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Page 2 of 5.
Miscellaneous notes on this:
- other possible notes to Apple:
I didn't pay enough for my iPad 2. Here are two more dollars to compensate.
We are learning that if each Apple goodie cost two dollars more, the conditions in Chinese plants would be right and proper. I mean this money to help and hope you will charge more from now on.
- can you think of a good note? please add your ideas in the Comments window, below.
July 2, 2012-
This page was published in the May edition of YES! Magazine- issue 62.
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- George mentioned a problem with this idea that would limit the response: Americans are mad at China for taking our jobs and don't want to help them.
- fair enough, but our problem is with policy makers in China and American corporations. we're not out to hurt Chinese workers. ( in fact, there are tent cities outside of Chinese plants, filled with people waiting to get these awful jobs. it's a mess from both sides. )
- in fact, if conditions improve in China, some jobs will come back to the States.
- that is already happening in cases where rising shipping and labor costs are changing the equation. see next page...
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- one of the awful policies of Chinese management is to pay low wages in order to force people to work more hours. talk about a devil-deal.
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- i have an odd connection to this problem:
- in 1984- the first year of the little, stand-up Macintosh- i was an Apple developer.
- i made the first scanned image software for the Mac that came from outside the company. we were shipping in March. ( it was called, "Clip 1". )
- Apple liked it.
- they ordered four hundred copies as Christmas presents for their factory workers. that factory was in Silicon Valley. *
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- you can bet that the PR department at Apple approached management a year ago- or four years ago- with the problem of working conditions in China. they advised that it would be cheap to make it right, now, and expensive to play catch-up later.
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- [ i didn't mail the note in the picture. saw a typo and made a text correction. the rewrite goes like this:
"Hi, Apple Folks-
I didn't pay enough for my iPad 2. The working conditions at Foxconn make that clear.
Please apply this money to the problem and charge 2 dollars more in the future."
I think that Apple marketers will object to a price change that goes above the standard "$1.99" tactic. On the contrary, running the price above the standard is a plus in this case. The word will get out what the extra charge is about. Apple has an expensive PR problem. This is a cheap solution.
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- the Foxconn factories in China make products for Mototorola, Bell, Hewlett-Packard, Apple, and others.
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- a performing artist and journalist, Mike Daisey, went to China and stood outside of a Foxconn factory in Shen Chen and talked to workers as they came out.
- Daisey says there are two issues: wages and conditions:
- wages would be ok by local standards if they were actually paid. they often are not.
- as for conditions- given that the cost of assembling an iPhone is about $6- coming into compliance with [existing] Chinese labor laws, … "is going to cost A COUPLE OF DOLLARS".
Source: radio show on NPR: "Your Call" yourcallradio.org/ - search 'apple'.
Mike Daisey speaks of this between counters 22:00 and 22:33.
- i sent the 2 Dollar pages to Rose Aguilar, the creator of the "Your Call" program on NPR.
- she sent more info back to me: "The same goes for Wal-Mart. If you add about 40 cents to your purchase, overseas workers would be paid a living wage. Thanks, Rose."
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Feb. 18, 2012- George sent me new info from WIRED: of the two problems- wages and conditions (which includes safety), Foxconn has made a gesture to solve part of one of them- perhaps to quiet criticism:
www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/02/foxconn-raises-pay-of-fac...
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Feb. 20, 2012- New York Times reporter says on NPR, this morning, that Foxconn has improved some of the wage problem and, now, some of the conditions problem in their factories. Foxconn is known for ignoring Chinese law but there may be some change coming.
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- i have two Apple devices that were made in China, so i'm sending a second envelope:
Hi, Apple folks-
I didn't pay enough for my wonderful Mac Mini. Please find two dollars, enclosed.
If I had paid two dollars more, the working conditions at Foxconn would be fair and honorable, and your developing PR problem would disappear.
Around 1989, I designed in-house and TIE icons- static and animated- for you. I conceived the comic Hypercard animation for 'selling' Space Shuttle arms- the one where the arm picked up a button on the screen and turned it to read backwards.
I have owned many Macs and have influenced at least ten other people to go the Mac route and let Windows twist in the wind.
I love Apple.
Please make this right and charge two dollars more from now on. No one will notice on our side of the Rim.
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* - [ only a quarter of the Apple order for "Clip 1" was filled- 100 copies. but that is another story.]
Problem solving with RCECC - Red clowns enter caves carefully - Read Choose Estimate Calculate Check
+++ DISCLAIMER +++
Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!
Some background:
As the Luftwaffe (German Air Force) lost control over the skies over Germany in the second half of the Second World War, it could no longer provide sufficient protection against Allied aircraft. Panzer divisions were especially affected by the lack of cover from fighter aircraft because they were always at the center of the most intense fighting.
The Germans already had copious amounts of half-tracked Self-Propelled Anti-Aircraft Guns (SPAAG) of different calibers and weights (Sd.Kfz.10/4, Sd.Kfz.6/2, Sd.Kfz.7/1, etc.). As these vehicles had very limited or no armor, they were vulnerable to enemy fire either from ground or air. The crew needed better protection from small arms fire and artillery/mortar high explosive fragmentation shell shrapnel. A tank-based anti-aircraft vehicle (Flakpanzer) could solve this problem, as it would have sufficient armor to resist most ground attacks with the exception of larger caliber guns. They would also provide some protection against air attacks, but even tanks could be destroyed by air ground-attack fire.
Many designs based on different Panzer chassis and weapons were tested and built during the war. The most successful early ones were based on the Panzer IV chassis (Möbelwagen, Wirbelwind and Ostwind), but one of the major shortcomings of all German Flakpanzers was the lack of a fully enclosed fighting compartment. As all were open-topped (because of easier construction, easier exhaust of gun fumes and the need to produce them as fast as possible), the gun crews were exposed to air attacks and the weather.
As the war progressed, German engineers tried to solve this problem by designing and building new Flakpanzers with fully enclosed turrets, based on later and bigger tank chassis’. One of these was the Flakpanzer based on the Panther tank, best known today as the ‘Coelian’, which was a new turret that could take various gun armaments.
The path to the Coelian SPAAG was not straight. In May 1943, Oberleutnant Dipl. Ing von Glatter-Götz, responding to the orders of Inspectorate 6, initiated the development of a new series of Flakpanzers based on already existing chassis. The Panzer I and II were outdated or used for other purposes. The Panzer III tank chassis was earmarked for the production of the StuG III and thus not available. The Panzer IV and the Panzer V Panther were considered next. The Panzer IV tank chassis was already in use for several German modifications, so it was decided to use it for the Flakpanzer program, eventually leading to the light “Kugelblitz” SPAAG. The Panzer V Panther was considered in case even the Panzer IV chassis proved to be inadequate for the task. Furthermore, the development of a whole new tank generation, the “Einheitspanzer” or “E-Serie”, had just been initiated.
The Germans formed a commission for the analysis of the effectiveness of enemy ground attack planes. The report (dated 31st June 1943) stated that, in the case of dive-bombing, the lowest point that the enemy plane reached was 1.200 to 1.500 m at an angle of 45-80°. Planes using larger caliber machine guns or cannons attacked at an altitude of around 150 to 300 m. The committee suggested that the best way to bring down enemy planes was using direct fire autocannons. To effectively fight the enemy planes, the future Flakpanzer would have to have a fully rotating turret with a high angle of fire and the caliber used should not be lower than 2 cm, with the more powerful 3.7 cm being preferred.
To give the crew the best protection possible and to meet any future Allied developments, the Panther-based Flakpanzer had to have a fully enclosed turret that could be armed with several different proposed weapon configurations. These included the 2 cm Flakvierling, 3.7 cm Flak either in twin or triple configuration, a newly developed 5.5 cm Gerät 58 Flakzwilling and even the powerful 88 mm caliber heavy anti-aircraft gun. The new turret design was to be ready for frontline service by the middle of 1944.
The first proposed design drawings were completed by Rheinmetall under the internal project number H-SkA 82827 in late May 1943 with the title “Turm Panther II mit Vierling MG 151/20”. This turret was heavily based on the Panther’s standard turret that it would simply replace. The new turret had to fulfill several set criteria like armor thickness and having an effective traversing mechanism. The armor protection of the turret was impressive, with 80 mm frontal armor and 40 mm on the sides. The turret was to be moved by using a hydraulic drive which was powered by the tank’s own engine. The maximum traverse speed was around 36° per second. Hydraulic power was used to raise the weapons, too, but a manual drive option was included as a fallback option.
The H-SkA 82827’s armament consisted of four 20 mm MG 151/20, mounted in staggered pairs, the same armament carried by the contemporary Panver IV-based “Möbelwagen” and “Wirbelwind” SPAAGs, too, but now under full armor protection. The elevation of the four guns was -5° to +75° and they had a combined practical rate of fire of 800 RPM, even though a maximum ROF of 1680 to 1920 RPM was theoretically possible. The weapons had a muzzle velocity of 900 m/s, a range of 4.800 m (15,720 ft) and an effective ceiling of 3.700 m (12,120 ft). They were belt-fed and separated from the turret crew, the gunner and the commander, which were seated in the left of the turret, weapons and ammunition were placed on the right side. The commander sat behind the gunner in an elevated position under a cupola, adapted from the Panther battle tank, for a good all-round view. Thanks to the belt-fed guns, no dedicated loader was necessary anymore, saving internal weight and space. The rest of the crew, driver and radio/machine gun operator, were seated in the Panzer V hull’s front in their standard positions.
After a wooden mock-up had been built, inspected and approved by the Heeresinspektorat 6, the go-ahead for the construction of five prototype turrets was given in September 1943, to be mounted and tested on refurbished Panther hulls. The new vehicle received the official designation Sd.Kfz. 171/1 “Flakpanzer V/20 mm”. On the 21st of December 1943, however, a Panzerkommision was formed to examine the further development of a Flakpanzer based on the Panther tank chassis. It was decided that the main armament should consist of at least two 3.7 cm caliber anti-aircraft guns, for more range and firepower, and this requirement was later revised to two even heavier 5.5 cm Gerät 58 guns. The Luftwaffe’s 30 mm MK 103 machine cannon was considered, too, since it had outstanding range, accuracy and penetration.
The problem was now that the Sd.Kfz. 171/1’s turret did not offer enough space or development potential to accommodate these heavier and bigger weapons, so that a completely new turret had to be designed from scratch around them. Daimler-Benz was chosen for this follow-up project, which was internally called “Flakpanzer 341” – after the SPAAG’s planned main armament with an experimental 3.7 cm (L/77) Flak 341 twin gun, also known as “Gerät 341”. In mid-1944 it would evolve into the Panther-based Coelian SPAAG family, but even this more sophisticated design with several armament variants became just a stopgap solution, bridging the delay of the anti-aircraft tanks based on the new Einheitspanzer chassis family.
Serial production of the Sd.Kfz. 171/1 was consequently dropped, only three fully operational prototypes were completed by March 1944, plus two armed turrets for static test. One of these turrets was later mounted onto another Panther hull, for a fourth operational vehicle. Rheinmetall kept on working with these vehicles and components until late 1945, and the four SPAAGs were also employed by the company’s Werksverteidigung unit (manned by the Rheinmetall staff, not by Wehrmacht soldiers) at the Apolda factory in central Thuringia.
The Sd.Kfz. 171/1s and the separate turrets were also used in the development programs for Rheinmetall’s so-called “Einheits-Flakturm” for the upcoming E-50/75 SPAAGs, primarily for targeting and rangefinding systems, weapon mounts and simplified turret movement mechanisms. One of these developments was the Kommandogerät 44, a much more compact analogue rangefinder, effectively an analogue fire control calculator that translated target and ambient data into electronic signals that could control weapon drives and trigger a weapon at an ideal moment. This innovative device eventually became part of the later E-50/75 SPAAGs that entered service in 1946.
The fate of these four unique vehicles after the factory’s invasion through Soviet troops is uncertain, though. They were probably destroyed by retreating German troops to prevent their experimental technologies from falling into enemy hands.
Specifications:
Crew: Four (commander, gunner, driver, radio-operator/hull machine gunner)
Weight: 40.5 tonnes (39.9 long tons; 44.7 short tons)
Length (hull only): 6.87 m (22 ft 6 in)
Width: 3.42 m (11 ft 3 in)
Height: 3.06 m (10 ft 2/3 in)
Suspension: Double torsion bar, interleaved road wheels
Fuel capacity: 720 litres (160 imp gal; 190 US gal)
Armor:
15–80 mm (0.6 – 3.15 in)
Performance:
Maximum road speed: 55 km/h (34 mph)
Operational range: 250 km (160 mi)
Power/weight: 15.39 PS (11.5 kW)/tonne (13.77 hp/ton)
Engine:
Maybach HL230 P30 V-12 petrol engine with 700 PS (690 hp, 515 kW)
ZF AK 7-200 gear; 7 forward 1 reverse
Armament:
4× 20 mm (0.787 in) MG 151/29 machine cannon in two twin mounts with a total of 3.200 rounds
1× 7.92 mm MG 34 machine gun in the front glacis plate with 2.500 rounds
The kit and its assembly:
This is an OOB what-if model, the prototype of the “Panther 20mm Flakvierling MG 151/20” from Dragon. The kit is actually mislabeled as “Flakpanzer 341”, but this designation had been allocated to the later prototype of the “Coelian” turret for the Panther chassis, just as described in the background. AFAIK, the “Panther 20mm Flakvierling MG 151/20” was not produced at all, there was just a wooden mock-up. And the whole project was quickly cancelled because it did not offer sufficient firepower and development potential. The only “official” designation I could find is the title of a project paper that describes the turret’s layout and construction, and it was called “H-SkA 82827.
But what if a small batch of these vehicles had been manufactured/completed and used by factory defense units like the Luftwaffe’s Werkschutzstaffeln?
That’s the basic idea/story behind this build, and it was kept OOB. The Dragon Panther is a simple affair and goes together well, but the instructions are weak, if not confusing. Good thing, though, is that the kit contains an extra sprue from a Jagdpanther kit that contains many optional parts for early and late Panther variants, as well as hull equipment, so that you get a good number of surplus parts for the spares box. The only downer is the fact that the soft vinyl tracks were molded in a bright sand tone, so that these delicate parts had to be completely painted.
Painting and markings:
The Panther 20mm Flakvierling is – even though it never “existed” – frequently depicted in a weird two-color scheme, probably consisting of Dunkelgelb (RAL 7028) over a red primer coat. But the depicted colors frequently appear much too garish and strong, like bright sunflower yellow over wine red! WTF? However, I liked the concept and adopted it for the model, just with more realistic tones and some personal twists.
The hull received an overall coat with RAL 3009 (Oxidrot), while the turret was painted with a paler shade of red (Humbrol 70, Brick red). On top of that, thinned Tamiya XF-57 (Buff) was used to add a fragmented meander pattern to break up the tank’s outlines. The result is quite attractive, and it might have worked well in an urban/factory environment – hence the idea of allocating the vehicle to a Werksschutz unit – several aircraft companies, e. g. Heinkel or Focke Wulf, also used prototypes for local defense, organized outside of Luftwaffe units.
