User:OrchardBreeze/sandbox

Ideas for P2

 * Add to summary section of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Evenings
 * The Book of One Man Dead
 * The Book of the Gods
 * Create background section in Ancient Evenings from A Double Life source
 * Look for opportunities in A Double Life to add to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marilyn:_A_Biography
 * Review early history content deleted from FOG to consider for https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graffiti_in_New_York_City
 * Link to FOG from other articles
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graffiti_in_New_York_City
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Mailer

Ideas for The Faith of Graffiti

 * List of graffiti artist
 * Mapped locations mentioned in FOG, i.e., 106th Street
 * Definitions of terms
 * "hit"

Mailer's state-of-mind
1973

1974

Hit
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Hit
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Hit
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Hit
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Hit
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Hit
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Hit
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Hit
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Map plots



 * Elaine's Restaurant
 * Junior's parent apartment where interview took place between I-A, CAY 161, JUNIOR 161, etc.

Analysis section to add
Cultural criticism and an old Jewish grandmother joke

True to the task of a journalist, A-I includes both supportive and opposing aesthetic views. A-I’s interview with NYC Mayor Lindsay shapes much of the opposing aesthetic of graffiti in FOG. The interview takes place at Gracie Mansion, two weeks before Lindsay leaves office at the end of an eight-year run. According to A-I, Lindsay is hungover that Saturday morning, after celebrating into the early morning hours. (146)

A-I begins with Lindsay’s background as a champion of rights for residents of Bedford-Stuyvesant, Harlem and the South Bronx and offers, as an example, Lindsay’s engagement in and support of the community during the 1971 and 1972 summer riots. (148, 150)

Lindsay also worked closely with real estate developers, building offices and high-rise apartments to uplift ghetto communities. A-I termed the uplift, instead, as “desecration,” stating that “Lindsay had bought ghetto relief at the price of aesthetic stultification”. (148)

According to A-I, ghetto residents like CAY 161 re-established their presence among the nondescript and monotone high-rise structures. CAY 161 and his peers did the same to color the new air-conditioned subway cars. Lindsay and his administration, however, objected with name-calling: “insecure cowards” and “dirty pigs.” (149)

Lindsay was offended by the defacement, feeling betrayed for his accomplishments, while A-I claimed the subway art “brighten[ed] the place like a big bouquet from Latin America”. (149)

Lindsay’s “accomplished” high-rises and gray air-conditioned public transport – stating his sense of pride and ownership – subjugated vibrant ghetto life and communities. CAY 161 and his peers claimed it back and continued to do so in the face of Lindsay’s public perception of defacement and depression. (150)

Lindsay responded to NYC’s growing violence by erecting 40-story walls, CAY 161 and his peers colored Lindsay’s monotone structures, and A-I responded with The Faith of Graffiti. (151)

In the first pages of FOG, A-I established his goal to elevate the graffiti as art, in part, by including an old Jewish grandmother joke. The joke elevates a child’s photo over that of seeing the same child in person – in other words, a book of photographs over the original. Graffiti photos in FOG elevate the work as creative and courageous, unlike the passerby’s perceptions of the originals. (135) Dr. Bill Benzon calls Mailer’s essay “cultural criticism at its best” in his close reading about the joke.

A-I explains the public perception of graffiti as indistinguishable between the “pure old-fashioned piece of smut graffiti” written on the bathroom wall of a York Avenue bar (a street one block west of East End Avenue of Gracie Mansion’s address) (Google maps) and the artistic stylized names of CAY 161 and his peers. Both equally viewed as “obscene”, Lindsay’s public conflates CAY 161’s and his peers’ actions as “madness, instability, and horror”. (151)

A-I believed graffiti had its “virtues” and “bad architecture was as poisonous as bad food”. (152) For graffiti artists – powerless and confined behind “civilized” A/C transports and 40-story barriers erected to contain the ghetto – seeing their larger-than-life signatures (egotistical “hits”) traverse boundaries across the city established a human presence that could not be overlooked. (157)

