scottish graffiti - Over 20 years of burners

Dark and dingyyyyy Mearns!!

2012-01-22T08:10:00.004Z

Such a hard place to get nice flicks - well for me it is! Took more flicks but unfortunately they didnt come out.

Cold Concrete

2012-01-21T09:01:00.002Z

Derm

Rogue One interview

2012-01-18T09:38:00.002Z

Nice wee interview with Rogue One over here. Not a full on graff interview but a good read nonetheless.

Cam One

2012-01-15T19:14:00.001Z

The Skinny - Graff feature

2012-01-15T18:35:00.002Z

Graff article in The Skinny. Make of it what you will but the inclusion of the word "turntabling" just about sums it up. FFS!!

GazMac - Dublin

2012-01-14T21:35:00.000Z

Scotlands first ever Graff writer????

2012-01-12T10:08:00.005Z

Received an email from someone who put forward the following questions

who is the first documented graffiti writer in Scotland?
how far back can jazzy tags be claimed?

I sort of covered this in an early post which was slightly tongue in cheek. It did raise the question of whats the difference between "Tam was here" and someone putting up a tag as we would class it.

Personal opinion, I would say there were no Scottish "graff writers" before the whole Hip Hop package was delivered to the UK in the early 80's. I could be wrong.

For me as a young lad living in Dundee, the first writers that I knew of as graff writers were local boys Foxy, Cozmo and Bip. There could have been others and certainly there were others out around that time who became really prominent in the scene. That was back in 1985, although these guys could have been involved in graff for possibly a year or two by that time.

Thats my memory of that time and what was happening in Dundee. I have no real knowledge of what was going on throughout Scotland at that particular time. I know Gaz Mac has incorporated "Est 1983" onto the end of his tag. Were there others before him? Im sure Gaz or others would know. Again, would they know what was going on in other parts of Scotland? If not, can they claim to be the first?

The earliest flicks that I have on this site are archived as 1984 (Eez and Foxy) but by looking at these, particularly the Foxy piece, you can tell that this isnt his first attempt at graff.

Im sure there is loads of info out there, some fact, some slightly mixed up due to ageing memories and brain cells, and some that is absolute made up garbage. I would also put a large bet on this never being resolved.

It would be good to hear what others have to say.

Edinburgh Warehouse mid 90's

2012-01-08T21:02:00.000Z

Livi shop 1996

2012-01-06T11:58:00.004Z

Footage of a wall organised by Eez. Wall from left to right Elph, Vera, Lyken and Mie 1. Eez pulled the wall together by doing the background work.
My original Sketch here
Flick of full wall here

late 1980's graff

2012-01-06T11:14:00.002Z

Couple of Dundee pieces from 1988 videoed a good few years after they had been painted - i would guess at mid 90's.

More vids of older stuff coming soon, just finished converting some old VHS videos.

New York City Graffiti - The Destiny Children

2012-01-05T11:10:00.003Z

New York City Graffiti - The Destiny Children published by Schiffer books

Received this book just before Christams from the good folks at Bushwood books but due to the festivities its taken a while to get round to reviewing this.

So, given that you are most likely a writer and reading this review, what do you know about The Destiny Children? An internet search wont through up much other than info about this book.

So what do you need to know. Well its all in this book and what a book. 344 pages of high quality old school graffiti funk including 480+ photos. Need to know more? TDC hit the NY subway system and they hit it hard.

This book celebrates 25 years of The Destiny Children. The book transports you back to when graffiti was beginning to explode across the globe and was under serious attack from the MTA. The book features the crews work on trains and their transition to walls and tractor trailers.

To give you a feel of what this book looks like it has a feel of what maybe Subway Art would have been had it focussed on one crew. Like Subway Art the book has fold out pages to show full car pieces but there are far more included in here and it gives you a chance to fully appreciate the individual styles of the crew members. The styles are classic and timeless and burn so much stuff that is out there now.

Given that the TDC were active during the time when NY where cracking down on graffiti on the subway system, the fact that they were able to produce so much quality work is really impressive.

As the book focuses on one crew it means it can give an indepth account of what made the crew and each member tick. There are hundreds upon hundreds of quality flicks in this book including many action shots of the crew in the train yards putting their work up. But what really makes this book for me is the various tales told about train painting missions including Goldie’s trip to NY, numerous fight and beef tales and general chat about what the graff scene was like back then. There is also some contributions from other writers about how the TDC inspired/impacted on them.

Personally, this book is a favourite amongst the piles of graff books out there. The styles are classic, the colours are of a certain time reminding me of why I got into graff in the first place.