To emphasize the prototype nature of this vehicle, the wheels and the armor skirts were, for some variety, painted in standard Hinterhalt camouflage colors, in Dunkelgelb (Tamiya XF-60), Olivgrün (RAL 6003, Humbrol 86) and Rotbraun (RAL 8017, Humbrol 160). The latter was also used for the engine bay cover, which I simply forgot to paint on Oxidrot in the first place. But the slightly darker Rotbraun blends well into the rest of the hull. The wheels were painted uniformly, and I added a wheel in Brick Red on each side as an un-camouflaged replacement. The armor skirts’ camouflage pattern consists of dark circles over a Dunkelgelb background, created with a stamp (self-made from fine sponge rubber) and mimicking the original “factory design” of the Hinterhalt paint scheme.
As mentioned above, the tracks had to be painted, and this time I tried a base with acrylic black paint from the rattle can, plus some grey and re brown wet-in-wet acrylic paint on top of that. Worked quite well and might become a new standard for this field of work.
The tactical markings became minimal, as the vehicle would be factory-operated and also a test article – hence it just received small Balkenkreuz insignia (on the hull ,mostly obscured by tools), and a large black “3”, edged in white for more contrast, on the turret sides, with smaller numbers at front and back of the turret for quick identification from every side.
The model received an overall washing with thinned dark brown acrylic paint and dry-brushing with light grey and beige, before it was sealed with matt acrylic varnish. Once the vinyl tracks had been mounted, the model’s lower areas and the running gear were dusted with grey-brown mineral pigments.
Well, another simple build, thanks to an OOB kit of this exotic SPAAG prototype. The result looks quite good and was completed in just two days, another member in my growing collection of real, semi-fictional and whiffy German SPAAG vehicles – turning this mock-up into an of an operational prototype of a Werksverteidigung unit certainly works and could actually have been, even though the Panther 20mm Flakvierling MG 151/20 just remained a stillborn proposal.
This kind of stepped housing scheme, with cantilevered south-facing terraces, was common in the late 50's and 60's for steep Swiss valley sites; it preserves arable land and gives everyone private green space with a view. As well, in this case at least, the individual dwellings receive distinct articulation with the double-height living rooms becoming a pronounced formal element.
A serious problem with this approach is access. There are no internal streets, and in this case we are looking at a terrifyingly long, straight stair of 250 steps. There is a dark, claustrophobically small diagonal elevator (sometimes rather loftily labeled as a "funicular") which stops at every third level. This is quite a lot of effort to serve thirty three-bedroom units, but hey, these are upscale flats (if the expensive in situ concrete construction didn't give that away).
The egregious flaws of this scheme - the stupid elevator, the prospect of ascending hundreds of steps in the icy Swiss winter - shouldn't keep us from recognizing the extremely un-textbook Modernity of this: it's idiosyncratic, responsive to its site conditions, and an unmistakable attempt to reconstitute a historical Italian hill town. That Italy and Switzerland are climatically really different seems to have been lost but, eh.
Revisiting Frampton's "Critical Regionalism" texts this year, I was surprised to realize that the proposed hybrid between regional architectural and International Style Modernism is meant to work both ways. That is: the regional protects us from the banal universalization of the Modern, but the Modern protects us from the proto-Fascist provincialism of the regional. As well, Frampton explicitly calls for a weird cross-pollination of regionalisms: you don't necessarily have to cross Modernism with something from your region, just from some region, and in fact it might be better if it's not yours, in order to make it harder to re-appropriate the architecture for sketchy ultra-nationalist politics. This leads Frampton to champion some really ridiculous-sounding projects in filling out the article, but it goes a long way towards explaining the virtue of, say, Siza: why else would you choose Japanese-by-way-of-Frank-Lloyd-Wright for building in Salazar's Portugal?
So, okay, Switzerland's not Italy, and this is not a masterpiece, but the world waits for a really good volume on "terraced schemes of the 1960s." I wish I had more photos of the corridor/whatnot spaces up the hill - - it's actually a really fun place to wander around and explore, a real hanging garden of a building. The kids must have a ball with hide and seek here.
Modernism in the 50's and 60's is, in some ways, a historical blind spot; the canonical projects remain well-known, but the in-between stuff is hard to look at accurately, thanks in no small part to the polemical agenda of postmodernism. In order to draw sharp battle lines, the Jenckses and Venturis rather simplified the context they were rebelling against. So there was at least a full generation of architects who did all kinds of critical proto-postmodern work, but don't get any credit for it because their work was seen (first of all by them) as an extension and expansion of the Modernist project, not a revolution against it. Their projects wait to be rediscovered and resuscitated.
Lots of great background info and drawings can be found at Housing Prototypes. Ludwig probably takes the most flattering photograph. Some of our group were invited inside a dwelling unit, but I don't know if any of those photos are online.
Calculus has widespread application in areas like Engineering and Science. Since this study is pivotal in branching out to other fields, it is important to get the best help right from the formative years itself. Solving calculus problems is not easy but with the help of tutorvista's online tutors, this will become much easy and simple. Our online tutors will help you out to solve your calculus problems and understand the concepts with a better hand. Get your help from our tutors and ensure yourself quality learning on the subject.
Who decided to put the Find button on the left side of the input field? And the link below the box is usually used for advance search or search options. Two bad design choices...
If you are visiting Bury St Edmunds then the Cornhill is the central hub for shopping particularly on Market Days on both Wednesdays and Saturday when up to a 100 stalls can be browsed .
Perhaps the star attraction on the Cornhill is Moyse's Hall a 12th century building. It has served as the town's bridewell , workhouse , gaol, police station and now as a museum.
On the Cornhill is a Boer War memorial of a soldier of the Suffolk Regiment with rifle leaning on a rock The memorial lists the names of 193, inc 8 officers and 147 N.C.O.'s . The memorial was unveiled on 11th November 1904.
One of the finest buildings on the Cornhill is the Market Cross built in the 18th century to a Robert Adam design. Once a Corn Exchange with a theatre upstairs. You may spot the panels with masks and musical instruments. The theatre closed in 1819 . In a short life as a music venue Liszt performed here 1842.
If you look above the mock Tudor frontage of Boots Chemists you will see statues with a Suffolk connection Agricola, St Edmund , Edward 1st and Edward 6th.
Unfortunately Everard's Hotel where we had our wedding reception closed in 1987 and is now Pizza Hut. Other pubs I used to visit in the Cornhill included the Griffin (now Edmundo) , the Castle (now Superdrug) .
+++ DISCLAIMER +++
Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!
Some background:
Even in the early phase of the development of the Panzerkampfwagen V “Panther”, there were doubts as to whether the Panther would still be sufficiently protected against enemy anti-tank weapons in 1943. The attempt to introduce reinforced armor in the development of the "normal" Panther failed. For this reason, a further development called "Panther II" was worked on. The initial design of the vehicles differed only in terms of armor thickness. However, at a meeting on February 10, 1943, MAN 's chief development engineer, Dr. Wiebecke, said that the Panther in its original form did not meet the requirements of the Eastern Front.
In the days that followed, the Army Weapons Office called on the two companies Henschel and MAN to work more closely together, also because the logistical problems with the supply of spare parts for various types of tanks on the Eastern Front were obvious. The goal was, as set out in a meeting on February 17, 1943, to convert the production of the medium battle tank V Panther, which was just being introduced, to the advanced model of this vehicle at the latest with the introduction of the main battle tank Tiger Ausf. B (Tiger II), which could have as many common assemblies as possible with the second generation of the heavy main battle tank. One such standardization of the types had been demanded by the Panzer Commission. For example, the ZF AK 7/200 gearbox and the Maybach HL 230 engine were to be installed in both vehicles. In parallel, the development of a completely new vehicle generation, the “Entwicklungspanzer” (also known as “E-Panzer” and later “Einheitspanzer”) tank series, which took the interchangeability of elements and production simplification even further, was pushed. The perspective was that from 1945 on the Panther would be replaced with the medium E-50 battle tank with an 88mm main gun.
This development was not certain, though, so that the Panther was further updated as a stopgap solution until E-50 production was running sufficiently. Consequently, the Army Office's WaPrüf 6 department also involved the Rheinmetall company and discussed the design of a new, simplified turret for the Panther II on February 18 that could accept the powerful new 8.8 cm KwK 43. Many specifications were made in the planning phase, for example a maximum turret radius had to be observed so that the driver and radio operator hatch could be opened in every turret position. Other dimensions were also specified to ensure access to the engine compartment. On February 19, the installation of machine gun 42 in tank turrets was discussed with Krupp, Rheinmetall and Daimler-Benz.
During a development meeting on March 5, 1943, it was determined that either a Maybach-Olvar or a ZF all-claw manual transmission could be installed in the drive area of both the Tiger II and Panther II. By March 20th, construction plans for the steering gear and side transmission should be ready. Then, on March 30, it was determined that Krupp should begin production of the Panther II, and MIAG should supply parts for this. From April 1943 the project designation Panther II was used, and MAN had already promised a prototype for mid-August 1943.
In the period that followed, MAN developed the "rubber-saving rollers" for the project. These were later tested on the Panther Ausf. G and were used on the Tiger II and Tiger I. However, it was discovered that the Panther's track had problems with these rollers and the project was expanded to develop a new track to be used with these rollers. Both were gradually introduced to the still running Panther production or retrofitted to damaged/recovered earlier Panther models in field workshops. It was planned that in view of the alignment of the chassis, the regular Panther II track should be usable as a transport track for the Tiger II. However, the Panther track would be shorter, since it would have two rollers less than the Tiger II. The rubber-saving track rollers were a major point in the discussions surrounding the introduction of the Panther II since they meant an additional 2 tons of weight. To compensate for this, the use of side skirts on the hull was discussed. It had already shown during the first operations on the Eastern Front that the sensitivity of the Panther’s side armor to the fire from the well-known Soviet anti-tank rifles was less than feared. To simplify production and save material, the lateral reinforcement was consequently not implemented.
On January 4, 1944, there was a meeting of the tank commission, where the changes to the armored hull of the Panther were discussed as the main problem of standardization. If a temporarily reduced production would be accepted by the German command, the following identical components should be used from the Tiger II: its Maybach HL 230 engine, same cooling system, same gearbox AK 7/200 or Olvar B, steering gear, side transmission, and the rubber-saving rollers with the modified track. However, some of these changes should already be used on the Panther Ausf. G, which was the current production variant. Ultimately, it was decided that reduced output of Panthers was unacceptable. Overall, Dr. Blaicher from the Main Committee determined that series production of the Panther II could only begin in late 1944 or early 1945.
The general design of the Panther II followed the conception of the Panzerkampfwagen V Panther. However, the armor at the front was to be increased to 100 or even 120 mm, and the side armor was planned to be brought to 60 mm. Furthermore, gun mantlet, turret front, roof, sides and rear were also supposed to be better armored, what led to the so-called “Schmalturm”. This new design was introduced with the Panther Ausf. F, the first standardized interim variant on the way to the true Panther II. However, this turret was only outfitted with a long-barreled 7,5-cm-KwK 44/I (L/70) without a muzzle brake, so that there was no significant improvement in firepower in comparison with other contemporary German tanks. Nevertheless, offering improved protection, an overall lowered weight and simplified production effort, the Schmalturm entered production and was, beyond the Panther Ausf. F, also combined with some late Panzer IV hulls as well as with early E-50s.
After that, further turret development for the Panther and the E-Series of medium/heavy battle tanks was pushed forward independently from the base vehicle, since a modular concept appeared to be the most effective way to ensure constant output of new tanks.
Eventually, the “Panther II” never materialized. In the meantime, the E-50/75’s development as well as Panther production had continued, and the latter gradually adopted new elements from the E-Series of tanks as well as simplifications that saved material and reduced overall production time. This gradual evolution led to two Panther hybrid variants. These vehicles, even though they looked quite different from the early Panther variants, retained the original SdKfz. 171 ordnance inventory designation. The most common variant was the Panther Ausf. F with the standardized rubber-saving running gear and the Schmalturm with the long-barreled 7,5 cm gun. The other standardized crossbreed was the Panther Ausf. H; it was based on a simplified late Panther Ausf. G hull with 50 mm side walls, but it featured a new welded 100 mm front glacis plate without any openings for either the driver or the radio operator’s machine gun. Sight for the crew members in the hull was provided exclusively through periscopic mirrors. Like the Panther Ausf. F, the Ausf. H featured the simplified running gear with rubber-saving rollers and a track that consisted of the Tiger I/II’s train transport track.
However, the Panther Ausf. H’s engine was new: it introduced a Maybach HL 234 V-12 gasoline engine, which was a HL-230, used in former Panther and Tiger tanks, upgraded with a fuel injection system which allowed easier engine operation even at low engine temperatures (such as a cold start), good adaptation to a wide range of altitudes and ambient temperatures, precisely governed engine speeds (including at idle and redline) and improved fuel efficiency. The HL-234 had originally been developed for the heavier E-50/75 and even the super-heavy E-100 tanks, and it was designed to deliver up to 900 hp (650 kW) in them. However, for the lighter Panther it was limited to just 700 hp (434 kW), with emphasis on torque at low engine speeds and durability. In the Panther Ausf. H this extra power was transferred through E-50/75 transmission elements, which had generous dimensions and material strength, what greatly improved the tank’s mechanical reliability. Thanks to the more powerful engine and transmission, the Panther Ausf. H was more agile than the earlier versions, despite a higher overall weight of 53 vs. 45 tons, which was almost on par with the earlier Tiger I. With the new drive train, the Panther Ausf. H was able to achieve a top speed of 56 km/h (35 mph) on level terrain or roads, and acceleration from standstill was markedly improved so that the tank was less likely to be hit during battles when it changed positions.
To improve the Panther’s firepower and get it on par with the retired Tiger I that it replaced, a 8.8 cm KwK 43 cannon was mounted in a new turret called ‘Langturm’. The Langturm was another E-50/75 development element that was adapted to the old Panther hull. It was in fact just an extended variant of the Schmalturm from the Panther Ausf. F and it shared the same layout and armor level, but it had an overhang at the rear to make space for the KwK 43’s longer gun carriage and a bigger ammunition supply. As a beneficial side effect, the overhang also provided a counterweight for the long and heavy gun barrel, alleviating the turret bearing. Because the KwK 43 had a different and heavier turret mount than the KwK 44/I from the Panther Ausf. F, a different mantlet had to be used. Turret movement was supported by an electric drive and targeting was supported by a built-in stereoscopic rangefinder, with optics in twin matching armored blisters on the turret’s flanks in front of the commander’s cupola. Fully rotatable periscopes in the turret roof replaced pistol ports in the turret flanks, thereby removing these weak armor spots.
