The connection between graffiti and hip hop music

Graffiti is as old as human communication. Having its traces in ancient Greece and the Roman Empire, graffiti is a form of art, drawings or words, which are marked on public surfaces.

In the United States, graffiti is primarily associated with the explosion of urban gangs in the late 1960's and 1970's in South Bronx, Washington Heights and other impoverished neighborhoods of New York City. Starting with the major urbanization of many areas in the post-war period of the 20th century, urban gangs of young teenagers produced graffiti murals and covered the city with self-invented stylized signatures of names, known as tags, to mark their territory. Although this was not a new practice to the city, graffiti gained extensive consideration viewed as a way to challenge the system and express social manifestation.

Near the end of the 20th century, non-gang related graffiti was practiced for the sake of personal promotion and increased reputation. In some cases, artists performed extremely elaborate murals only to pay their respects to a deceased person. Such graffiti occurred after the deaths of Tupac Shakur and The Notorious B.I.G. In this context, for the first time, hip hop graffiti and gang graffiti were differentiated, at least in the minds of those who could spot the differences.

Hip hop graffiti is a means of self-expression and creativity rather than a way of gang demonstration. In the mid-1970s new music and dance forms emerged in Bronx and Brooklyn as a result of experimentation of black youth with new sounds, and neighborhood block parties. With the emergence of DJ’ing and breakdancing, graffiti pieces involved highly stylish letter-forms drawn with markers, or puzzling, multi-colorful spray paint murals on walls, buildings, and subways. Most of the DJs, MCs and break-dancers were also graffiti artists with distinctive and recognizable designs. They were friends, they shared similar graffiti methods and they were reshaping old practices to new, innovative and exciting forms. Together these music, language, graffiti and clothing embraced a new cultural fact, a new massive reality, ultimately a rich mix of creative practices that became known as hip hop. Eventually, many of these self-educated graffiti artists became well-known graphic designers working for Snoop Dogg, Run-DMC, Buddy Esquire, Spike Lee, Dapper Dan, designing album covers, sportswear, stage backdrops and great logos.

Hip hop graffiti is not vandalism as many people wrongly believe. Another element that differentiates graffiti artists from gang graffiti is that hip hop graffiti is constantly improved with new additions in its techniques. In contrast, the function of gang graffiti is mostly related to marking territorial boundaries and, therefore does not require, neither presupposes artistic intent. Those who differentiate between tagging and graffiti generally view tagging as gang-directed or vandalism-oriented with vulgar meaning and extremely controversial to encompass public value. In contrast, they consider hip hop graffiti as creative expression, even when it bears elements of political controversy.