The book is available in the UK from Bushwood Books and is priced at £39.95, although it can be picked up for £29.37 on Amazon. Pricey for a book? Maybe. Worth it? For a book dripping with style then yeah, its worth every penny.

highly recommended!!!!!

latest Blackbook Battle over at ZAP

2011-12-31T13:41:00.003Z

More info here

Beta

2011-12-31T13:39:00.000Z

Angry Birds

2011-12-30T10:28:00.000Z

DLA1, Krime, Vade, Paco

Plastek, Piks,,,

2011-12-19T09:57:00.001Z

Sync - 98ish

2011-12-15T12:37:00.002Z

not graff but...

2011-12-11T11:22:00.005Z

Cracking docu about Bboy Evo. You want style? It drips off this guy. Whats the link to Scotland and graff i hear you shout? Well, some nice footage and memories from Evo and Storm of the Under Pressure jam in Livingston. Also features Brain and Archie from Glasgow who went on to form a crew with Evo following the jam.

**New Years resolution is to see if i can get some inspiration to get out and about and take some flicks so that i can get this blog back on track. Hopefully have some more interviews on the go as well.

Embra

2011-11-24T10:57:00.000Z

DERM

Eddy Burgh

2011-11-22T12:13:00.002Z

Elph Jekyl Sole Smog Baby Odra

Scottishgraffiti makes it to..........

2011-11-20T21:51:00.002Z

Martha Coopers facebook page! Thanks to Terror 161 for the heads up on the link(s).

Edinburgh 94

2011-11-17T12:17:00.001Z

Get Dase Kush

Graffiti 365

2011-11-17T09:00:00.001Z

Graffiti 365 by Jay JSON Edlin published by Abrams

So this book was meant to arrive a few weeks ago but somehow had taken far longer to arrive than expected. Eventually it turned up, thrown through the door by the postman before he made a suspiciously fast getaway. The book arrived in one of those “sorry this package has been opened/damaged” type plastic bags that the post office have. No problem I thought as I ripped it open and had a quick scan through the pages, no obvious damage done. So I sit down to have a good look through the book and it becomes clear that this falls into the “opened” category on the plastic bag. Page after page is full of what looks like someone’s crumbs of toast. Clearly someone has had this delivered to them in error (made all the more clearer by the dodgy 4 and S on the address which makes it look like 45 instead of just 4) and they had opened the original package, had a good look through, possibly over breakfast, then thought they should do the right thing and return it. Not sure what they made of the book and what their review of the would have been but here’s mine…….

First impression is that this book is a monster both in volume and weight. With over 700 pages of photos and text, this is one hell of a book and should come with a health warning - ‘cos if you drop this then your feet are getting smashed!!

Graffiti 365 by Tarantula 235 aka Terror 161 aka JSON covers 365 artists and/or topics within the Graffiti world, ranging from the origins of New York subway graffiti writing through to the modern day Street Art. You get everything from Keith Haring to Cap, Miss Van to Seen, Shepard Fairey to Stay High 149 etc etc. From a Scottish viewpoint its good to see Elph included, even if there is a wee mistake in his hometown location.

The opening foreword and introductions by Zephyr and JSON tell us why there are a broad range of styles included and its interesting to read how JSON’s opinion of street art has been turned 360 degrees through him working on this book and immersing himself within that particular culture. However, if you’re a graffiti writer who is not already into street art then I’m not sure you are going to get that kind of experience yourself. This will probably be due to the sheer quality, and in some cases rarity, of the graffiti flicks included. Along with the numerous snippets of graffiti history if your not into street art now, then you aren’t going to give these works a second glance. For me, the images of dirty NY subway trains with early graff styles plastered over them destroy each and every street art example in this book.

Mayor Koch rockin a pilot!

The book really kicks into life when JSON takes a trip down memory lane and passes on his memories through his foreword and his brief bio of each of the early NY subway artists and/or their crews. His knowledge and enthusiasm for this jumps of the page and smacks you bang in the mouth, clearly showing where his heart lies. This gets into you and makes you jump from page to page so that you can take in the grainy old school flicks that seem to capture a certain something that for me, today’s lovely manufactured graff paint colours and crystal clear digital cameras cant compete with.

Some book are nice to look at but you may not go back to them that often. For me, I will be checking this out for a long time to come. Do yourself a favour, if you don’t already have this then grab yourself one asap. At the very least get it on your Christmas list.

Check out http://thegspotcolab.blog.com/2011/09/19/graffiti-365-terror-161json-speaks/ for an indepth interview with JSON and his work on the book.

All images grabbed from Terror 161's page over on 12oz Prophet

Plastek, Piks,,,

2011-11-13T19:04:00.000Z

Graffiti 365

2011-11-09T11:16:00.003Z

Just got a belated review copy of Graffiti 365 through the door. Had a quick swatch and noticed it features Elph (apparently he's from Glasgow!). However, good to see Scotland included in this absolute monster of a book. Full review coming soon.

