensity, but I knew plenty of cats who did. My buddy "CHIEF" was a notorious West Philly tagger...

   

   No wall in Philly was safe from cats like these. I could go anywhere, Manayunk, Cheltenham, South, West and North Philly and see some of the graffiti that all my boys lit up the city with.





   Greg Davis was a cat that my brother ran with. He went to Central with us and had a tagging crew called KCD. He used to write under the name T-Bone, but his style isn't what we're going to talk about here (even though his tags were vicious). He was one of the pioneers of the Philadelphia graffiti scene and there was a documentary made that documents some of his exploits. There are a number of the more well known artists spotlighted here, including Cornbread, the self-proclaimed "first graffiti artist".

                 The 80's is the decade that grew me up and this culture was at the center of it.