Pitzer College Professor Susan PhillipsRecently, the Metro Spirit published an article on graffiti and how we should accept it as an art form. Susan Phillips, Professor of Urban Studies at Pitzer was quoted saying:
“Graffiti is the biggest art movement in the history of humankind.” Not only is it the biggest, but it is also the first. Cavemen drew on walls to convey stories of battles and keep records of history."'We're taking it'? That's called stealing, more specifically -- vandalizing property. Perhaps if Pitzer had a few more courses on respecting private property, they would distinguish between vandalism and protesting. Dying the fountain red was unacceptable and punishable, regardless of its symbolism, message, or artistic beauty (most of the beauty is lost in the interim between two marijuana cigarettes, yes?)Kids who can’t afford an education in the fine arts take it upon themselves to display their works downtown or on a freight train. One “writer” is quoted as saying, “We’re not asking for the space, we’re taking it.”
(UPDATE: Typo fixed. Courtesy: Amy Jasper)
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8 comments:
Susan Philips, Professor of Urban Studies (whatever that is) is a complete horse's ass! Granted cavemen painted on walls, but , Duh! we had no written language. Granted artists like Hieronymus Bosch in the 1500s, painted (on canvas by the way) pigs in nun garb protesting the treatment of the people by Catholic Church, but comparing these rattle-can carrying, ass-crack showing punks to fine-artists of the past shows how out of touch this Pitzer Prof is on a subject she teaches. "Tagging" is much the same as a dog "marking" his territory. No more, no less and as offensive to those who live there.
If she is referring to some of the Latino muralist who paint some awesome murals (with permission from owner) ,I'll give her that they are some gifted artists. FYI- that's not graffiti. graffiti: writing or drawings scribbled, scratched, or sprayed illicitly on a wall or other surface in a public place.
Susan, I'm sure you grew up in an area where part of your daily chores WASN"T using lacquer thinner to scrub off these "animal markings" from your yard. Perhaps you should venture out of academia to South Central and ask those residents how much they like the "art." Susan- you are soooo hip!
el_Guapo
Goddamn those kids and their hippity hop and their mareehuana cigarettes.
Get the hell off my lawn.
Aditya is secretly 218 years old.
This post is unintelligible. A main point of the article is to advocate for more public art space. (You know, like the Pitzer College murals, or the Pomona College Walker Wall?) The tag line of the article is “Graffiti wouldn’t have to be criminal if the community created a place for wall artists to display their works”. Further, the article mentions that, “What a lot of people don’t realize is that “graffiti” isn’t necessarily a crime, even though vandalism and destruction of property is.”
But even more interesting than the Metro Spirit’s article is the Claremont Conservative’s treatment of it:
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The Claremont Conservative: “Susan Phillips, Professor of Urban Studies at Pitzer was quoted saying: “Graffiti is the biggest art movement in the history of humankind.” Not only is it the biggest, but it is also the first. Cavemen drew on walls to convey stories of battles and keep records of history. Kids who can’t afford an education in the fine arts take it upon themselves to display their works downtown or on a freight train. One “writer” is quoted as saying, “We’re not asking for the space, we’re taking it.””
The average high school journalism teacher: Hold on!!! In the actual article, (http://www.metrospirit.com/index.php?cat=1211101074307265&ShowArticle_ID=11022309083941132) Professor Phillips’ quotation ends at the word ‘humankind’. This blog misattributes the entire last half of the quotation to Professor Phillips. Oopsies!
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The Claremont Conservative: “'We're taking it'? That's called stealing, more specifically -- vandalizing property.”
A middling 1L: Vandalism is not a specific type of stealing. It is a type of destruction of property.
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The Claremont Conservative: “Perhaps if Pitzer had a few more courses on respecting private property, they would distinguish between vandalism and protesting.”
Me: To my knowledge Pitzer currently has zero courses in "respecting private property". I hope the number stays zero. How many CMC classes are offered on this fascinating subject? What’s on the syllabus?
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The Claremont Conservative:
--”Dying the fountain red was unacceptable and punishable, regardless of its symbolism, message, or artistic beauty (most of the beauty is lost in the interim between two marijuana cigarettes, yes?)”
A Pitzer student: Pitzer College did not dye the fountain red. Individual protestors did. If CMC had punished them, the protesters would have accepted it like adults. Now I wonder why CMC didn’t try to punish them? Maybe because adding red dye to a fountain just isn’t that noteworthy in comparison to orchestrating the most destructive presidential administration in modern history? Or maybe CMC administrators got the message?
Me: The fountain was not dyed because protestors like the color red. That’s obvious.