Edinburgh

2011-11-08T12:31:00.004Z

Graffiti artists make their mark in Leith paintball arena

2011-11-07T23:16:00.002Z

Scottish writers transformed the venue into colourful urban environment.

More here

Loanhead

2011-11-07T09:57:00.000Z

Another blog up and running

2011-10-28T10:54:00.001+01:00

Good to see another blog has surfaced pushing Scottish graff. Take 5 mins and go check it out

http://fontleaker.wordpress.com/

TCK Edinburgh

2011-10-27T10:02:00.000+01:00

Taio and Never

Zokes Taio Smirk

Loanheed!

2011-10-13T12:08:00.001+01:00

Elso by Sole

XRay

Mover

Glasgow

2011-10-11T08:41:00.004+01:00

Rogue, Akme, Che, Daze
GazMac, Estum, PowerCam One

Real, Vues

Ejek, and Epik

Vera, Conzo

Selection of flicks (ripped from Facebook) from the Cotterell's wall in Glasgow. Connector to follow once I get back down.

Good job by those involved in getting this organised, especially Gaz, both with permission and getting the writers down there to get the wall painted.

From a personal point of view, given some of the more recent legal walls that have been painted in Glasgow, I'm really pleased to see this wall come together in the way that it has - look closely, it even has letters in it!! Not a dig at those doing those other walls but a hats off to Cotterell's for letting people doing their thing, and do it well.

Hopefully, this will act as a starting point and that a lot more wall space can be secured on the back of this.

2011-10-10T19:24:00.003+01:00

Beta

2011-10-06T22:21:00.002+01:00

Nice feature on Beta over at the Montana site. Featuring a whole host of works by the man including the ridiculously insane number above. Jesus!

Silver Stuff...............

2011-10-06T09:41:00.001+01:00

Aberdeen

2011-10-06T09:39:00.001+01:00

Art school wank

2011-10-01T09:00:00.006+01:00

A video interview with Lyken from around about 1998-ish. Been sitting on this for quite a while. Look out for his explanantion of the "art school wank" and "no fucking letters" comments painted next to his piece and the interviewer trying to get to grips with graff and explain that "its a visual art form" so letters dont really matter. Think your missing the point slightly missus arent you!
Some really good stuff in here interview wise giving a snap shot of what was happening at the time, as well as a capturing some of the work from the Blackness spot. Well worth watching.

Some flix etc from New York

2011-09-27T10:03:00.009+01:00

Here mate, do you need a' o them? Gonna gee'z a can aff ye!

TUFF CITY

Tuff City train painting

Tuff City train painting

Work In Progress - Rask and TKid

Rask - Tuff City train

Sums - Tuff City train

Beta Vera Baby - Tuff City Bronx NY

5 POINTZ

rooftop spot at 5 Pointz

Pure
Vera

Sums
Rask
Beta

Thanks to Ces and TKid for hooking us up at Tuff City and to Meres for the 5Pointz spot. To the guys at Montana and ScrapYard for sorting out the paint. Most of all, massive thanks to Rask for pulling all of this together.

MSC!

2011-09-26T20:38:00.004+01:00

2011-09-22T09:56:00.001+01:00

Smog

Random flicks from the land of vinegar.

2011-09-19T12:48:00.004+01:00

Excuse the "grubby" quality flicks all stolen.

2011-09-19T12:06:00.001+01:00

5 Pointz New York

2011-09-16T16:34:00.001+01:00

Just back from a quick trip to New York. Full update coming soon.

Various!

2011-09-05T14:51:00.005+01:00

Cam One

2011-08-24T09:35:00.002+01:00

A couple from Cam One

Cam one and Gaz Mac

Electric Frog

"Not Edinburgh but related."

2011-08-23T17:59:00.003+01:00

4 years old

2011-08-19T08:02:00.007+01:00

4 years ago today I started this blog to hopefully share some of the old flicks that I had lying around the house with anyone who had an interest in old Scottish Graff. If some people dropped by then cool if not, well it wouldnt really matter. No big deal.

4 years later and hundreds of thousands of visitors from all over the world have dropped by, some contributing others just checking out a page or two.

Thanks to all that have contributed especially those who have submitted flicks, in particular the old school selections and to those who have taken on the job of being blog authors (you know who you are).

I would have hoped to have covered much more over the last 4 years but time is tight and getting tighter. Not sure if we will make it to 5 years - lets just see what happens.

Shouts to the other Scottish blogs out there

WankMagic
GraffLicks
RaisedAlarm

Oh yeah!!!

