Years ago, when he was still unmarried and childless he joined a community of graffiti-makers, who took advantage of certain sites designated by the City to spray to their heart's content.
Purposefully I did not call them artist because I do not know exactly the make-up of this group and I have not seen much of their work.
I have seen some of their photographed work and en masse I found it intense and interesting.
That brings me to a following reflection.
In general whatever wall art or graffiti we have in Ottawa it sucks big time and really could not be called art in any way. It is usually crude, style-less, devoid of those powerful things about graffiti that we could find interesting, like: vigour, spontaneity, colourfulness, certain aggressiveness, and a sense of mission.
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| Peter Slota, 2007 click to enlarge I have left bits of murals to the left and to the right visible so it reveals a bit more of the situation and context. |
The photographs from around 2007 had quite a bit of that. I have made a composite from several photographs of one of Peter's murals. When I have a bit of time I will print it as an art work, on matte canvas, stretch it and view in a gallery setting.
I am curious and I would love to observe how the gallery context plays against graffiti's essential "grungy", unmaintained, short-lived, often hit-and-run origins.
In the meantime:
