Reverse Graffiti
The environmental movement has brought about many advances in how we operate as a society creating a higher awareness of how our actions impact the world around us. This “Green” movement has even affected the way some artists think and choose to take their art to the streets.
Graffiti has long been a form of expression for both street artists and political activists both, but unfortunately it most often has come at the cost of defacing property and/or causing more harm to the environment. Reverse Graffiti, or Grime Writing, on the other hand takes the opposite approach of cleaning up parts of our already dirty society to create art, as well as an awareness of how dirty the world around us really is.
The use of Reverse Graffiti has been growing in popularity and used by many large companies such as IBM, Starbucks, Puma and Audi due to the fact that it is most often placed in highly visible urban areas and is considered an environmentally safe form of advertisement.
One artist who has been a front runner in the Reverse Graffiti movement is a man by the name of Paul “Moose” Curtis. Moose excels at the art of cleaning, spraying away dirt with his pressure washer to reveal a clean surface, and leaving behind his magnificent stenciled “Green” art. He takes great care to keep his work as “Green” as possible by creating his stencils out of scrap wood and collecting rain water to use for the pressure washing.
And although Moose is a front runner he’s not the only one cleaning up with his art. Alexandre Orion from Sao Paulo, Brazil also has gained a reputation for his for his thought provoking “Green” art. In one soot covered tunnel in particular Orion scraped away layers of grime leaving a myriad of clean skulls behind showing us the unfortunate truth of just how overlooked and accepted our own pollution is.
Below are several videos and images from different artists, including Moose and Alexandre Orion, who have taken their art to the streets in an effort to clean up the world. I hope you find their work to be as inspiring as I have and maybe take the time to enjoy creating a green work of your own!
:: Paul “Moose” Curtis
Reverse Graffiti - Moose
Reverse Graffiti SF - Moose
Reverse Graffiti SF - Moose
Reverse Graffiti SF - Moose
:: Alexandre Orion
Sao Paulo Tunnel - Alexandre Orion
Sao Paulo Tunnel - Alexandre Orion
:: IBM Reverse Graffiti Campaign
:: Misc. Reverse Graffiti
Reverse Graffiti - Puma
Reverse Graffiti - IBM
Reverse Graffiti - Audi
Reverse Graffiti - Starbucks
Reverse Graffiti - Discovery
Reverse Graffiti - Caltex
Reverse Graffiti - tatetracks.org.uk
Reverse Graffiti - hype
Reverse Graffiti - Thank You For Not Breeding
Reverse Graffiti - Dominos
Reverse Graffiti Resources
*A special thanks to my brother, Jason Kapzynski, for supplying the resources for this awesome inspiration!
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Thanks for the article. Inspiring. I do think think, however, that saying this type of advertising/art is actually “cleaning up our dirty society” is a bit ridiculous. A “reverse-graffiti” stencil may clean grime off a sidewalk in order to make a reverse impression… but it’s still leaving an IMAGE behind, which is actually more visual clutter then where we left off. Would it be better to have our sidewalks 50% cleaner by means of reverse logos / tags on every square inch of them? I doubt it. Technically you are cleaning away dirt, but the end result is not necessarily an improvement, just more stuff to look at, which isn’t necessarily a good thing.
Great site. A lot of useful information here. I’m sending it to some friends!