To provide the Panther with some form of defense against infantry attacks after the deletion of its hull machine gun, a Nahverteidigungswaffe grenade launcher was mounted in the turret roof. This was a simple breech-loaded launcher tube oriented at a fixed 50° angle and fitted in a fully 360° traversable mounting. The Nahverteidigungswaffe was designed to mate with the standard 26 mm Kampfpistole flare gun. It could be loaded and fired under full armor and sealed by an armored plug when not in use. Aiming was by periscopes located on the turret and cupola. Typically, Sprenggranatpatrone 326 LP anti-personnel explosives were fired; this device had a range of 7 to 10 meters (23 to 33 ft) around the tank with a blast point of 0.5 to 2 meters (2 to 7 ft) above the ground. It splintered to a circumferential distance of 100 meters (328 ft) after an initial delay time of one second. It turned out to be very effective, even though all turret hatches and openings were to be closed when the 326 LP round was fired. Alternatively, the Nahverteidigungswaffe could fire a range of flare, signal or smoke grenades, too.
Compared with the earlier Panther variants with the 7.5 cm main weapon, its 8.8 cm gun meant considerably more firepower, and the KwK 43’s long range made it possible to keep the tank out of most enemy weapon’s range. As long as the crew was able to keep the Panther Ausf. H’s reinforced, sloped front armor facing towards its enemies the vehicle was virtually invulnerable to almost any Allied medium tank in late 1945, except for very close range or when the tracks were targeted to immobilize the tank. The only real threat at the time was the Soviet IS-3 with its heavy 122 mm D-25 gun, or surprise attacks against the weaker flanks.
The interleaved running gear still made maintenance and operations in wintertime challenging, though, but this was regarded as a reasonable price to pay for the tank’s overall effectiveness. As a benefit from the complex running gear, the Panther had probably the best suspension system of all German tanks of the time, offering a very smooth ride, and it was therefore very popular among its crews. However, the high-quality steel that was needed for the Panther’s torsion bar suspension system became more and more rare. The situation became so dire that these suspension elements were recovered from damaged vehicles directly at the front lines, collected and then conveyed to the MAN production line to complete new Panthers and put out as many as possible.
Nevertheless, due to the E-50/75’s ongoing development, its rising production priority from late 1945 on and an ever-worsening resource situation, the final Panther variants, the Ausf. F and H, were only produced between early 1945 and summer 1946. After that, Panther production ceased altogether in favor of the new Einheitspanzer family. Exact production numbers of the Panther Ausf. H are uncertain, because of the many hybrids and the chaotic production conditions, but less than 250 were finished and sent to frontline units.
Specifications:
Crew: Five (commander, gunner, loader, driver, radio operator)
Weight: 53 tonnes (52.1 long tons; 58.2 short tons)
Length: 6.87 m (22 ft 6 in) hull only
9,14 m (29 ft 11½ in) overall with gun facing forward
Width: 3.42 m (11 ft 3 in)
Height: 2,81 m (9 ft 2½ in)
Suspension: Double torsion bar, interleaved road wheels
Fuel capacity: 720 liters (160 imp gal; 190 US gal)
Armor:
15–100 mm (0.6 – 3.93 in)
Performance:
Maximum road speed: 56 km/h (35 mph)
Operational range: 250 km (160 mi) on roads
100 km (62 mi) cross-country
Power/weight: 13.2 PS (9.5 kW)/tonne (12.02 hp/ton)
Engine & transmission:
Maybach HL234 V-12 gasoline engine with 700 PS (690 hp, 515 kW)
Maybach OLVAR OG 44 16 11 A gearbox with 8 forward and 2 reverse gears
Armament:
1× 8.8 cm KwK 43 (L/56) with 67 rounds, stored in the turret and the hull
1× 7.92 mm MG 42, mounted co-axially with the main gun with 2.500 rounds
1× 26 mm Nahverteidigungswaffe in the turret roof
Optional 6× Schnellnebelkerze 39 smoke dischargers, mounted to the turret flanks
Provision for a 7.92 mm MG 42 or MG 34 FlaMG on the commander cupola
The kit and its assembly:
This fictional Heer ’46 Panther variant was inspired by a Hasegawa Panther Ausf. F kit, which features rubber-saving all-steel wheels and a Schmalturm as optional parts – effectively a ‘whif-out-of-the-box’. I got it dead cheap, but just the plastic, without box, decals or instructions. I wondered how this hybrid could be even more upgraded, so that it could become a (fictional) stopgap solution to bridge the delayed introduction of the E-50/75 tank family? The result became my fictional ‘Ausführung H’.
To this end, I gave the Panther a bigger 8.8 cm gun, but this necessitated an enlarged turret. To keep things simple, I used the OOB Schmalturm to create a fictional extended version with a longer overhang at the rear – a “variant” that is actually available as one of the Modelcollect OOB E-50 kits, too. The overhang was scratched with the Schmalturm’s rear wall, styrene sheet material and 2C putty – the overhang is not large, but IMHO the turret looks now much more balanced than the original Schmalturm? For an individual look I also modified the gun mantlet, using early Panther parts from the Hasegawa kit and an 88 mm gun barrel with a muzzle brake left over from an Armorfast Jagdpanther. Additionally, some details were added to the turret, including a cover for the Nahverteidigungswaffe, periscopes and some free-standing lugs.
Another small modification: I removed the machine gun opening from the front glacis plate as a production simplification measure – after the driver’s visor slit had disappeared from the late production Panther Gs, removing the only other weak point in the front armor appeared like a plausible step. To create an even more E-50ish look I moved the light from the mudguards to the center of the glacis plate.
The running gear was taken OOB from the Hasegawa kit. To create a different look, I omitted the Panther’s standard side skirts that had protected the tank’s weak spot in the running gear above its tracks.
PE grates from a Modelcollect E-50/75 were fitted over the cooling fan openings (even though they did not fit perfectly), and I scratched two small smoke grenade mortar clusters for the turret flanks from sprue material. Tools and a container for a replacement main gun barrel segment were taken from the Hasegawa kit.
Painting and markings:
Another reason for this whiffy Panther was a camouflage concept that I had been wanting to test on a model for a while. It was inspired by French tank paint schemes from the early WWII phase: some vehicles carried a paint scheme consisting of horizontal, wavy high-contrast bands – an attempt to mimic a landscape with the horizon, consisting of relatively dark colors on low tank areas and light colors, even light grey or blue, on the turret. While some French tanks carried rather garish colors, I thought that this concept could work well with more subdued tones, only using the color contrast and trying to maximize the camouflage effect depending on the viewer’s perspective on the tank : either horizontally against the horizon, but also from above, when the vehicle would need a different camouflage against the ground.
The typical German “Hinterhalt” camouflage colors, Dunkelgelb, Olivgrün and the darker Rotbraun (RAL 7028, 6003 and 8017, respectively) were a good, limited palette to try this stunt, using Modelmaster 2095, a mix of Humbrol 86 and 78 for a lighter shade of green and Humbrol 180. Conforming to German standards, the running gear was painted uniformly, and I used RAL 7028 all around as a countershading measure. RAL 7028 was also applied to the turret flanks and to the barrel’s underside, to reduce the contrast of these areas against the sky.
RAL 6003 and 8017 were then primarily applied to the roof areas of hull, turret, and barrel, with only small RAL 7028 spots here and there to break these dark areas up against the ground when seen from above. To generally break the tank’s outlines up, the demarcation lines between the light and dark areas were painted with sharp, very wavy, “amoeba-esque” edges.
The model received an overall washing with dark brown ink and some dry-brushing with light grey to emphasize edges and details. The vinyl tracks were painted, too, with a mix of grey, red brown and iron (acrylic paints). The decals/markings are minimal, all taken from the scrap box, and the model was finally sealed with matt acrylic vanish overall, plus some very light extra dry-brushing with silver to simulate flaked paint, and dirt and rust residues were added here and there with watercolors. After final assembly, the lower areas of the model were furthermore powdered with mineral pigments to simulate mud crusts and dust.
A straightforward what-if/Heer ’46 project. From a hardware perspective, the idea of an upgraded Panther as an E-50 stopgap for late 1945 with a bigger turret and gun works IMHO well, as the model combines old and new elements. The paint scheme experiment worked, too; when seen from the side, the wavy contrast between the light and dark areas breaks up the Panther’s silhouette against the horizon, while the rather dark colors from above conceal the vehicle against the ground, e. g. when it would be hidden under trees or in the shadows between buildings. The overall package looks quite plausible! :D
We decided to go for a city break rather than sun in Tenerife again this September. Other than a few days in the North East we haven’t been away since last March and wanted a change and hopefully some sun. The problem is getting flights from the north of England to the places we want to go to. We chose Valencia as we could fly from East Midlands – which was still a pain to get to as it involved the most notorious stretch of the M1 at five in the morning. In the end we had a fairly good journey, the new Ryanair business class pre-booked scheme worked quite well and bang on time as usual. It was dull when we landed with storms forecast all week, the sky was bright grey – the kiss of death to the photography I had in mind. I was full of cold and wishing I was at work. It did rain but it was overnight on our first night and didn't affect us. There has been a drought for eleven months apparently and it rained on our first day there! The forecast storms didn't materialise in Valencia but they got it elsewhere.
You May notice discrepancies in the spelling of some Spanish words or names, this is because Valencian is used on signs, in some guide books and maps. There are two languages in common use with distinct differences. There may also be genuine mistakes - it has been known!
Over the course of a Monday to Sunday week we covered 75 miles on foot and saw most of the best of Valencia – The City of Bell Towers. The Old City covers a pretty large area in a very confusing layout. There was a lot of referring to maps – even compass readings! – a first in a city for us. The problem with photography in Valencia is that most of the famous and attractive building are closely built around, some have poor quality housing built on to them. Most photographs have to be taken from an extreme angle looking up. There are no high points as it is pan flat, there are a small number of buildings where you can pay to go up on to the roof for a better view and we went up them – more than once!
The modern buildings of The City of Arts and Sciences – ( Ciutat de Las Arts I de les Ciencies ) are what the city has more recently become famous for, with tourists arriving by the coachload all day until late at night. They must be photographed millions of times a month. We went during the day and stayed till dark one evening, I gave it my best shot but a first time visit is always a compromise between ambition and realism, time dictates that we have to move on to the next destination. I travelled with a full size tripod – another first – I forgot to take it with me to TCoAaS! so It was time to wind up the ISO, again! Needless to say I never used the tripod.
On a day when rain was forecast but it stayed fine, albeit a bit dull, we went to the Bioparc north west of the city, a zoo by another name. There are many claims made for this place, were you can appear to walk alongside some very large animals, including, elephants, lions, giraffe, rhino, gorillas and many types of monkey to name a few. It is laid out in different geographical regions and there is very little between you and the animals, in some cases there is nothing, you enter the enclosure through a double door arrangement and the monkeys are around you. It gets rave reviews and we stayed for most of the day. The animals it has to be said gave the appearance of extreme boredom and frustration and I felt quite sorry for them.
The course of The River Turia was altered after a major flood in the 50’s. The new river runs west of the city flanked by a motorway. The old river, which is massive, deep and very wide between ancient walls, I can’t imagine how it flooded, has been turned into a park that is five miles long. There is an athletics track, football pitches, cycle paths, restaurants, numerous kids parks, ponds, fountains, loads of bridges, historic and modern. At the western end closest to the sea sits The City of Arts and Sciences – in the river bed. Where it meets the sea there is Valencia’s urban Formula One racetrack finishing in the massive marina built for The Americas Cup. The race track is in use as roadways complete with fully removable street furniture, kerbs, bollards, lights, islands and crossings, everything is just sat on the surface ready to be moved.
We found the beach almost by accident, we were desperate for food after putting in a lot of miles and the afternoon was ticking by. What a beach, 100’s of metres wide and stretching as far as the eye could see with a massive promenade. The hard thing was choosing, out of the dozens of restaurants, all next door to each other, all serving traditional Paella – rabbit and chicken – as well as seafood, we don’t eat seafood and it constituted 90% of the menu in most places. Every restaurant does a fixed price dish of the day, with a few choices, three courses and a drink. Some times this was our only meal besides making the most of the continental breakfast at the hotel. We had a fair few bar stops with the local wine being cheap and pleasant it would have been a shame not to, there would have been a one woman riot – or strike!
On our final day, a Sunday, we were out of bed and down for breakfast at 7.45 as usual, the place was deserted barring a waiter. We walked out of the door at 8.30 – in to the middle of a mass road race with many thousands of runners, one of a series that take place in Valencia – apparently! We struggled to find out the distance, possibly 10km. The finish was just around the corner so off we went with the camera gear, taking photos of random runners and groups. There was a TV crew filming it and some local celebrity (I think) commentating. Next we came across some sort of wandering religious and musical event. Some sort of ritual was played out over the course of Sunday morning in various locations, it involved catholic priests and religious buildings and another film crew. The Catholic tourists and locals were filling the (many) churches for Sunday mass. Amongst all of this we had seen men walking around in Arab style dress – the ones in black looked like the ones from ISIS currently beheading people – all carrying guns. A bit disconcerting. We assumed that there had been some sort of battle enactment. We were wrong, it hadn’t happened yet. A while later, about 11.30 we could hear banging, fireworks? No it was our friends with the guns. We were caught up in total mayhem, around 60 men randomly firing muskets with some sort of blank rounds, the noise, smoke and flames from the muzzles were incredible. We were about to climb the Torres de Serranos which is where, unbeknown to us, the grand, and deafening, finale was going to be. We could feel the blast in our faces on top of the tower. Yet again there was a film camera in attendance. I couldn’t get close ups but I got a good overview and shot my first video with the 5D, my first in 5 years of owning a DLSR with the capability. I usually use my phone ( I used my phone as well). Later in the day there was a bullfight taking place, the ring was almost next to our hotel, in the end we had other things to do and gave it a miss, it was certainly a busy Sunday in the city centre, whether it’s the norm or not I don’t know.
There is a tram system in Valencia but it goes from the port area into the newer part of the city on the north side, it wouldn’t be feasible to serve the historic old city really. A quick internet search told me that there are 55,000 university students in the city, a pretty big number. I think a lot of the campus is on the north side and served by the tram although there is a massive fleet of buses as well. There is a massive, very impressive market building , with 100’s of stalls that would make a photo project on its own, beautiful on the inside and out but very difficult to get decent photos of the exterior other than detail shots owing to the closeness of other buildings and the sheer size of it. Across town, another market has been beautifully renovated and is full of bars and restaurants and a bit of a destination in its own right.
A downside was the all too typical shafting by the taxi drivers who use every trick in the book to side step the official tariffs and rob you. The taxi from the airport had a “broken” meter and on the way home we were driven 22 km instead of the nine that is the actual distance. Some of them seem to view tourists as cash cows to be robbed at all costs. I emailed the Marriot hotel as they ordered the taxi, needless to say no answer from Marriot – they’ve had their money. We didn’t get the rip off treatment in the bars etc. that we experienced in Rome, prices are very fair on most things, certainly considering the city location.
All in all we had a good trip and can highly recommend Valencia.
