by G. M. R.
While most people today in America might not mention stencils when discussing graffiti, the rise of unsanctioned public stencil artwork correlates with the rise of graffiti in the 1970s. Cities like Baltimore, Maryland, New York, London, and Paris became the new centers for public artwork, and it is no coincidence that graffiti blossomed in age of political and social strife (Howze). In the 1980s and 90s, graffiti became associated with hip-hop culture, especially in connection with music. The most popularized form of graffiti was “tagging,” or insignia done free-hand with spray paint. Stencils were virtually left out of this popularized graffiti, and this exclusion allowed stencil artists to remain anonymous and outside of the public’s outcry against graffiti as vandalism: “street stenciling has less in common with other graffiti, being more akin to the samizdat tradition of poster and sticker propaganda…while maintaining its low-tech immediacy and independence,” (Western Cell Division, 2). Unlike a scrawled nickname in sharpie, stencils could be beautiful, funny, clever, or just plain invisible to the average person who didn’t know to look. (This isn’t to ignore the obvious artistry of tags, just an exploration into the reasons why stencils have been almost overlooked). Many businesses use stencils for their logos or on buildings, and stencil artists can carefully use this authoritative form to create works of art and protest. Today, the stencil remains an avenue of protest for anonymous, usually individual artists, although popular figures like Banksy complicate and elaborate on what it means to be an anonymous stencil artist who sells in museum art shows. Today, the medium of a stencil has entered into a new historical arena, one that operates within the dominant cultural hierarchy. Yet even in a small college town like Eugene, Oregon, the stencil serves as an ant-war protest within artistic images. The stencil’s clean aesthetics allow artists to “blend in” with everyday corporate insignia, to “hide in the light,” thus giving the stencil the ability to appropriate and offer social and political protest.
Why would an artist choose the means of a stencil over anything else? “Being a simple form of printing,” Peter Walsh explains in his essay “Mapping Social and Cultural Space: The Ramifications of the Street Stencil,” “stencils, and the cutting of a template, allow for the theoretically endless mechanical reproduction of an image and/or text” ( 2). Once the stencil is made, all an artist needs is paint, and it can be used over and over again. Spray paint provides a quick-drying, easy-to-carry solution when creating unsanctioned art in public spaces. Although the stencil may resonate with a “mechanical” sense in today’s society, it resonates deeply in human history as a means of art. Russel Howze discusses the stencil’s history as an art form in “Stencil Art: A Revolutionary Meme”: “At least 5,000 years ago, the Aboriginal peoples of Australia stenciled hands, boomerangs, and tomahawks onto rock faces by blowing colored ochre with their mouths” (1). While we may not completely understand the meaning of these hands, we can find examples of this behavior in our own culture, because every city has sidewalks with handprints in them. Stencils made of dried banana leaves were used to decorate cloth with Buddha’s image in Asia, (ibid). The qualities of the stencil, including the templates’ ability to be replicated, have kept human beings using this art form for centuries. In the past few decades, “the art form redefined itself,” and stencils became a unique form of social awareness in an urbanized landscape.
In the pressures of a consumerist American society, the stencil gives an artist the ability to appropriate part of the landscape, a landscape they most likely live in. Western Cell Division discusses the stencil in “Graphics and Ethnographics: An Incomprehensive Survey of Stencil Activism in Baltimore and Beyond”: “With the most rudimentary technology one can one can achieve a clean, hardedged graphic quality as user-friendly and “authoritative” as advertising copy” (2). With materials you can buy at any crafts store, an artist can create something truly artistic and subversive that can be replicated all over a city. While other forms of graffiti are quickly labeled by an audience as vandalism, “stenciling, by its graphic quality as well as its serial reproducibility, offers a perceived authority through anonymity comparable to the images of “official” culture,” (ibid). It is through this perceived authority that stencils have a unique ability to appropriate and create discourse in an urban consumerist world. The stencil has been associated with the cultural revolution of the 60s and 70s because its accessibility and simplicity allow it to do what other art cannot:
Stencil art belongs to the artist that doesn’t have a big budget of a larger organization or the more advanced skills that screen printers, graffiti artists, and muralists need. Unlike fine art, stencils live indoors or out, easily making the transition from canvas, paper, or metal to a factory wall or concrete sidewalk. It is art for the people, accessible by anybody with a thick piece of paper, a pencil, a sharp knife, an idea, some spray paint, and time for practice. (Howze, 2-3)
Stencils as “art for the people” give their artists the ability to start new dialogues for political and social change. In a crowded urban environment where cultures and ideas intersect, in essence a liminal space, the stencil is an easy means to say what you want to say and repeat it in multiple places relatively quickly. Perhaps the most important thing about stencils to study, then, is this trend of social and political commentary.