My high school English teacher: The word “interim” refers to time, not space.
The average college student: You don’t smoke, do you?
So: a Pitzer professor is quoted advocating the analysis of graffiti as a reflection of the people who created it (in a newspaper in Georgia, no less), and this blog takes that to mean she advocates vandalism? That all of Pitzer advocates vandalism? That spray paint is real bad? Is reinforcing petty 5C stereotypes really that much fun for you? Your intentional twisting of quotations and facts is malicious and shameful.
Public art space? lulz. guapo, I agree with you. What the heck is Urban Studies?
and I don't think Vandals mess stuff up because of art. They deface property because they deface property.
Amy,
Stealing, like vandalism, violates property rights. While vandalism is certainly different from theft, it is legally grouped with theft and other forms of property damage.
Actually if you ever take an Econ class at CMC (and I believe some Gov classes -- Gov 80 for example), you would study the importance of property and the effect of introducing property rights into an economic system. So yes, CMC does study property rights and examines their importance in various fields -- economics, government and philosophy. We also study systems that lack any form of ownership and the chaotic result of that system.
I never implied that Pitzer's administration dyed the fountain red.
CMC invited Rove because we invite accomplished, successful and interesting speakers, regardless of their politics. We can sit and listen to someone we disagree with and ask a question to challenge them. There's no urge to arrest them because they're not humanitarian or don't like puppies.
But you are right about the administration. Unlike Stark and Benson, Gann failed to stop the vandals. If you study the history of CMC, you would find that former President Benson and Stark would have none of it. They stood up to the radicals that threatened to firebomb the campus because they opposed an ROTC program on campus:
'Many of these views were expressed as "non-negotiable demands" backed up by threats of violence. Jeering mobs of Harvard and Columbia students and armed gangs of Cornell students occupied their respective administration buildings for several days. Student militants from the other Claremont Colleges "liberated" the ROTC unit at CMC, camping out, ripping telephones out of the wall, turning desks upside down, scrawling obscenities on the wall. A year earlier a crowd of 400 demonstrators had tried to shut down a drill. CMC's Story House fire, supposedly caused by a hot radiator pipe, was one of 25 fires and three bombs which went off on the Claremont campuses. The Story House fire itself took place six days after a black militant from Pomona, demanding the endorsement of ethnic quotas and black studies courses, had asked the CMC faculty, "Do you want this campus burned down this summer or next summer?" Scripps President and Claremont Provost Mark Curtis was hauled out of his office to answer to an angry crowd of students and faculty. Anonymous phone callers inquired by what route his children went to school. One of the bombs maimed and partially blinded Mary Anne Keatley, wife of Robert Keatley, a CMC football player. Robert is now advisor to the City of Boulder, Colorado on the JonBenet Ramsey case. The militant spokesman later cautioned that he had only been speaking rhetorically.'
'Despite CMC's situational weaknesses in dealing with Liberations (or was it because of them?) both Benson and Stark found ways to work around them. In the fall of 1968, when a mass demonstration to shut down an ROTC drill was in the offing, old soldier Benson had a fence built around the drill field and prepared warnings for the demonstrators that they were trespassing on CMC property and would be subject to criminal prosecution. Photographers would be on hand, ready to record each infraction for referral to the prosecutor. But Benson was as cautious and consultative as he was resolute. He asked Ward Elliott, a young political scientist freshly arrived from demonstration-torn Harvard, and an ROTC sympathizer, what he thought of his preparations. Elliott had been a lawyer and, as a tutor at one of the Harvard Houses, a veteran of the Dow Chemical sit-in at Harvard. He thought that prosecuting the demonstrators was too clumsy and punitive an opener, and he found that Benson was willing to try a softer approach -- once. "They are making a mistake attacking students," said Elliott. "Let me talk to the cadets and see if we can't come up with something a little more subtle than hauling the demonstrators into court." '
Also,
Thank you for pointing out the typo. I've updated the original posts.
"That's called stealing, more specifically"
--Aditya Bindal
"While vandalism is certainly different from theft"
--Aditya Bindal, later that day.
In any event, implying that art and vandalism are somehow mutually exclusive is short-sighted. If Michelangelo (the artist, not the turtle. Although I suppose the same rules apply) painted a mural all over your house without asking, it would be BOTH vandalism and art.
"they would distinguish between vandalism and protesting"
Vandalism can certainly be a form of protest. Whether it's a legal or even an effective one is a different issue, but to say that they're entirely distinct is wrong.
I can only conclude that you wrote this post under the influence of two marijuana cigarettes.
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