We decided to go for a city break rather than sun in Tenerife again this September. Other than a few days in the North East we haven’t been away since last March and wanted a change and hopefully some sun. The problem is getting flights from the north of England to the places we want to go to. We chose Valencia as we could fly from East Midlands – which was still a pain to get to as it involved the most notorious stretch of the M1 at five in the morning. In the end we had a fairly good journey, the new Ryanair business class pre-booked scheme worked quite well and bang on time as usual. It was dull when we landed with storms forecast all week, the sky was bright grey – the kiss of death to the photography I had in mind. I was full of cold and wishing I was at work. It did rain but it was overnight on our first night and didn't affect us. There has been a drought for eleven months apparently and it rained on our first day there! The forecast storms didn't materialise in Valencia but they got it elsewhere.
You May notice discrepancies in the spelling of some Spanish words or names, this is because Valencian is used on signs, in some guide books and maps. There are two languages in common use with distinct differences. There may also be genuine mistakes - it has been known!
Over the course of a Monday to Sunday week we covered 75 miles on foot and saw most of the best of Valencia – The City of Bell Towers. The Old City covers a pretty large area in a very confusing layout. There was a lot of referring to maps – even compass readings! – a first in a city for us. The problem with photography in Valencia is that most of the famous and attractive building are closely built around, some have poor quality housing built on to them. Most photographs have to be taken from an extreme angle looking up. There are no high points as it is pan flat, there are a small number of buildings where you can pay to go up on to the roof for a better view and we went up them – more than once!
The modern buildings of The City of Arts and Sciences – ( Ciutat de Las Arts I de les Ciencies ) are what the city has more recently become famous for, with tourists arriving by the coachload all day until late at night. They must be photographed millions of times a month. We went during the day and stayed till dark one evening, I gave it my best shot but a first time visit is always a compromise between ambition and realism, time dictates that we have to move on to the next destination. I travelled with a full size tripod – another first – I forgot to take it with me to TCoAaS! so It was time to wind up the ISO, again! Needless to say I never used the tripod.
On a day when rain was forecast but it stayed fine, albeit a bit dull, we went to the Bioparc north west of the city, a zoo by another name. There are many claims made for this place, were you can appear to walk alongside some very large animals, including, elephants, lions, giraffe, rhino, gorillas and many types of monkey to name a few. It is laid out in different geographical regions and there is very little between you and the animals, in some cases there is nothing, you enter the enclosure through a double door arrangement and the monkeys are around you. It gets rave reviews and we stayed for most of the day. The animals it has to be said gave the appearance of extreme boredom and frustration and I felt quite sorry for them.
The course of The River Turia was altered after a major flood in the 50’s. The new river runs west of the city flanked by a motorway. The old river, which is massive, deep and very wide between ancient walls, I can’t imagine how it flooded, has been turned into a park that is five miles long. There is an athletics track, football pitches, cycle paths, restaurants, numerous kids parks, ponds, fountains, loads of bridges, historic and modern. At the western end closest to the sea sits The City of Arts and Sciences – in the river bed. Where it meets the sea there is Valencia’s urban Formula One racetrack finishing in the massive marina built for The Americas Cup. The race track is in use as roadways complete with fully removable street furniture, kerbs, bollards, lights, islands and crossings, everything is just sat on the surface ready to be moved.
We found the beach almost by accident, we were desperate for food after putting in a lot of miles and the afternoon was ticking by. What a beach, 100’s of metres wide and stretching as far as the eye could see with a massive promenade. The hard thing was choosing, out of the dozens of restaurants, all next door to each other, all serving traditional Paella – rabbit and chicken – as well as seafood, we don’t eat seafood and it constituted 90% of the menu in most places. Every restaurant does a fixed price dish of the day, with a few choices, three courses and a drink. Some times this was our only meal besides making the most of the continental breakfast at the hotel. We had a fair few bar stops with the local wine being cheap and pleasant it would have been a shame not to, there would have been a one woman riot – or strike!
On our final day, a Sunday, we were out of bed and down for breakfast at 7.45 as usual, the place was deserted barring a waiter. We walked out of the door at 8.30 – in to the middle of a mass road race with many thousands of runners, one of a series that take place in Valencia – apparently! We struggled to find out the distance, possibly 10km. The finish was just around the corner so off we went with the camera gear, taking photos of random runners and groups. There was a TV crew filming it and some local celebrity (I think) commentating. Next we came across some sort of wandering religious and musical event. Some sort of ritual was played out over the course of Sunday morning in various locations, it involved catholic priests and religious buildings and another film crew. The Catholic tourists and locals were filling the (many) churches for Sunday mass. Amongst all of this we had seen men walking around in Arab style dress – the ones in black looked like the ones from ISIS currently beheading people – all carrying guns. A bit disconcerting. We assumed that there had been some sort of battle enactment. We were wrong, it hadn’t happened yet. A while later, about 11.30 we could hear banging, fireworks? No it was our friends with the guns. We were caught up in total mayhem, around 60 men randomly firing muskets with some sort of blank rounds, the noise, smoke and flames from the muzzles were incredible. We were about to climb the Torres de Serranos which is where, unbeknown to us, the grand, and deafening, finale was going to be. We could feel the blast in our faces on top of the tower. Yet again there was a film camera in attendance. I couldn’t get close ups but I got a good overview and shot my first video with the 5D, my first in 5 years of owning a DLSR with the capability. I usually use my phone ( I used my phone as well). Later in the day there was a bullfight taking place, the ring was almost next to our hotel, in the end we had other things to do and gave it a miss, it was certainly a busy Sunday in the city centre, whether it’s the norm or not I don’t know.
There is a tram system in Valencia but it goes from the port area into the newer part of the city on the north side, it wouldn’t be feasible to serve the historic old city really. A quick internet search told me that there are 55,000 university students in the city, a pretty big number. I think a lot of the campus is on the north side and served by the tram although there is a massive fleet of buses as well. There is a massive, very impressive market building , with 100’s of stalls that would make a photo project on its own, beautiful on the inside and out but very difficult to get decent photos of the exterior other than detail shots owing to the closeness of other buildings and the sheer size of it. Across town, another market has been beautifully renovated and is full of bars and restaurants and a bit of a destination in its own right.
A downside was the all too typical shafting by the taxi drivers who use every trick in the book to side step the official tariffs and rob you. The taxi from the airport had a “broken” meter and on the way home we were driven 22 km instead of the nine that is the actual distance. Some of them seem to view tourists as cash cows to be robbed at all costs. I emailed the Marriot hotel as they ordered the taxi, needless to say no answer from Marriot – they’ve had their money. We didn’t get the rip off treatment in the bars etc. that we experienced in Rome, prices are very fair on most things, certainly considering the city location.
All in all we had a good trip and can highly recommend Valencia.
Graffiti (plural; singular graffiti or graffito, the latter rarely used except in archeology) is art that is written, painted or drawn on a wall or other surface, usually without permission and within public view. Graffiti ranges from simple written words to elaborate wall paintings, and has existed since ancient times, with examples dating back to ancient Egypt, ancient Greece, and the Roman Empire (see also mural).
Graffiti is a controversial subject. In most countries, marking or painting property without permission is considered by property owners and civic authorities as defacement and vandalism, which is a punishable crime, citing the use of graffiti by street gangs to mark territory or to serve as an indicator of gang-related activities. Graffiti has become visualized as a growing urban "problem" for many cities in industrialized nations, spreading from the New York City subway system and Philadelphia in the early 1970s to the rest of the United States and Europe and other world regions
"Graffiti" (usually both singular and plural) and the rare singular form "graffito" are from the Italian word graffiato ("scratched"). The term "graffiti" is used in art history for works of art produced by scratching a design into a surface. A related term is "sgraffito", which involves scratching through one layer of pigment to reveal another beneath it. This technique was primarily used by potters who would glaze their wares and then scratch a design into them. In ancient times graffiti were carved on walls with a sharp object, although sometimes chalk or coal were used. The word originates from Greek γράφειν—graphein—meaning "to write".
The term graffiti originally referred to the inscriptions, figure drawings, and such, found on the walls of ancient sepulchres or ruins, as in the Catacombs of Rome or at Pompeii. Historically, these writings were not considered vanadlism, which today is considered part of the definition of graffiti.
The only known source of the Safaitic language, an ancient form of Arabic, is from graffiti: inscriptions scratched on to the surface of rocks and boulders in the predominantly basalt desert of southern Syria, eastern Jordan and northern Saudi Arabia. Safaitic dates from the first century BC to the fourth century AD.
Some of the oldest cave paintings in the world are 40,000 year old ones found in Australia. The oldest written graffiti was found in ancient Rome around 2500 years ago. Most graffiti from the time was boasts about sexual experiences Graffiti in Ancient Rome was a form of communication, and was not considered vandalism.
Ancient tourists visiting the 5th-century citadel at Sigiriya in Sri Lanka write their names and commentary over the "mirror wall", adding up to over 1800 individual graffiti produced there between the 6th and 18th centuries. Most of the graffiti refer to the frescoes of semi-nude females found there. One reads:
Wet with cool dew drops
fragrant with perfume from the flowers
came the gentle breeze
jasmine and water lily
dance in the spring sunshine
side-long glances
of the golden-hued ladies
stab into my thoughts
heaven itself cannot take my mind
as it has been captivated by one lass
among the five hundred I have seen here.
Among the ancient political graffiti examples were Arab satirist poems. Yazid al-Himyari, an Umayyad Arab and Persian poet, was most known for writing his political poetry on the walls between Sajistan and Basra, manifesting a strong hatred towards the Umayyad regime and its walis, and people used to read and circulate them very widely.
Graffiti, known as Tacherons, were frequently scratched on Romanesque Scandinavian church walls. When Renaissance artists such as Pinturicchio, Raphael, Michelangelo, Ghirlandaio, or Filippino Lippi descended into the ruins of Nero's Domus Aurea, they carved or painted their names and returned to initiate the grottesche style of decoration.
There are also examples of graffiti occurring in American history, such as Independence Rock, a national landmark along the Oregon Trail.
Later, French soldiers carved their names on monuments during the Napoleonic campaign of Egypt in the 1790s. Lord Byron's survives on one of the columns of the Temple of Poseidon at Cape Sounion in Attica, Greece.
The oldest known example of graffiti "monikers" found on traincars created by hobos and railworkers since the late 1800s. The Bozo Texino monikers were documented by filmmaker Bill Daniel in his 2005 film, Who is Bozo Texino?.
In World War II, an inscription on a wall at the fortress of Verdun was seen as an illustration of the US response twice in a generation to the wrongs of the Old World:
During World War II and for decades after, the phrase "Kilroy was here" with an accompanying illustration was widespread throughout the world, due to its use by American troops and ultimately filtering into American popular culture. Shortly after the death of Charlie Parker (nicknamed "Yardbird" or "Bird"), graffiti began appearing around New York with the words "Bird Lives".
Modern graffiti art has its origins with young people in 1960s and 70s in New York City and Philadelphia. Tags were the first form of stylised contemporary graffiti. Eventually, throw-ups and pieces evolved with the desire to create larger art. Writers used spray paint and other kind of materials to leave tags or to create images on the sides subway trains. and eventually moved into the city after the NYC metro began to buy new trains and paint over graffiti.
While the art had many advocates and appreciators—including the cultural critic Norman Mailer—others, including New York City mayor Ed Koch, considered it to be defacement of public property, and saw it as a form of public blight. The ‘taggers’ called what they did ‘writing’—though an important 1974 essay by Mailer referred to it using the term ‘graffiti.’
Contemporary graffiti style has been heavily influenced by hip hop culture and the myriad international styles derived from Philadelphia and New York City Subway graffiti; however, there are many other traditions of notable graffiti in the twentieth century. Graffiti have long appeared on building walls, in latrines, railroad boxcars, subways, and bridges.
An early graffito outside of New York or Philadelphia was the inscription in London reading "Clapton is God" in reference to the guitarist Eric Clapton. Creating the cult of the guitar hero, the phrase was spray-painted by an admirer on a wall in an Islington, north London in the autumn of 1967. The graffito was captured in a photograph, in which a dog is urinating on the wall.
Films like Style Wars in the 80s depicting famous writers such as Skeme, Dondi, MinOne, and ZEPHYR reinforced graffiti's role within New York's emerging hip-hop culture. Although many officers of the New York City Police Department found this film to be controversial, Style Wars is still recognized as the most prolific film representation of what was going on within the young hip hop culture of the early 1980s. Fab 5 Freddy and Futura 2000 took hip hop graffiti to Paris and London as part of the New York City Rap Tour in 1983
Commercialization and entrance into mainstream pop culture
Main article: Commercial graffiti
With the popularity and legitimization of graffiti has come a level of commercialization. In 2001, computer giant IBM launched an advertising campaign in Chicago and San Francisco which involved people spray painting on sidewalks a peace symbol, a heart, and a penguin (Linux mascot), to represent "Peace, Love, and Linux." IBM paid Chicago and San Francisco collectively US$120,000 for punitive damages and clean-up costs.
In 2005, a similar ad campaign was launched by Sony and executed by its advertising agency in New York, Chicago, Atlanta, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, and Miami, to market its handheld PSP gaming system. In this campaign, taking notice of the legal problems of the IBM campaign, Sony paid building owners for the rights to paint on their buildings "a collection of dizzy-eyed urban kids playing with the PSP as if it were a skateboard, a paddle, or a rocking horse".
Tristan Manco wrote that Brazil "boasts a unique and particularly rich, graffiti scene ... [earning] it an international reputation as the place to go for artistic inspiration". Graffiti "flourishes in every conceivable space in Brazil's cities". Artistic parallels "are often drawn between the energy of São Paulo today and 1970s New York". The "sprawling metropolis", of São Paulo has "become the new shrine to graffiti"; Manco alludes to "poverty and unemployment ... [and] the epic struggles and conditions of the country's marginalised peoples", and to "Brazil's chronic poverty", as the main engines that "have fuelled a vibrant graffiti culture". In world terms, Brazil has "one of the most uneven distributions of income. Laws and taxes change frequently". Such factors, Manco argues, contribute to a very fluid society, riven with those economic divisions and social tensions that underpin and feed the "folkloric vandalism and an urban sport for the disenfranchised", that is South American graffiti art.
Prominent Brazilian writers include Os Gêmeos, Boleta, Nunca, Nina, Speto, Tikka, and T.Freak. Their artistic success and involvement in commercial design ventures has highlighted divisions within the Brazilian graffiti community between adherents of the cruder transgressive form of pichação and the more conventionally artistic values of the practitioners of grafite.
Graffiti in the Middle East has emerged slowly, with taggers operating in Egypt, Lebanon, the Gulf countries like Bahrain or the United Arab Emirates, Israel, and in Iran. The major Iranian newspaper Hamshahri has published two articles on illegal writers in the city with photographic coverage of Iranian artist A1one's works on Tehran walls. Tokyo-based design magazine, PingMag, has interviewed A1one and featured photographs of his work. The Israeli West Bank barrier has become a site for graffiti, reminiscent in this sense of the Berlin Wall. Many writers in Israel come from other places around the globe, such as JUIF from Los Angeles and DEVIONE from London. The religious reference "נ נח נחמ נחמן מאומן" ("Na Nach Nachma Nachman Meuman") is commonly seen in graffiti around Israel.