Peter Walsh calls stencils “beautiful little booby traps lying in wait, aesthetic gifts left behind as urban folk art, simultaneously revealing and concealing their purposes” (1-2). In the liberal college town of Eugene, Oregon, these beautiful booby-traps are found on sidewalks, PO boxes, and sides of buildings, visibly “hidden” in strategic areas around the University of Oregon and downtown. Excluding the exception of an alleyway between two art co-ops, the stencils in Eugene are found overwhelmingly on the streets and not in the alleyways. This placement suggests the artists of these stencils intend their artwork to be seen and discussed. Anti-war symbols abound; a monkey holding a gun and dressed like a soldier, cartoon representations of President Bush and Dick Cheney, and an artful Palestinian woman’s face, to mention a few. One stencil found on sidewalks had a swastika, cross, and dollar sign underneath “FIGHT FASCISM,” reflecting the community’s strong anti-consumerist discourse. Phil Knight, the CEO of Nike, is an alumni of the U of O, and a particularly clever stencil excorporating Nike’s logo is found around town: “Just Give Up.” These stencils all display an element of artistry and an attempt to criticize political and social conditions in the community and the world at large. Critiques of the war in Iraq provide an interesting way of informing or starting conversations, even if the viewer disagrees with the overall message. The Palestinian woman is an example of impeccable artistry and a socio-political message beautifully intertwined. Her expression is calm and warm, providing recognition of a marginalized voice in American society while inviting the viewer to connect with her, and humanize the “other.” While these stencils reflect the dominant social critique of the University of Oregon, they provide insight into the way stencil art is used to protest the current political environment.
While the stencil usually provides an artist with anonymity and complete distance from their work, the UK’s Banksy complicates this dynamic. Banksy’s work started appearing around Bristol in 1993, and recently has been featured in museum exhibits (not including the ones Banksy intentionally places his artwork in). Even Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have bought a few Banksy pieces, (Collins). Banksy has created a new frenzy around his work, and has also brought new media attention to the stencil as a medium. The New Yorker did an article on Banksy by Laura Collins called “Banksy Was Here – The invisible man of graffiti art.” Although Collins seems critical of Banksy’s ability to stay out of the press himself, she does call attention to his medium: “Typically crafting his images with spray paint and cardboard stencils, Banksy is able to achieve a meticulous level of detail. His aesthetic is clean and instantly readable—broad social cartooning rendered with the graphic bang of an indie concert poster” (Collins 2). Banksy’s entrance into the fine art world would seem to have distanced him from his simpler street-art roots, and yet his ability to stay anonymous seems to have allowed him the credibility of a street artist in a museum setting. Banksy’s work (see below) is reminiscent of what I found in Eugene, both humorous and deeply political. In today’s politically charged climate, the stencil is a unique means of creating a message and getting it seen and heard by an audience in an artist’s specific area. Stencils are easily transported, allowing them to be taken to other cities, states, and even countries (Howze). Everything about the stencil gives it a distinct power over other means of graffiti as a means to begin social change. For marginalized voices in the underground of urban America, graffiti art and the stencil are opportunities to be heard, and in Banksy’s case, even get accepted into the mainstream art world. With a stencil and spray paint can in hand, the artists of this new century will usher in a wave of street art and political protest.
For a large photo survey by G.M.R. of Eugene-based stencil work, please see:
http://picasaweb.google.com/nligett/EugeneStencilArt
Works Cited
Collins, Laura: “Banksy Was Here – The invisible man of graffiti art” http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/05/14/070514fa_fact_collins?currentPage=all
Howze, Russel: “Stencil Art: A Revolutionary Meme” from www.stencilpirates.org
Walsh, Peter: “Mapping Social and Cultural Space: The Ramifications of the Street Stencil” from www.stencilpirates.org
Western Cell Division: “Graphics and Ethnographics: An Incomprehensive Survey of Stencil Activism in Baltimore and Beyond” from www.stencilpirates.org
