Street art as a megaphone

Street art is a visual megaphone for ideas, thoughts, commentary and information. While artists have always acted as a mirror to society’s big questions, what makes this art form unique is that it is a voice in public space.

It is also a medium that can work in ‘real time.’ For example, a piece by Australian artist, Scott Marsh, appeared in Chippendale Sydney recently. This artwork is a response to how the Australian government handled the devastating bushfires of 2019/2020.

This artwork catches the audience’s attention both with its visual impact, but also by asking us to contemplate and reflect about the events – not just the devastation caused but the power structures that has made climate change policy inaction a dimension of Australian political life. Marsh’s work asks us to begin conversations about conservation, prevention and assistance to those who need help. In this painting it creates a voice for those victims that may have been forgotten.

We can compare the way street art captures audience attention from the way an audience interacts with an artwork in a traditional gallery setting. Entering a museum space – you see what is presented to you on the walls:  curated information and context and specified a way to be guided through the museum, creating ‘docile spectators’ (Flessas & Maulchay 2018). In contrast, artworks that break the traditional space of the gallery setting allow artists to create works that are guided by their own intentions and thoughts.

Street art is raw, exposed and, ‘in your face’.

The audience is captured in the moment they confront the artwork, creating a disruption of thought. A moment that awakens the audience out of their daily rituals to reflect on what they are viewing and associated subject matter.

It is this moment of disruption that drives my research.

The threshold

Such an instant is described by German Philosopher, Martin Heidegger (1927), as a ‘threshold moment’. A moment that breaks the audience’s train of thought and re-directs what they were thinking – this is the disruption that fascinates me.

It is through these disruptions that street art creates conversations between the audience, artwork and the artist. Art in the everyday permits people to break from their everyday lives and embrace the way that artists create art as a mirror of our consciousness (Arvanitakis & Beattie 2019).

These conversations that occur in the urban landscape are reverberated through social media (MacDowall & De Souza 2018). Posting images on social media, sharing and liking the artists posts, embedded this disruption within the virtual world and continuing a conversation that was once non-existent.

However, context is missed when there is no information available for the audience to delve into. What if there was information available to convey what the artist is trying to say? Would this change the experience of street art? and how can we use this artform to provide information to the audiences past social media interactions?

Would the disruption linger and change conversations? This is what my research aims to do!

Covid-19 and street art

Covid-19 has challenged us all. Not only the way we live our lives but has placed the focus on many people we take for granted: the delivery drivers, nurses, doctors, essential service workers and teachers.

Across the world, street artists are demanding audiences pay attention to such facts. They are employing their artwork to thank those who are providing relief and care during this pandemic and commentate on the way society is dealing with this crisis.

This reflection on society and how art can be used as a tool to engage audiences to view the world differently.

These street art examples highlight how artists use their media in the urban landscape to thank and support these workers. However, is there an underlying message and how can we get to the hidden information if there is nothing provided?

Street art is being shared across Instagram through the use of tags including #covidstreetart #covid19streetart. Whilst these artworks thank the workers who have been at the forefront on the pandemic – there are social issues that are coming through these works.

Artists such as Giovanni Ranaldo and Austin Zucchini-Fowler have depicted the medical staff as superheroes and fighters: the people on the front lines of the pandemic battles risking their lives to help stop Covid-19. Whilst the messages of these artworks are self-explanatory, it is also a recognition that for far too long our society has taken these workers for granted. Having these works in the urban landscape will create a moment where people will stop and reflect on how we should appreciate such people in our society.

Other artists have such as The Rebel Bear and Jérémy Syro have created works that look at the impact on society that Covid-19 is having.

The Rebel Bear created an image of ‘Covid-19’ as a ball and chain (see image above) depicting how society is struggling during this crisis. People are feeling like they are weighed down by the virus restricting them of their daily lives.

Jérémy Syro who has replicated an image form the film Indian Jones displaying the importance of the toilet paper (in the film it was a gold statue). This is satirical image of the panic buying that occurred during the early stages of the pandemic.

As noted, social media has seen these ephemeral artworks embedded in the digital world, allowing us to access these pieces from across continents. Allowing street art to cross multiply countries in the matter of seconds – something that formal museums and galleries have learnt to use and engage audiences with as a result of the lockdown. This is an innovation in the way we view art – but one that street artists have relied on for years.

We are living in a unique time and street artists have found multiply ways to reflect this. My research aims to capture this and the unique prospective they bring.

References

Arvanitakis, J., & Beattie, A. (2019). Power, politics and art. Open Forum. Retrieved from https://www.openforum.com.au/power-politics-and-art-in-bondi/

Flessas, T., & Mulcahy, L. (2018). Limiting Law: Art in the Street and Street in the Art. Law, Culture and the Humanities, 14(2), 219-241. doi:10.1177/1743872115625951.

Heidegger, M. (1927). Being and time, trans. J Macquarrie & E Robinson. New York, Harper & Row.

Macdowall, L., & de Souza, P. (2018). ‘I’d Double Tap That!!’: Street art, graffiti, and Instagram research. Media, Culture & Society, 40(1), 3-22. doi:10.1177/0163443717703793