Graffiti has played an important role within the street art scene in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), especially following the events of the Arab Spring of 2011 or the Sudanese Revolution of 2018/19. Graffiti is a tool of expression in the context of conflict in the region, allowing people to raise their voices politically and socially. Famous street artist Banksy has had an important effect in the street art scene in the MENA area, especially in Palestine where some of his works are located in the West Bank barrier and Bethlehem.
There are also a large number of graffiti influences in Southeast Asian countries that mostly come from modern Western culture, such as Malaysia, where graffiti have long been a common sight in Malaysia's capital city, Kuala Lumpur. Since 2010, the country has begun hosting a street festival to encourage all generations and people from all walks of life to enjoy and encourage Malaysian street culture.
The modern-day graffitists can be found with an arsenal of various materials that allow for a successful production of a piece. This includes such techniques as scribing. However, spray paint in aerosol cans is the number one medium for graffiti. From this commodity comes different styles, technique, and abilities to form master works of graffiti. Spray paint can be found at hardware and art stores and comes in virtually every color.
Stencil graffiti is created by cutting out shapes and designs in a stiff material (such as cardboard or subject folders) to form an overall design or image. The stencil is then placed on the "canvas" gently and with quick, easy strokes of the aerosol can, the image begins to appear on the intended surface.
Some of the first examples were created in 1981 by artists Blek le Rat in Paris, in 1982 by Jef Aerosol in Tours (France); by 1985 stencils had appeared in other cities including New York City, Sydney, and Melbourne, where they were documented by American photographer Charles Gatewood and Australian photographer Rennie Ellis
Tagging is the practice of someone spray-painting "their name, initial or logo onto a public surface" in a handstyle unique to the writer. Tags were the first form of modern graffiti.
Modern graffiti art often incorporates additional arts and technologies. For example, Graffiti Research Lab has encouraged the use of projected images and magnetic light-emitting diodes (throwies) as new media for graffitists. yarnbombing is another recent form of graffiti. Yarnbombers occasionally target previous graffiti for modification, which had been avoided among the majority of graffitists.
Theories on the use of graffiti by avant-garde artists have a history dating back at least to the Asger Jorn, who in 1962 painting declared in a graffiti-like gesture "the avant-garde won't give up"
Many contemporary analysts and even art critics have begun to see artistic value in some graffiti and to recognize it as a form of public art. According to many art researchers, particularly in the Netherlands and in Los Angeles, that type of public art is, in fact an effective tool of social emancipation or, in the achievement of a political goal
In times of conflict, such murals have offered a means of communication and self-expression for members of these socially, ethnically, or racially divided communities, and have proven themselves as effective tools in establishing dialog and thus, of addressing cleavages in the long run. The Berlin Wall was also extensively covered by graffiti reflecting social pressures relating to the oppressive Soviet rule over the GDR.
Many artists involved with graffiti are also concerned with the similar activity of stenciling. Essentially, this entails stenciling a print of one or more colors using spray-paint. Recognized while exhibiting and publishing several of her coloured stencils and paintings portraying the Sri Lankan Civil War and urban Britain in the early 2000s, graffitists Mathangi Arulpragasam, aka M.I.A., has also become known for integrating her imagery of political violence into her music videos for singles "Galang" and "Bucky Done Gun", and her cover art. Stickers of her artwork also often appear around places such as London in Brick Lane, stuck to lamp posts and street signs, she having become a muse for other graffitists and painters worldwide in cities including Seville.
Graffitist believes that art should be on display for everyone in the public eye or in plain sight, not hidden away in a museum or a gallery. Art should color the streets, not the inside of some building. Graffiti is a form of art that cannot be owned or bought. It does not last forever, it is temporary, yet one of a kind. It is a form of self promotion for the artist that can be displayed anywhere form sidewalks, roofs, subways, building wall, etc. Art to them is for everyone and should be showed to everyone for free.
Graffiti is a way of communicating and a way of expressing what one feels in the moment. It is both art and a functional thing that can warn people of something or inform people of something. However, graffiti is to some people a form of art, but to some a form of vandalism. And many graffitists choose to protect their identities and remain anonymous or to hinder prosecution.
With the commercialization of graffiti (and hip hop in general), in most cases, even with legally painted "graffiti" art, graffitists tend to choose anonymity. This may be attributed to various reasons or a combination of reasons. Graffiti still remains the one of four hip hop elements that is not considered "performance art" despite the image of the "singing and dancing star" that sells hip hop culture to the mainstream. Being a graphic form of art, it might also be said that many graffitists still fall in the category of the introverted archetypal artist.
Banksy is one of the world's most notorious and popular street artists who continues to remain faceless in today's society. He is known for his political, anti-war stencil art mainly in Bristol, England, but his work may be seen anywhere from Los Angeles to Palestine. In the UK, Banksy is the most recognizable icon for this cultural artistic movement and keeps his identity a secret to avoid arrest. Much of Banksy's artwork may be seen around the streets of London and surrounding suburbs, although he has painted pictures throughout the world, including the Middle East, where he has painted on Israel's controversial West Bank barrier with satirical images of life on the other side. One depicted a hole in the wall with an idyllic beach, while another shows a mountain landscape on the other side. A number of exhibitions also have taken place since 2000, and recent works of art have fetched vast sums of money. Banksy's art is a prime example of the classic controversy: vandalism vs. art. Art supporters endorse his work distributed in urban areas as pieces of art and some councils, such as Bristol and Islington, have officially protected them, while officials of other areas have deemed his work to be vandalism and have removed it.
Pixnit is another artist who chooses to keep her identity from the general public. Her work focuses on beauty and design aspects of graffiti as opposed to Banksy's anti-government shock value. Her paintings are often of flower designs above shops and stores in her local urban area of Cambridge, Massachusetts. Some store owners endorse her work and encourage others to do similar work as well. "One of the pieces was left up above Steve's Kitchen, because it looks pretty awesome"- Erin Scott, the manager of New England Comics in Allston, Massachusetts.
Graffiti artists may become offended if photographs of their art are published in a commercial context without their permission. In March 2020, the Finnish graffiti artist Psyke expressed his displeasure at the newspaper Ilta-Sanomat publishing a photograph of a Peugeot 208 in an article about new cars, with his graffiti prominently shown on the background. The artist claims he does not want his art being used in commercial context, not even if he were to receive compensation.
Territorial graffiti marks urban neighborhoods with tags and logos to differentiate certain groups from others. These images are meant to show outsiders a stern look at whose turf is whose. The subject matter of gang-related graffiti consists of cryptic symbols and initials strictly fashioned with unique calligraphies. Gang members use graffiti to designate membership throughout the gang, to differentiate rivals and associates and, most commonly, to mark borders which are both territorial and ideological.
Graffiti has been used as a means of advertising both legally and illegally. Bronx-based TATS CRU has made a name for themselves doing legal advertising campaigns for companies such as Coca-Cola, McDonald's, Toyota, and MTV. In the UK, Covent Garden's Boxfresh used stencil images of a Zapatista revolutionary in the hopes that cross referencing would promote their store.
Smirnoff hired artists to use reverse graffiti (the use of high pressure hoses to clean dirty surfaces to leave a clean image in the surrounding dirt) to increase awareness of their product.
Graffiti often has a reputation as part of a subculture that rebels against authority, although the considerations of the practitioners often diverge and can relate to a wide range of attitudes. It can express a political practice and can form just one tool in an array of resistance techniques. One early example includes the anarcho-punk band Crass, who conducted a campaign of stenciling anti-war, anarchist, feminist, and anti-consumerist messages throughout the London Underground system during the late 1970s and early 1980s. In Amsterdam graffiti was a major part of the punk scene. The city was covered with names such as "De Zoot", "Vendex", and "Dr Rat". To document the graffiti a punk magazine was started that was called Gallery Anus. So when hip hop came to Europe in the early 1980s there was already a vibrant graffiti culture.
The student protests and general strike of May 1968 saw Paris bedecked in revolutionary, anarchistic, and situationist slogans such as L'ennui est contre-révolutionnaire ("Boredom is counterrevolutionary") and Lisez moins, vivez plus ("Read less, live more"). While not exhaustive, the graffiti gave a sense of the 'millenarian' and rebellious spirit, tempered with a good deal of verbal wit, of the strikers.
I think graffiti writing is a way of defining what our generation is like. Excuse the French, we're not a bunch of p---- artists. Traditionally artists have been considered soft and mellow people, a little bit kooky. Maybe we're a little bit more like pirates that way. We defend our territory, whatever space we steal to paint on, we defend it fiercely.
The developments of graffiti art which took place in art galleries and colleges as well as "on the street" or "underground", contributed to the resurfacing in the 1990s of a far more overtly politicized art form in the subvertising, culture jamming, or tactical media movements. These movements or styles tend to classify the artists by their relationship to their social and economic contexts, since, in most countries, graffiti art remains illegal in many forms except when using non-permanent paint. Since the 1990s with the rise of Street Art, a growing number of artists are switching to non-permanent paints and non-traditional forms of painting.
Contemporary practitioners, accordingly, have varied and often conflicting practices. Some individuals, such as Alexander Brener, have used the medium to politicize other art forms, and have used the prison sentences enforced on them as a means of further protest. The practices of anonymous groups and individuals also vary widely, and practitioners by no means always agree with each other's practices. For example, the anti-capitalist art group the Space Hijackers did a piece in 2004 about the contradiction between the capitalistic elements of Banksy and his use of political imagery.
Berlin human rights activist Irmela Mensah-Schramm has received global media attention and numerous awards for her 35-year campaign of effacing neo-Nazi and other right-wing extremist graffiti throughout Germany, often by altering hate speech in humorous ways.
In Serbian capital, Belgrade, the graffiti depicting a uniformed former general of Serb army and war criminal, convicted at ICTY for war crimes and crimes against humanity, including genocide and ethnic cleansing in Bosnian War, Ratko Mladić, appeared in a military salute alongside the words "General, thank to your mother". Aleks Eror, Berlin-based journalist, explains how "veneration of historical and wartime figures" through street art is not a new phenomenon in the region of former Yugoslavia, and that "in most cases is firmly focused on the future, rather than retelling the past". Eror is not only analyst pointing to danger of such an expressions for the region's future. In a long expose on the subject of Bosnian genocide denial, at Balkan Diskurs magazine and multimedia platform website, Kristina Gadže and Taylor Whitsell referred to these experiences as a young generations' "cultural heritage", in which young are being exposed to celebration and affirmation of war-criminals as part of their "formal education" and "inheritance".
There are numerous examples of genocide denial through celebration and affirmation of war criminals throughout the region of Western Balkans inhabited by Serbs using this form of artistic expression. Several more of these graffiti are found in Serbian capital, and many more across Serbia and Bosnian and Herzegovinian administrative entity, Republika Srpska, which is the ethnic Serbian majority enclave. Critics point that Serbia as a state, is willing to defend the mural of convicted war criminal, and have no intention to react on cases of genocide denial, noting that Interior Minister of Serbia, Aleksandar Vulin decision to ban any gathering with an intent to remove the mural, with the deployment of riot police, sends the message of "tacit endorsement". Consequently, on 9 November 2021, Serbian heavy police in riot gear, with graffiti creators and their supporters, blocked the access to the mural to prevent human rights groups and other activists to paint over it and mark the International Day Against Fascism and Antisemitism in that way, and even arrested two civic activist for throwing eggs at the graffiti.
Graffiti may also be used as an offensive expression. This form of graffiti may be difficult to identify, as it is mostly removed by the local authority (as councils which have adopted strategies of criminalization also strive to remove graffiti quickly). Therefore, existing racist graffiti is mostly more subtle and at first sight, not easily recognized as "racist". It can then be understood only if one knows the relevant "local code" (social, historical, political, temporal, and spatial), which is seen as heteroglot and thus a 'unique set of conditions' in a cultural context.
A spatial code for example, could be that there is a certain youth group in an area that is engaging heavily in racist activities. So, for residents (knowing the local code), a graffiti containing only the name or abbreviation of this gang already is a racist expression, reminding the offended people of their gang activities. Also a graffiti is in most cases, the herald of more serious criminal activity to come. A person who does not know these gang activities would not be able to recognize the meaning of this graffiti. Also if a tag of this youth group or gang is placed on a building occupied by asylum seekers, for example, its racist character is even stronger.
By making the graffiti less explicit (as adapted to social and legal constraints), these drawings are less likely to be removed, but do not lose their threatening and offensive character.
Elsewhere, activists in Russia have used painted caricatures of local officials with their mouths as potholes, to show their anger about the poor state of the roads. In Manchester, England, a graffitists painted obscene images around potholes, which often resulted in them being repaired within 48 hours.
In the early 1980s, the first art galleries to show graffitists to the public were Fashion Moda in the Bronx, Now Gallery and Fun Gallery, both in the East Village, Manhattan.
A 2006 exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum displayed graffiti as an art form that began in New York's outer boroughs and reached great heights in the early 1980s with the work of Crash, Lee, Daze, Keith Haring, and Jean-Michel Basquiat. It displayed 22 works by New York graffitists, including Crash, Daze, and Lady Pink. In an article about the exhibition in the magazine Time Out, curator Charlotta Kotik said that she hoped the exhibition would cause viewers to rethink their assumptions about graffiti.
From the 1970s onwards, Burhan Doğançay photographed urban walls all over the world; these he then archived for use as sources of inspiration for his painterly works. The project today known as "Walls of the World" grew beyond even his own expectations and comprises about 30,000 individual images. It spans a period of 40 years across five continents and 114 countries. In 1982, photographs from this project comprised a one-man exhibition titled "Les murs murmurent, ils crient, ils chantent ..." (The walls whisper, shout and sing ...) at the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris.
In Australia, art historians have judged some local graffiti of sufficient creative merit to rank them firmly within the arts. Oxford University Press's art history text Australian Painting 1788–2000 concludes with a long discussion of graffiti's key place within contemporary visual culture, including the work of several Australian practitioners.
Between March and April 2009, 150 artists exhibited 300 pieces of graffiti at the Grand Palais in Paris.
Spray paint has many negative environmental effects. The paint contains toxic chemicals, and the can uses volatile hydrocarbon gases to spray the paint onto a surface.
Volatile organic compound (VOC) leads to ground level ozone formation and most of graffiti related emissions are VOCs. A 2010 paper estimates 4,862 tons of VOCs were released in the United States in activities related to graffiti.
In China, Mao Zedong in the 1920s used revolutionary slogans and paintings in public places to galvanize the country's communist movement.
Based on different national conditions, many people believe that China's attitude towards Graffiti is fierce, but in fact, according to Lance Crayon in his film Spray Paint Beijing: Graffiti in the Capital of China, Graffiti is generally accepted in Beijing, with artists not seeing much police interference. Political and religiously sensitive graffiti, however, is not allowed.