2011-08-17T12:11:00.000+01:00

Odra and Derm

Beta and Friends

2011-08-16T08:49:00.001+01:00

Braehead

2011-08-12T08:45:00.003+01:00

Soka

Bamer

Power

Someone requested these - unfortunately a bit dogged by the time they were flicked. Anyone got clean shots of these?

PS - Who is Evolve?

Taio - London

2011-08-12T08:37:00.002+01:00

Glesga!

2011-08-08T20:50:00.010+01:00

Glasgow

2011-08-08T20:43:00.004+01:00

Glasgow

2011-08-03T11:49:00.002+01:00

Spectrum Edinburgh

2011-08-02T09:52:00.005+01:00

'Spectrum' have opened a shop in Edinburgh (317 Cowgate) and have been open for just over a week.

They currently stock :

Full range of Illuminarty and some other misc cans. They will soon have a full range of Kobra, some Kobra low pressure & some transparents, Burner chrome, Coversall etc.
Markers/pens
Inks
Acrylics
Sketch books
Books/mags
Clothing
Etc

Other things they have on offer:

Gallery
Paint-able wallspace

Other things they are involved in:

Workshops
Commissioned/custom artworks & murals
Promote local/grass-roots projects - for example local designers, music producers, artists etc. If anyone wants to display work, stock products, advertise etc then they will help!

Any questions about any of the above then the guys can be contacted via email at thebiznizz@live.co.uk.

For those into Facebook they can be found under- 'Spectrum Edinburgh' & like page - 'Spectrum Arts Edinburgh'

a few from Arak PMG

2011-08-02T09:13:00.001+01:00

Doin My Own Thing

2011-07-29T10:08:00.005+01:00

BIP

Thought i had already uploaded these but cant find them anywhere. Anyways, these are from 1986. I can still remember walking round the corner and discovering the top piece and instantly noting how he had used the "S" shape to create his "B".

Beano styled bboy characters!! Its the way forward.

Dundee

2011-07-26T09:48:00.001+01:00

Shyne + Krime

Aberdeen

2011-07-22T08:47:00.002+01:00

Thanks to DLA1 for passing these on

2011-07-22T08:46:00.002+01:00

RareKind

2011-07-21T11:42:00.005+01:00

The guys at RareKind have dropped me an email about some work they have done for KFC. This, for now, is only going to be running in Scotland. RareKind would appreciate a flick of this if anyone comes across one. If you spot one can you flick it, email it through (scottishgraffiti@yahoo.com) and i will pass it on.

Cheers

Blackbook battle

2011-07-21T11:19:00.002+01:00

The summer blackbook battle has begun over on the ZAP graff blog. Judge for the event is Dead of the Infamous Last Words Crew. Word to be tackled is GEOMETRICS
Closing date is 31 August. Prize will be given for the top 5 entries. Send entries to blackbook@zapgraffiti.co.uk.

Previous battle entries and result here to give you an idea of what kind of thing you are up against

What else are you doing?

The infamous fag packet piece

2011-07-21T10:55:00.004+01:00

Flick of a piece by Ase. Just creeping into the right hand corner is the infamous "fag packet" piece by Lyken (detail below). I always thought that i had a flick of the full Lyken piece but i have never been able to find it. And no one else, including Lyken seems to have one either. Anyways, diggin around for an old flick todayto pass onto someone and found this stuck down the side of a box. Unearthed some other old school gems as well. Will get them up soon. think this must be from about 98.

Detail of Lyken piece (aka the fag packet piece by Lyken)

Old stuff!

2011-07-20T11:29:00.002+01:00

Elph and Beat

Edinburgh

2011-07-16T22:42:00.004+01:00

Glasgow

2011-07-16T22:33:00.002+01:00

MSC boys out in the sun and flowers!

2011-07-16T16:39:00.001+01:00

Odra Beta Soler

GraffLicks

2011-07-16T10:42:00.004+01:00

Interesting debate over at GraffLicks around the legal murals in Glasgow. Some interesting points being raised rather than the usual type first think later kind of stuff that usually happens with these things.

2011-07-15T08:45:00.001+01:00

Sinz ECB in Sweden

Flex dat.

2011-07-14T21:13:00.002+01:00

Maintaining a decent contribution and whatnot ;)

2011-07-13T10:01:00.000+01:00

Pure and Elph

Interview with ER from this Sundays Newspaper

2011-07-12T09:48:00.002+01:00

Vandals or artists? Those who graffiti Scotland's public spaces risk imprisonment and death

THE thrown spray-can arcs through the air, turning end over end, a flash and blur in the Glasgow gloaming.