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Gracie+Mansion+Conservancy/@40.7760767,-73.9452279,17z/data=!4m12!1m6!3m5!1s0x89c258b73e743f93:0xe0d98de15d0f86a8!2sGracie+Mansion+Conservancy!8m2!3d40.7760727!4d-73.9430392!3m4!1s0x89c258b73e743f93:0xe0d98de15d0f86a8!8m2!3d40.7760727!4d-73.9430392

http://new-savanna.blogspot.com/2010/09/fog2-close-reading-of-old-joke.html

Graffiti style and writers from FOG
Graffiti style and writers from FOG

Graffiti style and brief history FOG captures a snapshot of graffiti’s purpose, its writers and artistic style during the late 1960s and early 1970s. Eric “DEAL CIA” Felisbret, former NYC graffiti writer and published expert, states that writers marking an object with their name constitutes a territorial goal toward notoriety that should not be confused with gang-related warnings or drug-related claims to a street corner. Writers select their signatures using their name or an alias, often appending it with the street number where they live or a number indicating order of claim, such as “one”, “1” or Roman numeral “I” to indicate the first use of the name. Jack Stewart — teacher, painter, muralist, art historian and photographer — befriended and interviewed CAY 161 and JUNIOR 161 – graffiti writers from FOG – as part of his doctoral thesis. Stewart offers insight and background of the graffiti writers from FOG.

CAY 161 and his peers began graffiti writing in the summer of 1969, quit in late 1972, and differ from the murals and bubble lettering seen today. Volume and fame, not aesthetics, was the goal and subway cars the most competitive carrying a writer’s name throughout the city. Writers climbed fences and searched dark tunnels for off-hours, parked subway cars to reduce the risk of discovery. Stationary cars also created opportunities to improve their craft with taller lettering, even “top-to-bottom” letter height that stood out among competitors.

Additional innovations and creativity became increasingly important due to the rising number of practicing graffiti writers. Some influences included the human experience and comic books, but especially each other. As the need to stand out increased, so followed a more focused aesthetic effort.

Straight lettering or all caps were adopted by many like Cay and Junior for legibility. Letter width ranged from skinny, to wide, to chiseled, to ornate. Evolving alterations to their signatures reflected the characteristics of the work they saw and respected of others.

Early graffiti writers used felt-tipped markers of varied colors and tip widths ranging from ¼ inch to 1 ½ inches. Larger projects required wider tips, refillable markers, and increased skills to manipulate and produce respectable tags. Brands included Magic Marker, Pilot, Magnum 44, Niji, and Marvy. (111) Some used aerosol spray paint and favored brands such as Rust-Oleum, Krylon, and Red Devil for their coverage and vibrant colors. Writers also replaced standard spray paint caps with fat caps or skinny caps from other products to vary their art form and control.

Three featured FOG graffiti writers

CAY 161 aka THE PRAYER 161:
 * Interviewed by A-I in apartment on West 161st Street, Washington Heights
 * Preferred red markers
 * All caps, nearly square lettering
 * Later adopted a crown at the top of his signature indicating him as “regal” or a “king” in his craft
 * Accomplished writer achieving letter height from “top-to-bottom” of subway cars

JAPAN I:
 * Interviewed by A-I and Jon Naar in subway station at 158th and St. Nicholas Avenue
 * Used aerosol spray paint
 * Accomplished writer achieving letter height from “top-to-bottom” of subway cars

JUNIOR 161:
 * Interviewed by A-I in apartment on West 161st Street, Washington Heights
 * Favored blue or black markers
 * All caps, squared-letter tag
 * Distinguishing signature element made famous: stylized “J” resembling the aligned vertical lines of a capital “T” and mirrored lowercase “h”
 * Accomplished writer achieving letter height from “top-to-bottom” of subway cars
 * Six-foot high lettered masterpiece on IRT number 1 line tunnel between 116th Street and 124th Street

Glossary

“Bombing” is the practice of volume tagging to collect as many hits as possible; quantity over quality is the goal.

“Class” from JAPAN I’s statement, “I would still get the class”, signifies graffiti admired or copied by others.

A “graffiti writer” or “writer” is one who practices the art of graffiti writing.

“Hit” references both a signature or the action to write a signature.

“Inventing” is stealing paint.

“Kill” describes an excessive number of tags covering an entire surface or the name of another writer.

“Masterpiece” references a single signature covering a large surface.

“Tag” or “tagging” to write or reference a signature.

“Top-to-bottom" or "T-to-B” is a signature height that extends from the top to the bottom of a subway car.