In Hong Kong, Tsang Tsou Choi was known as the King of Kowloon for his calligraphy graffiti over many years, in which he claimed ownership of the area. Now some of his work is preserved officially.
In Taiwan, the government has made some concessions to graffitists. Since 2005 they have been allowed to freely display their work along some sections of riverside retaining walls in designated "Graffiti Zones". From 2007, Taipei's department of cultural affairs also began permitting graffiti on fences around major public construction sites. Department head Yong-ping Lee (李永萍) stated, "We will promote graffiti starting with the public sector, and then later in the private sector too. It's our goal to beautify the city with graffiti". The government later helped organize a graffiti contest in Ximending, a popular shopping district. graffitists caught working outside of these designated areas still face fines up to NT$6,000 under a department of environmental protection regulation. However, Taiwanese authorities can be relatively lenient, one veteran police officer stating anonymously, "Unless someone complains about vandalism, we won't get involved. We don't go after it proactively."
In 1993, after several expensive cars in Singapore were spray-painted, the police arrested a student from the Singapore American School, Michael P. Fay, questioned him, and subsequently charged him with vandalism. Fay pleaded guilty to vandalizing a car in addition to stealing road signs. Under the 1966 Vandalism Act of Singapore, originally passed to curb the spread of communist graffiti in Singapore, the court sentenced him to four months in jail, a fine of S$3,500 (US$2,233), and a caning. The New York Times ran several editorials and op-eds that condemned the punishment and called on the American public to flood the Singaporean embassy with protests. Although the Singapore government received many calls for clemency, Fay's caning took place in Singapore on 5 May 1994. Fay had originally received a sentence of six strokes of the cane, but the presiding president of Singapore, Ong Teng Cheong, agreed to reduce his caning sentence to four lashes.
In South Korea, Park Jung-soo was fined two million South Korean won by the Seoul Central District Court for spray-painting a rat on posters of the G-20 Summit a few days before the event in November 2011. Park alleged that the initial in "G-20" sounds like the Korean word for "rat", but Korean government prosecutors alleged that Park was making a derogatory statement about the president of South Korea, Lee Myung-bak, the host of the summit. This case led to public outcry and debate on the lack of government tolerance and in support of freedom of expression. The court ruled that the painting, "an ominous creature like a rat" amounts to "an organized criminal activity" and upheld the fine while denying the prosecution's request for imprisonment for Park.
In Europe, community cleaning squads have responded to graffiti, in some cases with reckless abandon, as when in 1992 in France a local Scout group, attempting to remove modern graffiti, damaged two prehistoric paintings of bison in the Cave of Mayrière supérieure near the French village of Bruniquel in Tarn-et-Garonne, earning them the 1992 Ig Nobel Prize in archeology.
In September 2006, the European Parliament directed the European Commission to create urban environment policies to prevent and eliminate dirt, litter, graffiti, animal excrement, and excessive noise from domestic and vehicular music systems in European cities, along with other concerns over urban life.
In Budapest, Hungary, both a city-backed movement called I Love Budapest and a special police division tackle the problem, including the provision of approved areas.
The Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003 became Britain's latest anti-graffiti legislation. In August 2004, the Keep Britain Tidy campaign issued a press release calling for zero tolerance of graffiti and supporting proposals such as issuing "on the spot" fines to graffiti offenders and banning the sale of aerosol paint to anyone under the age of 16. The press release also condemned the use of graffiti images in advertising and in music videos, arguing that real-world experience of graffiti stood far removed from its often-portrayed "cool" or "edgy'" image.
To back the campaign, 123 Members of Parliament (MPs) (including then Prime Minister Tony Blair), signed a charter which stated: "Graffiti is not art, it's crime. On behalf of my constituents, I will do all I can to rid our community of this problem."
In the UK, city councils have the power to take action against the owner of any property that has been defaced under the Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003 (as amended by the Clean Neighbourhoods and Environment Act 2005) or, in certain cases, the Highways Act. This is often used against owners of property that are complacent in allowing protective boards to be defaced so long as the property is not damaged.
In July 2008, a conspiracy charge was used to convict graffitists for the first time. After a three-month police surveillance operation, nine members of the DPM crew were convicted of conspiracy to commit criminal damage costing at least £1 million. Five of them received prison sentences, ranging from eighteen months to two years. The unprecedented scale of the investigation and the severity of the sentences rekindled public debate over whether graffiti should be considered art or crime.
Some councils, like those of Stroud and Loerrach, provide approved areas in the town where graffitists can showcase their talents, including underpasses, car parks, and walls that might otherwise prove a target for the "spray and run".
Graffiti Tunnel, University of Sydney at Camperdown (2009)
In an effort to reduce vandalism, many cities in Australia have designated walls or areas exclusively for use by graffitists. One early example is the "Graffiti Tunnel" located at the Camperdown Campus of the University of Sydney, which is available for use by any student at the university to tag, advertise, poster, and paint. Advocates of this idea suggest that this discourages petty vandalism yet encourages artists to take their time and produce great art, without worry of being caught or arrested for vandalism or trespassing.[108][109] Others disagree with this approach, arguing that the presence of legal graffiti walls does not demonstrably reduce illegal graffiti elsewhere. Some local government areas throughout Australia have introduced "anti-graffiti squads", who clean graffiti in the area, and such crews as BCW (Buffers Can't Win) have taken steps to keep one step ahead of local graffiti cleaners.
Many state governments have banned the sale or possession of spray paint to those under the age of 18 (age of majority). However, a number of local governments in Victoria have taken steps to recognize the cultural heritage value of some examples of graffiti, such as prominent political graffiti. Tough new graffiti laws have been introduced in Australia with fines of up to A$26,000 and two years in prison.
Melbourne is a prominent graffiti city of Australia with many of its lanes being tourist attractions, such as Hosier Lane in particular, a popular destination for photographers, wedding photography, and backdrops for corporate print advertising. The Lonely Planet travel guide cites Melbourne's street as a major attraction. All forms of graffiti, including sticker art, poster, stencil art, and wheatpasting, can be found in many places throughout the city. Prominent street art precincts include; Fitzroy, Collingwood, Northcote, Brunswick, St. Kilda, and the CBD, where stencil and sticker art is prominent. As one moves farther away from the city, mostly along suburban train lines, graffiti tags become more prominent. Many international artists such as Banksy have left their work in Melbourne and in early 2008 a perspex screen was installed to prevent a Banksy stencil art piece from being destroyed, it has survived since 2003 through the respect of local street artists avoiding posting over it, although it has recently had paint tipped over it.
In February 2008 Helen Clark, the New Zealand prime minister at that time, announced a government crackdown on tagging and other forms of graffiti vandalism, describing it as a destructive crime representing an invasion of public and private property. New legislation subsequently adopted included a ban on the sale of paint spray cans to persons under 18 and increases in maximum fines for the offence from NZ$200 to NZ$2,000 or extended community service. The issue of tagging become a widely debated one following an incident in Auckland during January 2008 in which a middle-aged property owner stabbed one of two teenage taggers to death and was subsequently convicted of manslaughter.
Graffiti databases have increased in the past decade because they allow vandalism incidents to be fully documented against an offender and help the police and prosecution charge and prosecute offenders for multiple counts of vandalism. They also provide law enforcement the ability to rapidly search for an offender's moniker or tag in a simple, effective, and comprehensive way. These systems can also help track costs of damage to a city to help allocate an anti-graffiti budget. The theory is that when an offender is caught putting up graffiti, they are not just charged with one count of vandalism; they can be held accountable for all the other damage for which they are responsible. This has two main benefits for law enforcement. One, it sends a signal to the offenders that their vandalism is being tracked. Two, a city can seek restitution from offenders for all the damage that they have committed, not merely a single incident. These systems give law enforcement personnel real-time, street-level intelligence that allows them not only to focus on the worst graffiti offenders and their damage, but also to monitor potential gang violence that is associated with the graffiti.
Many restrictions of civil gang injunctions are designed to help address and protect the physical environment and limit graffiti. Provisions of gang injunctions include things such as restricting the possession of marker pens, spray paint cans, or other sharp objects capable of defacing private or public property; spray painting, or marking with marker pens, scratching, applying stickers, or otherwise applying graffiti on any public or private property, including, but not limited to the street, alley, residences, block walls, and fences, vehicles or any other real or personal property. Some injunctions contain wording that restricts damaging or vandalizing both public and private property, including but not limited to any vehicle, light fixture, door, fence, wall, gate, window, building, street sign, utility box, telephone box, tree, or power pole.
To help address many of these issues, many local jurisdictions have set up graffiti abatement hotlines, where citizens can call in and report vandalism and have it removed. San Diego's hotline receives more than 5,000 calls per year, in addition to reporting the graffiti, callers can learn more about prevention. One of the complaints about these hotlines is the response time; there is often a lag time between a property owner calling about the graffiti and its removal. The length of delay should be a consideration for any jurisdiction planning on operating a hotline. Local jurisdictions must convince the callers that their complaint of vandalism will be a priority and cleaned off right away. If the jurisdiction does not have the resources to respond to complaints in a timely manner, the value of the hotline diminishes. Crews must be able to respond to individual service calls made to the graffiti hotline as well as focus on cleanup near schools, parks, and major intersections and transit routes to have the biggest impact. Some cities offer a reward for information leading to the arrest and prosecution of suspects for tagging or graffiti related vandalism. The amount of the reward is based on the information provided, and the action taken.
When police obtain search warrants in connection with a vandalism investigation, they are often seeking judicial approval to look for items such as cans of spray paint and nozzles from other kinds of aerosol sprays; etching tools, or other sharp or pointed objects, which could be used to etch or scratch glass and other hard surfaces; permanent marking pens, markers, or paint sticks; evidence of membership or affiliation with any gang or tagging crew; paraphernalia including any reference to "(tagger's name)"; any drawings, writing, objects, or graffiti depicting taggers' names, initials, logos, monikers, slogans, or any mention of tagging crew membership; and any newspaper clippings relating to graffiti crime.
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Graffiti (plural; singular graffiti or graffito, the latter rarely used except in archeology) is art that is written, painted or drawn on a wall or other surface, usually without permission and within public view. Graffiti ranges from simple written words to elaborate wall paintings, and has existed since ancient times, with examples dating back to ancient Egypt, ancient Greece, and the Roman Empire (see also mural).
Graffiti is a controversial subject. In most countries, marking or painting property without permission is considered by property owners and civic authorities as defacement and vandalism, which is a punishable crime, citing the use of graffiti by street gangs to mark territory or to serve as an indicator of gang-related activities. Graffiti has become visualized as a growing urban "problem" for many cities in industrialized nations, spreading from the New York City subway system and Philadelphia in the early 1970s to the rest of the United States and Europe and other world regions
"Graffiti" (usually both singular and plural) and the rare singular form "graffito" are from the Italian word graffiato ("scratched"). The term "graffiti" is used in art history for works of art produced by scratching a design into a surface. A related term is "sgraffito", which involves scratching through one layer of pigment to reveal another beneath it. This technique was primarily used by potters who would glaze their wares and then scratch a design into them. In ancient times graffiti were carved on walls with a sharp object, although sometimes chalk or coal were used. The word originates from Greek γράφειν—graphein—meaning "to write".
The term graffiti originally referred to the inscriptions, figure drawings, and such, found on the walls of ancient sepulchres or ruins, as in the Catacombs of Rome or at Pompeii. Historically, these writings were not considered vanadlism, which today is considered part of the definition of graffiti.
The only known source of the Safaitic language, an ancient form of Arabic, is from graffiti: inscriptions scratched on to the surface of rocks and boulders in the predominantly basalt desert of southern Syria, eastern Jordan and northern Saudi Arabia. Safaitic dates from the first century BC to the fourth century AD.
Some of the oldest cave paintings in the world are 40,000 year old ones found in Australia. The oldest written graffiti was found in ancient Rome around 2500 years ago. Most graffiti from the time was boasts about sexual experiences Graffiti in Ancient Rome was a form of communication, and was not considered vandalism.
Ancient tourists visiting the 5th-century citadel at Sigiriya in Sri Lanka write their names and commentary over the "mirror wall", adding up to over 1800 individual graffiti produced there between the 6th and 18th centuries. Most of the graffiti refer to the frescoes of semi-nude females found there. One reads:
Wet with cool dew drops
fragrant with perfume from the flowers
came the gentle breeze
jasmine and water lily
dance in the spring sunshine
side-long glances
of the golden-hued ladies
stab into my thoughts
heaven itself cannot take my mind
as it has been captivated by one lass
among the five hundred I have seen here.
Among the ancient political graffiti examples were Arab satirist poems. Yazid al-Himyari, an Umayyad Arab and Persian poet, was most known for writing his political poetry on the walls between Sajistan and Basra, manifesting a strong hatred towards the Umayyad regime and its walis, and people used to read and circulate them very widely.
Graffiti, known as Tacherons, were frequently scratched on Romanesque Scandinavian church walls. When Renaissance artists such as Pinturicchio, Raphael, Michelangelo, Ghirlandaio, or Filippino Lippi descended into the ruins of Nero's Domus Aurea, they carved or painted their names and returned to initiate the grottesche style of decoration.
There are also examples of graffiti occurring in American history, such as Independence Rock, a national landmark along the Oregon Trail.
Later, French soldiers carved their names on monuments during the Napoleonic campaign of Egypt in the 1790s. Lord Byron's survives on one of the columns of the Temple of Poseidon at Cape Sounion in Attica, Greece.
The oldest known example of graffiti "monikers" found on traincars created by hobos and railworkers since the late 1800s. The Bozo Texino monikers were documented by filmmaker Bill Daniel in his 2005 film, Who is Bozo Texino?.
In World War II, an inscription on a wall at the fortress of Verdun was seen as an illustration of the US response twice in a generation to the wrongs of the Old World:
During World War II and for decades after, the phrase "Kilroy was here" with an accompanying illustration was widespread throughout the world, due to its use by American troops and ultimately filtering into American popular culture. Shortly after the death of Charlie Parker (nicknamed "Yardbird" or "Bird"), graffiti began appearing around New York with the words "Bird Lives".
Modern graffiti art has its origins with young people in 1960s and 70s in New York City and Philadelphia. Tags were the first form of stylised contemporary graffiti. Eventually, throw-ups and pieces evolved with the desire to create larger art. Writers used spray paint and other kind of materials to leave tags or to create images on the sides subway trains. and eventually moved into the city after the NYC metro began to buy new trains and paint over graffiti.
While the art had many advocates and appreciators—including the cultural critic Norman Mailer—others, including New York City mayor Ed Koch, considered it to be defacement of public property, and saw it as a form of public blight. The ‘taggers’ called what they did ‘writing’—though an important 1974 essay by Mailer referred to it using the term ‘graffiti.’
Contemporary graffiti style has been heavily influenced by hip hop culture and the myriad international styles derived from Philadelphia and New York City Subway graffiti; however, there are many other traditions of notable graffiti in the twentieth century. Graffiti have long appeared on building walls, in latrines, railroad boxcars, subways, and bridges.