It is caught at the top of a ladder by Akme, a graffiti writer, who uses it to apply a bold purple outline to his painting. 'Writer' is the word this tribe use to refer to themselves.

Some call them artists, others vandals. To most of us they are just names on a wall. Akme. Estum. Ejek. Vues. These tags, which together have a liturgical air, are a sort of murmured incantation, part of the ambient noise of city life.

Graffiti is everywhere in Glasgow – on rooftops and road signs, bridges and tunnels, and by the side of the railway tracks.

There is a graffiti culture in other Scottish cities, notably Dundee, as well as Edinburgh and Aberdeen, but Glasgow is the epicentre. The city is home to the Easy Riderz, Scotland's most prominent and prolific crew.

"To me," says Akme, a 30-year-old who has been on the scene for more than half his life, "graffiti is art in its purest form. It's spontaneous and you are doing it just for yourself."

Estum, who is in his early twenties, nods. "You are doing all this planning and risking jail just for five minutes' work and a photo that pure immortalises it."

Both men have criminal convictions for graffiti. "House raids are the worst," says Akme. "Cops kicking your door in at the crack of dawn. Shit like that makes me think, 'F*** them, I'm not going to stop.'"

The usual charges are vandalism and malicious mischief. From time to time, a graffiti writer is sent to prison. In 2008, a member of the Easy Riderz crew – Gary Shields, known as Daze – was given 28 months, sending shock waves through the graffiti community. He served two months in Barlinnie before the sentence was quashed and replaced by community service and a £4,000 compensation order.

Given the high stakes, graffiti writers do everything they can to avoid being caught. Some even place magnets on the bottoms of their spray-cans, holding the ball-bearings inside in place, so they do not rattle and alert police or security guards.

Naturally, they are suspicious of the media. However, a number of members of the Easy Riderz agreed to talk to Scotland On Sunday on the understanding their tags, rather than real names, would be used in print. "Anyway," says Akme, "that really is who I am. Graffiti is my life. It consumes you."

That's an interesting point. The Easy Riderz have a range of occupations – student, barman, graphic designer, tattoo artist, shop assistant, call centre worker – but those tend not to define who they are. Graffiti gives them an identity and a purpose.

Engagement with the press is, therefore, a risk they are willing to take in order to communicate to the mainstream their feelings about graffiti – their passion for it, and their belief that it is misunderstood.

To be taken into their confidence is to be shown an underground world, sometimes literally so, a hidden Glasgow beneath street level. It is to be shown The Tunnels.

The headquarters of Glasgow's graffiti scene is a network of tunnels in the south-west of the city. The Easy Riderz call The Tunnels a "hall of fame". Beneath a motorway flyover and a couple of bridges is a large area of wilderness, popular with deer, foxes, bats and young men wearing baseball caps and respirators.

Squeeze through a gap in the diamond-mesh fence, pick your way carefully down a steep slope choked with brambles and nettles, and you're there. You can't see it properly from the road; few if any of the thousands of motorists driving overhead each day realise their cars are passing over what amounts to a gigantic art gallery.

Putting aside the rights and wrongs of graffiti, this place is astonishing. Every concrete surface, each pock-marked pillar is a riot of colour.

There are dozens, perhaps hundreds of different tags, each painted in a distinctive style, originality being highly prized in graffiti culture. More striking, though, are the huge wall paintings and how these blend in with the environment down here. Bush babies stare out from behind barbed wire. Estum's weirdly luminous organic abstracts appear to have sprouted from the marshy ground.

Within one flooded tunnel, in which lurk the rusting hulks of half-submerged shopping trolleys, there is a 50-foot-long painting of a skull, a chimp and Benedict XVI, the Pope's profile reflected in the fetid water. The meaning of the piece is unclear, but it could not be more different from the scrawled FTPs and FTQs that dominate much of the graffiti seen above ground in Glasgow.

Unlike other Scottish cities and elsewhere in Europe, there is nowhere in Glasgow in which it is legal to paint in public space. Glasgow Community and Safety Services spends £1 million removing graffiti each year.

"The majority of the citizens don't like graffiti," says Darren Lambie of Glasgow Community and Safety Services.

"It is a signal crime. It brings areas down. It's a culture that we need to break down. We can't allow people to run about, putting stuff on other people's property. The same people who are doing some nice stuff with their peers are then going out, with the hood up, and doing damage."

Given the zero-tolerance approach of the city authorities, writers wishing to create complex, time-consuming work must seek out desolate spots such as The Tunnels.

They like it down there, but would rather their work was seen by large numbers of people. Rogue-One, who has painted an enormous photorealist portrait of a shaven-headed child with his hands balled into fists, says: "It's very sad for me that I have to remain underground and my work is hidden. The public walking around up there have no idea that this exists, but I am sure they would love it."

