 |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |
I found these three YouTube videos an hour ago from a short documentary called Getting Up: A Graffiti Documentary. This film is narrated by several famous writers on the culture, drama, and lessons of being a Graff outlaw.
You got to love the social expose YouTube provides as a medium for people to open up themselves to the world. Especially for Hip Hop culture. I lurk on it every couple of days to find who is posting the latest dopeness in the world of Graff Writing!
A true Graff Writer is an artist masked by the alter ego of a character-empowered pseudonym. They live and run for the thrill seeking life of blazing their identity to the world with the same prime-time energy as a sign in Times Square. They deliver their craft as harbingers, poets, messengers, apostles, activists, visionaries, prophets, shock jocks, romantics, and editorialists. No matter what they create, where they bomb, or how they burn their hieroglyphics, Graff Writers ultimately prize the game in the name of fame.
When Hip Hop thrived in the late 80’s, everything at that time seemed to be good. The art form was loved, appreciated and most importantly getting respected. I’m not so sure about you, but in my opinion, something always seems to be left out or left behind or even left alone. The DJs were bringing it, the Emcees were flowing it, the B-Boys were rocking it and the Graffiti Artists were…
I found these You Tube videos posted by the ID of Pinten and Dannylee78 titled Best of Style Wars and Style Wars Interview. Style Wars is a prolific documentary, by Tony Silver (whom recently passed) and Henry Chalfant, of not only Graffiti artists but Old School Hip Hop’s roots.
I love Hip Hop. I love everything about what makes it so profound in my life and how I am always a part of it. It is a culture born from above average people whom ingeniously created to make a better aesthetic life out of limited resources. It is revolutionary. It never asked for permission to be seen or heard while inspiring the uninspired, and it neither apologized for its liberty being felt.
What is Hip Hop? There are a lot of different answers, depending on who you ask. Before I give my definition, let me start with what isn’t Hip Hop: Gangstas, Pimps, Hustlers, Drug Dealers. Basically, all the negative stigmas of urban life glorified in today’s rap music. It’s downright insulting to call the rap (or crap) music of the last few years Hip Hop. The early foundations of Hip Hop culture were built on the desire to escape the dreary existence of street life.