An early graffito outside of New York or Philadelphia was the inscription in London reading "Clapton is God" in reference to the guitarist Eric Clapton. Creating the cult of the guitar hero, the phrase was spray-painted by an admirer on a wall in an Islington, north London in the autumn of 1967. The graffito was captured in a photograph, in which a dog is urinating on the wall.
Films like Style Wars in the 80s depicting famous writers such as Skeme, Dondi, MinOne, and ZEPHYR reinforced graffiti's role within New York's emerging hip-hop culture. Although many officers of the New York City Police Department found this film to be controversial, Style Wars is still recognized as the most prolific film representation of what was going on within the young hip hop culture of the early 1980s. Fab 5 Freddy and Futura 2000 took hip hop graffiti to Paris and London as part of the New York City Rap Tour in 1983
Commercialization and entrance into mainstream pop culture
Main article: Commercial graffiti
With the popularity and legitimization of graffiti has come a level of commercialization. In 2001, computer giant IBM launched an advertising campaign in Chicago and San Francisco which involved people spray painting on sidewalks a peace symbol, a heart, and a penguin (Linux mascot), to represent "Peace, Love, and Linux." IBM paid Chicago and San Francisco collectively US$120,000 for punitive damages and clean-up costs.
In 2005, a similar ad campaign was launched by Sony and executed by its advertising agency in New York, Chicago, Atlanta, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, and Miami, to market its handheld PSP gaming system. In this campaign, taking notice of the legal problems of the IBM campaign, Sony paid building owners for the rights to paint on their buildings "a collection of dizzy-eyed urban kids playing with the PSP as if it were a skateboard, a paddle, or a rocking horse".
Tristan Manco wrote that Brazil "boasts a unique and particularly rich, graffiti scene ... [earning] it an international reputation as the place to go for artistic inspiration". Graffiti "flourishes in every conceivable space in Brazil's cities". Artistic parallels "are often drawn between the energy of São Paulo today and 1970s New York". The "sprawling metropolis", of São Paulo has "become the new shrine to graffiti"; Manco alludes to "poverty and unemployment ... [and] the epic struggles and conditions of the country's marginalised peoples", and to "Brazil's chronic poverty", as the main engines that "have fuelled a vibrant graffiti culture". In world terms, Brazil has "one of the most uneven distributions of income. Laws and taxes change frequently". Such factors, Manco argues, contribute to a very fluid society, riven with those economic divisions and social tensions that underpin and feed the "folkloric vandalism and an urban sport for the disenfranchised", that is South American graffiti art.
Prominent Brazilian writers include Os Gêmeos, Boleta, Nunca, Nina, Speto, Tikka, and T.Freak. Their artistic success and involvement in commercial design ventures has highlighted divisions within the Brazilian graffiti community between adherents of the cruder transgressive form of pichação and the more conventionally artistic values of the practitioners of grafite.
Graffiti in the Middle East has emerged slowly, with taggers operating in Egypt, Lebanon, the Gulf countries like Bahrain or the United Arab Emirates, Israel, and in Iran. The major Iranian newspaper Hamshahri has published two articles on illegal writers in the city with photographic coverage of Iranian artist A1one's works on Tehran walls. Tokyo-based design magazine, PingMag, has interviewed A1one and featured photographs of his work. The Israeli West Bank barrier has become a site for graffiti, reminiscent in this sense of the Berlin Wall. Many writers in Israel come from other places around the globe, such as JUIF from Los Angeles and DEVIONE from London. The religious reference "נ נח נחמ נחמן מאומן" ("Na Nach Nachma Nachman Meuman") is commonly seen in graffiti around Israel.
Graffiti has played an important role within the street art scene in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), especially following the events of the Arab Spring of 2011 or the Sudanese Revolution of 2018/19. Graffiti is a tool of expression in the context of conflict in the region, allowing people to raise their voices politically and socially. Famous street artist Banksy has had an important effect in the street art scene in the MENA area, especially in Palestine where some of his works are located in the West Bank barrier and Bethlehem.
There are also a large number of graffiti influences in Southeast Asian countries that mostly come from modern Western culture, such as Malaysia, where graffiti have long been a common sight in Malaysia's capital city, Kuala Lumpur. Since 2010, the country has begun hosting a street festival to encourage all generations and people from all walks of life to enjoy and encourage Malaysian street culture.
The modern-day graffitists can be found with an arsenal of various materials that allow for a successful production of a piece. This includes such techniques as scribing. However, spray paint in aerosol cans is the number one medium for graffiti. From this commodity comes different styles, technique, and abilities to form master works of graffiti. Spray paint can be found at hardware and art stores and comes in virtually every color.
Stencil graffiti is created by cutting out shapes and designs in a stiff material (such as cardboard or subject folders) to form an overall design or image. The stencil is then placed on the "canvas" gently and with quick, easy strokes of the aerosol can, the image begins to appear on the intended surface.
Some of the first examples were created in 1981 by artists Blek le Rat in Paris, in 1982 by Jef Aerosol in Tours (France); by 1985 stencils had appeared in other cities including New York City, Sydney, and Melbourne, where they were documented by American photographer Charles Gatewood and Australian photographer Rennie Ellis
Tagging is the practice of someone spray-painting "their name, initial or logo onto a public surface" in a handstyle unique to the writer. Tags were the first form of modern graffiti.
Modern graffiti art often incorporates additional arts and technologies. For example, Graffiti Research Lab has encouraged the use of projected images and magnetic light-emitting diodes (throwies) as new media for graffitists. yarnbombing is another recent form of graffiti. Yarnbombers occasionally target previous graffiti for modification, which had been avoided among the majority of graffitists.
Theories on the use of graffiti by avant-garde artists have a history dating back at least to the Asger Jorn, who in 1962 painting declared in a graffiti-like gesture "the avant-garde won't give up"
Many contemporary analysts and even art critics have begun to see artistic value in some graffiti and to recognize it as a form of public art. According to many art researchers, particularly in the Netherlands and in Los Angeles, that type of public art is, in fact an effective tool of social emancipation or, in the achievement of a political goal
In times of conflict, such murals have offered a means of communication and self-expression for members of these socially, ethnically, or racially divided communities, and have proven themselves as effective tools in establishing dialog and thus, of addressing cleavages in the long run. The Berlin Wall was also extensively covered by graffiti reflecting social pressures relating to the oppressive Soviet rule over the GDR.
Many artists involved with graffiti are also concerned with the similar activity of stenciling. Essentially, this entails stenciling a print of one or more colors using spray-paint. Recognized while exhibiting and publishing several of her coloured stencils and paintings portraying the Sri Lankan Civil War and urban Britain in the early 2000s, graffitists Mathangi Arulpragasam, aka M.I.A., has also become known for integrating her imagery of political violence into her music videos for singles "Galang" and "Bucky Done Gun", and her cover art. Stickers of her artwork also often appear around places such as London in Brick Lane, stuck to lamp posts and street signs, she having become a muse for other graffitists and painters worldwide in cities including Seville.
Graffitist believes that art should be on display for everyone in the public eye or in plain sight, not hidden away in a museum or a gallery. Art should color the streets, not the inside of some building. Graffiti is a form of art that cannot be owned or bought. It does not last forever, it is temporary, yet one of a kind. It is a form of self promotion for the artist that can be displayed anywhere form sidewalks, roofs, subways, building wall, etc. Art to them is for everyone and should be showed to everyone for free.
Graffiti is a way of communicating and a way of expressing what one feels in the moment. It is both art and a functional thing that can warn people of something or inform people of something. However, graffiti is to some people a form of art, but to some a form of vandalism. And many graffitists choose to protect their identities and remain anonymous or to hinder prosecution.
With the commercialization of graffiti (and hip hop in general), in most cases, even with legally painted "graffiti" art, graffitists tend to choose anonymity. This may be attributed to various reasons or a combination of reasons. Graffiti still remains the one of four hip hop elements that is not considered "performance art" despite the image of the "singing and dancing star" that sells hip hop culture to the mainstream. Being a graphic form of art, it might also be said that many graffitists still fall in the category of the introverted archetypal artist.
Banksy is one of the world's most notorious and popular street artists who continues to remain faceless in today's society. He is known for his political, anti-war stencil art mainly in Bristol, England, but his work may be seen anywhere from Los Angeles to Palestine. In the UK, Banksy is the most recognizable icon for this cultural artistic movement and keeps his identity a secret to avoid arrest. Much of Banksy's artwork may be seen around the streets of London and surrounding suburbs, although he has painted pictures throughout the world, including the Middle East, where he has painted on Israel's controversial West Bank barrier with satirical images of life on the other side. One depicted a hole in the wall with an idyllic beach, while another shows a mountain landscape on the other side. A number of exhibitions also have taken place since 2000, and recent works of art have fetched vast sums of money. Banksy's art is a prime example of the classic controversy: vandalism vs. art. Art supporters endorse his work distributed in urban areas as pieces of art and some councils, such as Bristol and Islington, have officially protected them, while officials of other areas have deemed his work to be vandalism and have removed it.
Pixnit is another artist who chooses to keep her identity from the general public. Her work focuses on beauty and design aspects of graffiti as opposed to Banksy's anti-government shock value. Her paintings are often of flower designs above shops and stores in her local urban area of Cambridge, Massachusetts. Some store owners endorse her work and encourage others to do similar work as well. "One of the pieces was left up above Steve's Kitchen, because it looks pretty awesome"- Erin Scott, the manager of New England Comics in Allston, Massachusetts.
Graffiti artists may become offended if photographs of their art are published in a commercial context without their permission. In March 2020, the Finnish graffiti artist Psyke expressed his displeasure at the newspaper Ilta-Sanomat publishing a photograph of a Peugeot 208 in an article about new cars, with his graffiti prominently shown on the background. The artist claims he does not want his art being used in commercial context, not even if he were to receive compensation.
Territorial graffiti marks urban neighborhoods with tags and logos to differentiate certain groups from others. These images are meant to show outsiders a stern look at whose turf is whose. The subject matter of gang-related graffiti consists of cryptic symbols and initials strictly fashioned with unique calligraphies. Gang members use graffiti to designate membership throughout the gang, to differentiate rivals and associates and, most commonly, to mark borders which are both territorial and ideological.
Graffiti has been used as a means of advertising both legally and illegally. Bronx-based TATS CRU has made a name for themselves doing legal advertising campaigns for companies such as Coca-Cola, McDonald's, Toyota, and MTV. In the UK, Covent Garden's Boxfresh used stencil images of a Zapatista revolutionary in the hopes that cross referencing would promote their store.
Smirnoff hired artists to use reverse graffiti (the use of high pressure hoses to clean dirty surfaces to leave a clean image in the surrounding dirt) to increase awareness of their product.
Graffiti often has a reputation as part of a subculture that rebels against authority, although the considerations of the practitioners often diverge and can relate to a wide range of attitudes. It can express a political practice and can form just one tool in an array of resistance techniques. One early example includes the anarcho-punk band Crass, who conducted a campaign of stenciling anti-war, anarchist, feminist, and anti-consumerist messages throughout the London Underground system during the late 1970s and early 1980s. In Amsterdam graffiti was a major part of the punk scene. The city was covered with names such as "De Zoot", "Vendex", and "Dr Rat". To document the graffiti a punk magazine was started that was called Gallery Anus. So when hip hop came to Europe in the early 1980s there was already a vibrant graffiti culture.
The student protests and general strike of May 1968 saw Paris bedecked in revolutionary, anarchistic, and situationist slogans such as L'ennui est contre-révolutionnaire ("Boredom is counterrevolutionary") and Lisez moins, vivez plus ("Read less, live more"). While not exhaustive, the graffiti gave a sense of the 'millenarian' and rebellious spirit, tempered with a good deal of verbal wit, of the strikers.
I think graffiti writing is a way of defining what our generation is like. Excuse the French, we're not a bunch of p---- artists. Traditionally artists have been considered soft and mellow people, a little bit kooky. Maybe we're a little bit more like pirates that way. We defend our territory, whatever space we steal to paint on, we defend it fiercely.
The developments of graffiti art which took place in art galleries and colleges as well as "on the street" or "underground", contributed to the resurfacing in the 1990s of a far more overtly politicized art form in the subvertising, culture jamming, or tactical media movements. These movements or styles tend to classify the artists by their relationship to their social and economic contexts, since, in most countries, graffiti art remains illegal in many forms except when using non-permanent paint. Since the 1990s with the rise of Street Art, a growing number of artists are switching to non-permanent paints and non-traditional forms of painting.
Contemporary practitioners, accordingly, have varied and often conflicting practices. Some individuals, such as Alexander Brener, have used the medium to politicize other art forms, and have used the prison sentences enforced on them as a means of further protest. The practices of anonymous groups and individuals also vary widely, and practitioners by no means always agree with each other's practices. For example, the anti-capitalist art group the Space Hijackers did a piece in 2004 about the contradiction between the capitalistic elements of Banksy and his use of political imagery.
Berlin human rights activist Irmela Mensah-Schramm has received global media attention and numerous awards for her 35-year campaign of effacing neo-Nazi and other right-wing extremist graffiti throughout Germany, often by altering hate speech in humorous ways.
In Serbian capital, Belgrade, the graffiti depicting a uniformed former general of Serb army and war criminal, convicted at ICTY for war crimes and crimes against humanity, including genocide and ethnic cleansing in Bosnian War, Ratko Mladić, appeared in a military salute alongside the words "General, thank to your mother". Aleks Eror, Berlin-based journalist, explains how "veneration of historical and wartime figures" through street art is not a new phenomenon in the region of former Yugoslavia, and that "in most cases is firmly focused on the future, rather than retelling the past". Eror is not only analyst pointing to danger of such an expressions for the region's future. In a long expose on the subject of Bosnian genocide denial, at Balkan Diskurs magazine and multimedia platform website, Kristina Gadže and Taylor Whitsell referred to these experiences as a young generations' "cultural heritage", in which young are being exposed to celebration and affirmation of war-criminals as part of their "formal education" and "inheritance".
There are numerous examples of genocide denial through celebration and affirmation of war criminals throughout the region of Western Balkans inhabited by Serbs using this form of artistic expression. Several more of these graffiti are found in Serbian capital, and many more across Serbia and Bosnian and Herzegovinian administrative entity, Republika Srpska, which is the ethnic Serbian majority enclave. Critics point that Serbia as a state, is willing to defend the mural of convicted war criminal, and have no intention to react on cases of genocide denial, noting that Interior Minister of Serbia, Aleksandar Vulin decision to ban any gathering with an intent to remove the mural, with the deployment of riot police, sends the message of "tacit endorsement". Consequently, on 9 November 2021, Serbian heavy police in riot gear, with graffiti creators and their supporters, blocked the access to the mural to prevent human rights groups and other activists to paint over it and mark the International Day Against Fascism and Antisemitism in that way, and even arrested two civic activist for throwing eggs at the graffiti.