On an overcast Monday in late June, Akme, Estum and Vues have assembled at The Tunnels to paint a 'production', their term for a large colour piece, on to a triangular section of wall by the side of a bridge.

The painting consists of the tag Easy Riderz, a dragon and a woman in a short purple dress. It is slow going as they only have one ladder between them. They begin at about 3pm, first emulsioning over the graffiti that was there, and are still painting as midnight approaches, working by the lights of the motorway. The air smells of marijuana and the equally heady chemical stink of the paint.

Between hip hop tracks, it is possible to make out the hiss of the spray and the discussions between the three regarding how the picture should develop.

They work in near silence with great intensity, painting with confident flicks and flourishes of the cans. Watching them work is like listening to a jazz trio – each man filling space with improvised lines and motifs.

"I love the motion of spray-painting," says Akme. "When I've got paint going on to a wall or a train, it's a rush. It's instant satisfaction."
Vues, the oldest of the three, is in his mid-thirties. He is wearing a blue Nike T-shirt with 'Vandal' written on the front.

"If somebody was to call me a vandal I wouldn't take offence," he says. "Vandalism is part and parcel of it. It's how you start out – tagging, trying to get a bit of style and flow, until you are good enough to start doing pieces like this."

The graffiti writers are at ease in The Tunnels. It is unlikely the police will bother them here. But as Vues suggests, there is another practice within the culture – the so-called tagging or bombing, painting your name in a highly visible spot.

Three huge Akme tags on buildings in Tradeston – including one down the middle of a fire-escape, four-storeys high – are unmissable from trains pulling into Glasgow Central. "It's nice being high up above the city, away from people, in your own space," he muses. "You're like Spider-Man. You see the city in a different way from everyone else."

The more prominent the tag, and the more risk incurred by the writer in putting it there, the more respect – 'props' – he will receive from his peers. There are ethics – "No churches, no cars, no houses, no historic buildings," says Akme – but in general the idea is to paint your name where it will be seen by as many people as possible.

That is why graffiti on trains or at the side of railway tracks is so crucial. Writers risk life and liberty to paint them, usually in the middle of the night. It is rife. Between Muirend in the south of the city and Central Station, a journey that takes a quarter of an hour, there are around 300 separate pieces of trackside graffiti. The writers also break into depots in order to paint the carriages.

"These freight trains go up and down the country, and the guys love painting them," says Gary MacKay, known as GazMac, who at 42 is a sort of elder statesman of the scene, though not involved in illegal work; he undertakes private commissions and gives workshops in graffiti. "The boys are cutting through barbed-wire fences three-fold to get to these holding yards."

Estum gets a dreamy look in his eye when he talks about the trains. "There's a great atmosphere on the track at night," he says.

"It's so quiet and no one else is there. It's about wall-spots that people will see the next day and know you've gone to the effort to get there."

Akme nods. "Graffiti started in New York on the trains. So it's an ongoing tradition. It's a battle to keep that going. You don't want the big boys to win. We want to stay on top. And why not? It looks fresh, it looks good, it's our way of communicating. We're not going to just shut down."

The big boys in question are Network Rail and the British Transport Police. Network Rail in Scotland spends at least £330,000 each year on cleaning graffiti from its property. The BTP uses sophisticated methods in its attempts to catch and prosecute graffiti writers. It seeks DNA and fingerprint evidence from crime scenes, stakes out train depots and employs a graphologist to identify whether different pieces of graffiti were created by the same person using different tags.

Constable Stephen Hughes, a field intelligence officer with the British Transport Police in Scotland, maintains a database of tens of thousands of photographs of tags amassed over the five years he has been responsible for investigating graffiti crime. An amiable 42-year-old, he has studied the work so closely he is now able to make aesthetic judgments.

"I have two Banksy prints on my living-room wall," he says. "I think, personally, graffiti is good but has to be channelled in the right direction. A lot of the kids are very bright and articulate. They are not wee neds.

"You see some getting better, some dropping out of the scene, and others as young as 13, 14 coming through. This is not going to go away. We'll have the Commonwealth Games here in three years, and the eyes of the world will be upon us. Do we really want them to see a city strewn with graffiti vandalism? Ultimately, what we want is a reduction in crime, and we don't want anyone getting killed on the railway."

For Hughes, the way forward is engagement with the writers. The BTP is supporting a scheme by Mark Henderson, community safety manager at Network Rail in Scotland, which would see members of the Easy Riderz crew invited to create a mural on the side of the Cotterell Light Centre, off Scotland Street.

