Garbage bins, high-rise apartment buildings, narrow streets, broken sidewalks, car horns, laundromats, ruins… and yet, this suffocating big-city environment provides the setting for an endless open-air gallery: Graffiti is now officially an integral part of modern city life, while more and more graffiti work is exhibited in renowned museums around the world or showcased at high-edge art galleries, making graffiti a highly profitable investment within the global art market.
Unlike other forms of street art, the acceptance of the cultural value of graffiti has created a romantic myth that attracts art lovers, turning graffiti-making into a legitimate professional art practice allowing graffiti practitioners to turn their hobby into a viable career. Which, of course, results in the subversive dimension of graffiti being called into question.
So does graffiti belong in museums and galleries, after all?
Produced and presented by Ariadni Sofia-Kouri