It faces on to the railway line and has become a graffiti hot spot as a result of its proximity to the Shields depot. The writers will also be allowed to use two adjacent walls belonging to Network Rail.

"We're hoping they will take this olive branch," says Henderson. It is a diversionary tactic. The railway authority hopes to see a marked reduction in tagging within Shields depot. If so, the plan is to roll the scheme out across Scotland, providing authorised trackside walls around Dundee, Edinburgh, Aberdeen and in the environs of Glasgow Central.

The graffiti writers seem willing to give this a go, though some have concerns that they are being asked to create pre-agreed content and will not be allowed to write their tags. More problematic is the fact that illegal tagging is an article of faith within graffiti orthodoxy.

The idea of being an urban outlaw runs deep. "I feel that I can't really identify myself as a graffiti artist if I don't paint illegally," says Estum.

While he, Akme and Vues are painting, a couple of young women walk through The Tunnels – one blonde, one dark haired.

They are 17-year-old shopgirls finished work for the day, effortlessly negotiating the marshy, uneven ground in high-heeled boots. "We're the only two female writers in Glasgow," says the petite and brassy blonde, who calls herself Wasp. "It's male-dominated, so I thought I'd prove that we can do it too."

Wasp and her friend Know have been on the scene for 18 months. "We paint in heels," she says. "It's a good way of not getting caught. If you've just done a spot and are walking through the town in trainers and a dirty tracky then there's more chance of the polis knowing what you've been doing."

What about the risk of getting hit by a train? Does that not frighten her? Wasp shrugs. "You just do it, don't you? The adrenalin overbeats the fear."

Perhaps the most remarkable aspect of The Tunnels is its longevity. This has been the place to come for more than a decade. Each wall is thick with layer upon layer of designs. It is Glasgow's Lascaux. The graffiti scene in Glasgow dates back to around 1983, emerging from the breakdancing scene which was itself inspired by the hip hop music and movies coming over from America.

"The MCs were talking about ghettos, and we associated with that," says Gary MacKay. "We were living in housing schemes that were shitholes. You could relate to the idea of kids putting their name up because they wanted to be more than a number. You were either getting into something good, like graffiti, or into something naughty. Six or seven of my mates from school became junkies."

This is, perhaps, the key point about the most prominent Glaswegian writers – they see what they are doing as a force for good, both in their own lives, and with regard to how it makes Glasgow look and feel. In their view, graffiti is anti-authoritarian and utopian, an expression of individual creativity which stands against the creeping commodification and homogenisation of society.

Just listen to Gary Shields. As Daze, he was found guilty of causing £12,000 worth of damage to railway property. Now 24 and working as a draughtsman with an engineering firm, he regrets the pain his actions and imprisonment caused his family, and is glad he was caught because it has meant he is no longer addicted to going out a breaking the law. But he does not believe what he did was morally wrong.

"No," he says. "If you didn't have graffiti, the whole city would just be covered in advertising. The people should have a say in the way our environment looks. In cities like Barcelona, graffiti is embraced and it adds a lot of colour and culture.

"Graffiti," he adds, "gives Glasgow a voice.

Rd 3!

2011-07-10T16:25:00.007+01:00

MSC

2011-07-05T19:44:00.001+01:00

2011-07-05T19:00:00.000+01:00

Fundee

2011-06-20T23:06:00.000+01:00

Paco Krime DLA1

2011-06-20T10:42:00.001+01:00

Going over - 1986 style

2011-06-18T10:17:00.004+01:00

If you have ever watched Beat Street then you will know all about Spit. Probably deserves to be dissed simply for the shocking spelling of "wariors"

1985

2011-06-18T10:13:00.001+01:00

Flick from 85. This was inside a power station. Probably not the brightest idea by the person involved.

1995

2011-06-18T10:09:00.000+01:00

Raiz

Radio Scotland - Kelburn Castle

2011-06-18T09:19:00.004+01:00

Found this kicking about on one of my old pc's. Its a piece from a show hosted by Gerard Kelly on Radio Scotland from a few years back. The chat is around the project at Kelburn Castle. Includes all the usual references to Banksy etc from the host(s) but some good balance and nice points raised by "Alex and David" makes this well worth a listen. Apologies for the dodgy cracklin and poppin quality - soundcard was playing up at the time.

Dont Panic/Channel 4 competition.

2011-06-17T09:46:00.000+01:00

Street artists, writers and vandals join Channel 4’s Street Summer here! Enter your work to win!

http://www.dontpaniconline.com/street_summer/

Don’t Panic is running a design competition on the Don’t Panic site for all budding designers, graffiti and street artists to come up with a creative design. The winners of the competition will have their design used as an advertisement for Channel 4’s Street Summer schedule of programming, as well as having their design printed on postcards and the Don’t Panic Poster to be distributed around the UK.

The focus of the competition is to find new talent to help promote Street Summer across the UK in the only way which makes sense; using the competition winners’ designs as massive outdoor advertisements.

The winning entries need to represent one of the five elements of street culture which the Street Summer season is featuring: street dance, urban sports, spoken word, hip hop and street art.

Entrants will represent their region and the winning piece for each region will appear in a major city from their part of the UK.

The 7 competition regions are:

London

South East

South West

Midlands and East

Wales

North

Scotland

Prizes include:

- Winning entrants will be paid £300 for the use of their artwork

- Winners will have their design displayed on a premium outdoor space for two weeks (04^th August to 18th August)

- Winners will get the opportunity to work with an established street artist from their region of the UK

- Winners’ work will feature on the Don’t Panic Poster and on postcards which will be distributed across the UK in Don’t Panic Packs

- Winners will be featured in a short film about their work

The competition will run from 13th June to 17th July. Voting will run from 01^st July to 17th July.

Check out: http://www.dontpaniconline.com/street_summer/ for more details!

Cam One

2011-06-09T10:26:00.001+01:00

Glasgow

2011-06-04T23:04:00.003+01:00

Beta

2011-06-02T21:11:00.000+01:00

Beta and tea 1

Glasgow

2011-06-02T21:09:00.002+01:00

Hare

2011-05-29T23:33:00.000+01:00

MSC livi skate park 2005

2011-05-27T08:47:00.000+01:00

Mie

Elph

Mie and Sole

Loanhead pt2

2011-05-26T09:20:00.005+01:00

Shyne

Vera

Krime

DLA1

Paco

Odra

Vera

Baby

Sole

glasgow

2011-05-22T09:49:00.006+01:00

Power

Loanhead

2011-05-22T09:49:00.005+01:00

Esko

Korea

Sigh

VIT B12

Never

Oldies from Beta - Edinburgh

2011-05-20T20:47:00.004+01:00

A few oldies that Beta is featuring on his blog along with a massive amount of his other work. Check out his blog here

Found on the net......

2011-05-20T12:43:00.003+01:00

I reckon that these are late 80's to early nineties going on the style, colour schemes and do da's.

oldies

2011-05-19T10:57:00.003+01:00

Estm

Sole

Pube and Bosk

Chunky and funky!

2011-05-18T11:31:00.000+01:00

Graffiti Burners by Bjorn Almqvist

2011-05-17T09:40:00.004+01:00

Graffiti Burners by Bjorn Almqvist (Dokument Press)

Burners. Is it a word that is still commonly used within graffiti nowdays? What is a Burner? Its a good question. By bring togther 100+ artists and asking them to provide a flick of their favourite piece and explain what they feel makes a burner, the author Bjorn Almqvist tries to find out. And what we get, and for me this is where genius of this book lies, is over 100+ differing answers. Some of these are quite insightful; “Forget about theme, forget about combinated colours with your partners – its bullshit!” says Func'88. Whilst others are a bit more tounge in cheek; “Have a good breakfast” states Stray. Some of the artists take you through the making of their piece and what their thought process was behind their burner. All of which makes for an interesting addition to the works featured and should maybe even make yourself question what you think makes a burner.

This book has it all, an excellent introduction bringing back so many memories of seeking out graff, page after page of top pieces and some real insights from the various writers featured. But personally, the best thing about this is the fact that it clearly shows that there isnt a set formula for a burner. Each writer gives their own take on what a burner is. A burner “is subjective and not clearly defined”. What is a burner to me isnt necessarily are burner to you. And that is why the content of this book is so varied.

This book as the title suggests doesnt feature 2 minute silvers etc. However it is jammed packed with top end graff from around the world. If you are into style and burners, dont even think about it just buy it. Its that good.

Oldie!!

2011-05-14T11:50:00.003+01:00

Ke by Mie 1

Beta

2011-05-14T11:50:00.001+01:00

Looking for something to do on Sunday?

2011-05-11T10:08:00.003+01:00

Elph - Exhibition closing and artist talk

On the 15th of May, Elph's latest exhibition One One Three Three at Recoat Gallery comes to an end. To mark the occasion Recoat are holding a closing party from 3-5pm. Elph will be in the gallery mingling with the punters and releasing a new limited edition screen print and the 2nd in his series of "Sketchbook" zines - pass him a beer and he may sign one for you. The plan is for him to deliver a short artist's talk at 4pm.

Burgh...

2011-05-08T19:29:00.001+01:00

Chrome and Black (and blues and reds and orange etc)

2011-05-04T10:17:00.002+01:00