Graffiti may also be used as an offensive expression. This form of graffiti may be difficult to identify, as it is mostly removed by the local authority (as councils which have adopted strategies of criminalization also strive to remove graffiti quickly). Therefore, existing racist graffiti is mostly more subtle and at first sight, not easily recognized as "racist". It can then be understood only if one knows the relevant "local code" (social, historical, political, temporal, and spatial), which is seen as heteroglot and thus a 'unique set of conditions' in a cultural context.
A spatial code for example, could be that there is a certain youth group in an area that is engaging heavily in racist activities. So, for residents (knowing the local code), a graffiti containing only the name or abbreviation of this gang already is a racist expression, reminding the offended people of their gang activities. Also a graffiti is in most cases, the herald of more serious criminal activity to come. A person who does not know these gang activities would not be able to recognize the meaning of this graffiti. Also if a tag of this youth group or gang is placed on a building occupied by asylum seekers, for example, its racist character is even stronger.
By making the graffiti less explicit (as adapted to social and legal constraints), these drawings are less likely to be removed, but do not lose their threatening and offensive character.
Elsewhere, activists in Russia have used painted caricatures of local officials with their mouths as potholes, to show their anger about the poor state of the roads. In Manchester, England, a graffitists painted obscene images around potholes, which often resulted in them being repaired within 48 hours.
In the early 1980s, the first art galleries to show graffitists to the public were Fashion Moda in the Bronx, Now Gallery and Fun Gallery, both in the East Village, Manhattan.
A 2006 exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum displayed graffiti as an art form that began in New York's outer boroughs and reached great heights in the early 1980s with the work of Crash, Lee, Daze, Keith Haring, and Jean-Michel Basquiat. It displayed 22 works by New York graffitists, including Crash, Daze, and Lady Pink. In an article about the exhibition in the magazine Time Out, curator Charlotta Kotik said that she hoped the exhibition would cause viewers to rethink their assumptions about graffiti.
From the 1970s onwards, Burhan Doğançay photographed urban walls all over the world; these he then archived for use as sources of inspiration for his painterly works. The project today known as "Walls of the World" grew beyond even his own expectations and comprises about 30,000 individual images. It spans a period of 40 years across five continents and 114 countries. In 1982, photographs from this project comprised a one-man exhibition titled "Les murs murmurent, ils crient, ils chantent ..." (The walls whisper, shout and sing ...) at the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris.
In Australia, art historians have judged some local graffiti of sufficient creative merit to rank them firmly within the arts. Oxford University Press's art history text Australian Painting 1788–2000 concludes with a long discussion of graffiti's key place within contemporary visual culture, including the work of several Australian practitioners.
Between March and April 2009, 150 artists exhibited 300 pieces of graffiti at the Grand Palais in Paris.
Spray paint has many negative environmental effects. The paint contains toxic chemicals, and the can uses volatile hydrocarbon gases to spray the paint onto a surface.
Volatile organic compound (VOC) leads to ground level ozone formation and most of graffiti related emissions are VOCs. A 2010 paper estimates 4,862 tons of VOCs were released in the United States in activities related to graffiti.
In China, Mao Zedong in the 1920s used revolutionary slogans and paintings in public places to galvanize the country's communist movement.
Based on different national conditions, many people believe that China's attitude towards Graffiti is fierce, but in fact, according to Lance Crayon in his film Spray Paint Beijing: Graffiti in the Capital of China, Graffiti is generally accepted in Beijing, with artists not seeing much police interference. Political and religiously sensitive graffiti, however, is not allowed.
In Hong Kong, Tsang Tsou Choi was known as the King of Kowloon for his calligraphy graffiti over many years, in which he claimed ownership of the area. Now some of his work is preserved officially.
In Taiwan, the government has made some concessions to graffitists. Since 2005 they have been allowed to freely display their work along some sections of riverside retaining walls in designated "Graffiti Zones". From 2007, Taipei's department of cultural affairs also began permitting graffiti on fences around major public construction sites. Department head Yong-ping Lee (李永萍) stated, "We will promote graffiti starting with the public sector, and then later in the private sector too. It's our goal to beautify the city with graffiti". The government later helped organize a graffiti contest in Ximending, a popular shopping district. graffitists caught working outside of these designated areas still face fines up to NT$6,000 under a department of environmental protection regulation. However, Taiwanese authorities can be relatively lenient, one veteran police officer stating anonymously, "Unless someone complains about vandalism, we won't get involved. We don't go after it proactively."
In 1993, after several expensive cars in Singapore were spray-painted, the police arrested a student from the Singapore American School, Michael P. Fay, questioned him, and subsequently charged him with vandalism. Fay pleaded guilty to vandalizing a car in addition to stealing road signs. Under the 1966 Vandalism Act of Singapore, originally passed to curb the spread of communist graffiti in Singapore, the court sentenced him to four months in jail, a fine of S$3,500 (US$2,233), and a caning. The New York Times ran several editorials and op-eds that condemned the punishment and called on the American public to flood the Singaporean embassy with protests. Although the Singapore government received many calls for clemency, Fay's caning took place in Singapore on 5 May 1994. Fay had originally received a sentence of six strokes of the cane, but the presiding president of Singapore, Ong Teng Cheong, agreed to reduce his caning sentence to four lashes.
In South Korea, Park Jung-soo was fined two million South Korean won by the Seoul Central District Court for spray-painting a rat on posters of the G-20 Summit a few days before the event in November 2011. Park alleged that the initial in "G-20" sounds like the Korean word for "rat", but Korean government prosecutors alleged that Park was making a derogatory statement about the president of South Korea, Lee Myung-bak, the host of the summit. This case led to public outcry and debate on the lack of government tolerance and in support of freedom of expression. The court ruled that the painting, "an ominous creature like a rat" amounts to "an organized criminal activity" and upheld the fine while denying the prosecution's request for imprisonment for Park.
In Europe, community cleaning squads have responded to graffiti, in some cases with reckless abandon, as when in 1992 in France a local Scout group, attempting to remove modern graffiti, damaged two prehistoric paintings of bison in the Cave of Mayrière supérieure near the French village of Bruniquel in Tarn-et-Garonne, earning them the 1992 Ig Nobel Prize in archeology.
In September 2006, the European Parliament directed the European Commission to create urban environment policies to prevent and eliminate dirt, litter, graffiti, animal excrement, and excessive noise from domestic and vehicular music systems in European cities, along with other concerns over urban life.
In Budapest, Hungary, both a city-backed movement called I Love Budapest and a special police division tackle the problem, including the provision of approved areas.
The Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003 became Britain's latest anti-graffiti legislation. In August 2004, the Keep Britain Tidy campaign issued a press release calling for zero tolerance of graffiti and supporting proposals such as issuing "on the spot" fines to graffiti offenders and banning the sale of aerosol paint to anyone under the age of 16. The press release also condemned the use of graffiti images in advertising and in music videos, arguing that real-world experience of graffiti stood far removed from its often-portrayed "cool" or "edgy'" image.
To back the campaign, 123 Members of Parliament (MPs) (including then Prime Minister Tony Blair), signed a charter which stated: "Graffiti is not art, it's crime. On behalf of my constituents, I will do all I can to rid our community of this problem."
In the UK, city councils have the power to take action against the owner of any property that has been defaced under the Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003 (as amended by the Clean Neighbourhoods and Environment Act 2005) or, in certain cases, the Highways Act. This is often used against owners of property that are complacent in allowing protective boards to be defaced so long as the property is not damaged.
In July 2008, a conspiracy charge was used to convict graffitists for the first time. After a three-month police surveillance operation, nine members of the DPM crew were convicted of conspiracy to commit criminal damage costing at least £1 million. Five of them received prison sentences, ranging from eighteen months to two years. The unprecedented scale of the investigation and the severity of the sentences rekindled public debate over whether graffiti should be considered art or crime.
Some councils, like those of Stroud and Loerrach, provide approved areas in the town where graffitists can showcase their talents, including underpasses, car parks, and walls that might otherwise prove a target for the "spray and run".
Graffiti Tunnel, University of Sydney at Camperdown (2009)
In an effort to reduce vandalism, many cities in Australia have designated walls or areas exclusively for use by graffitists. One early example is the "Graffiti Tunnel" located at the Camperdown Campus of the University of Sydney, which is available for use by any student at the university to tag, advertise, poster, and paint. Advocates of this idea suggest that this discourages petty vandalism yet encourages artists to take their time and produce great art, without worry of being caught or arrested for vandalism or trespassing.[108][109] Others disagree with this approach, arguing that the presence of legal graffiti walls does not demonstrably reduce illegal graffiti elsewhere. Some local government areas throughout Australia have introduced "anti-graffiti squads", who clean graffiti in the area, and such crews as BCW (Buffers Can't Win) have taken steps to keep one step ahead of local graffiti cleaners.
Many state governments have banned the sale or possession of spray paint to those under the age of 18 (age of majority). However, a number of local governments in Victoria have taken steps to recognize the cultural heritage value of some examples of graffiti, such as prominent political graffiti. Tough new graffiti laws have been introduced in Australia with fines of up to A$26,000 and two years in prison.
Melbourne is a prominent graffiti city of Australia with many of its lanes being tourist attractions, such as Hosier Lane in particular, a popular destination for photographers, wedding photography, and backdrops for corporate print advertising. The Lonely Planet travel guide cites Melbourne's street as a major attraction. All forms of graffiti, including sticker art, poster, stencil art, and wheatpasting, can be found in many places throughout the city. Prominent street art precincts include; Fitzroy, Collingwood, Northcote, Brunswick, St. Kilda, and the CBD, where stencil and sticker art is prominent. As one moves farther away from the city, mostly along suburban train lines, graffiti tags become more prominent. Many international artists such as Banksy have left their work in Melbourne and in early 2008 a perspex screen was installed to prevent a Banksy stencil art piece from being destroyed, it has survived since 2003 through the respect of local street artists avoiding posting over it, although it has recently had paint tipped over it.
In February 2008 Helen Clark, the New Zealand prime minister at that time, announced a government crackdown on tagging and other forms of graffiti vandalism, describing it as a destructive crime representing an invasion of public and private property. New legislation subsequently adopted included a ban on the sale of paint spray cans to persons under 18 and increases in maximum fines for the offence from NZ$200 to NZ$2,000 or extended community service. The issue of tagging become a widely debated one following an incident in Auckland during January 2008 in which a middle-aged property owner stabbed one of two teenage taggers to death and was subsequently convicted of manslaughter.
Graffiti databases have increased in the past decade because they allow vandalism incidents to be fully documented against an offender and help the police and prosecution charge and prosecute offenders for multiple counts of vandalism. They also provide law enforcement the ability to rapidly search for an offender's moniker or tag in a simple, effective, and comprehensive way. These systems can also help track costs of damage to a city to help allocate an anti-graffiti budget. The theory is that when an offender is caught putting up graffiti, they are not just charged with one count of vandalism; they can be held accountable for all the other damage for which they are responsible. This has two main benefits for law enforcement. One, it sends a signal to the offenders that their vandalism is being tracked. Two, a city can seek restitution from offenders for all the damage that they have committed, not merely a single incident. These systems give law enforcement personnel real-time, street-level intelligence that allows them not only to focus on the worst graffiti offenders and their damage, but also to monitor potential gang violence that is associated with the graffiti.
Many restrictions of civil gang injunctions are designed to help address and protect the physical environment and limit graffiti. Provisions of gang injunctions include things such as restricting the possession of marker pens, spray paint cans, or other sharp objects capable of defacing private or public property; spray painting, or marking with marker pens, scratching, applying stickers, or otherwise applying graffiti on any public or private property, including, but not limited to the street, alley, residences, block walls, and fences, vehicles or any other real or personal property. Some injunctions contain wording that restricts damaging or vandalizing both public and private property, including but not limited to any vehicle, light fixture, door, fence, wall, gate, window, building, street sign, utility box, telephone box, tree, or power pole.
To help address many of these issues, many local jurisdictions have set up graffiti abatement hotlines, where citizens can call in and report vandalism and have it removed. San Diego's hotline receives more than 5,000 calls per year, in addition to reporting the graffiti, callers can learn more about prevention. One of the complaints about these hotlines is the response time; there is often a lag time between a property owner calling about the graffiti and its removal. The length of delay should be a consideration for any jurisdiction planning on operating a hotline. Local jurisdictions must convince the callers that their complaint of vandalism will be a priority and cleaned off right away. If the jurisdiction does not have the resources to respond to complaints in a timely manner, the value of the hotline diminishes. Crews must be able to respond to individual service calls made to the graffiti hotline as well as focus on cleanup near schools, parks, and major intersections and transit routes to have the biggest impact. Some cities offer a reward for information leading to the arrest and prosecution of suspects for tagging or graffiti related vandalism. The amount of the reward is based on the information provided, and the action taken.
When police obtain search warrants in connection with a vandalism investigation, they are often seeking judicial approval to look for items such as cans of spray paint and nozzles from other kinds of aerosol sprays; etching tools, or other sharp or pointed objects, which could be used to etch or scratch glass and other hard surfaces; permanent marking pens, markers, or paint sticks; evidence of membership or affiliation with any gang or tagging crew; paraphernalia including any reference to "(tagger's name)"; any drawings, writing, objects, or graffiti depicting taggers' names, initials, logos, monikers, slogans, or any mention of tagging crew membership; and any newspaper clippings relating to graffiti crime.
He went on telling me about his life while I was taking his photo, and then he said "I used to be a graphic designer. The first business meeting I went to they said half a million dollars wasn't enough. But I'm here asking for loonies and toonies."-Matt Alvarez (right)
Pentax K1000
SMC Pentax-A 50mm 1:1.7
Fujifilm Superia 400
"Estenderam Mitsuki sobre o banco e logo Mary foi ver o que estava errado"
Mary: *pega o pulso de Mikky* Hm...ela está respirando,o que é bom...engraçado,parece estar apenas desmaiada.
Ícaro: Eu disse que não tinha feito nada.
Mel: *se aproxima de Mikky* Coma após ter ingerido muito sangue...e perdeu grande quantidade também...tudo indica que um pacto foi realizado. Essas marcas no pescoço estão muito profundas para serem uma mordida normal...
Mary: *suspira* Eu sabia que tinha algo errado,eu sabia!
Mel: Esperem!Tenho algo a te perguntar Ícaro...você por acaso...
Ícaro: *irritado* O que está insinuando?Que eu comi minha irmã e deixei ela em coma?!
Mel: *sorri* Exatamente.
Ícaro: *facepalm* Não...não foi isso que aconteceu,nós só realizamos um pacto antigo de magia proibida do fogo...um pacto que implica na morte de alguém.
Mel & Mary: *olhar assustado*
continua
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Ok demorei um ano pra postar mas é porque to doente u.u Acho que posto mais uma parte hoje ainda XD
Did your smartphone went swimming? Or you just accidentally dropped it right into the harm’s way? Or enjoyed the rain with your priced possession in your pocket? To be honest this is situation is faced by many smartphone owners once in a while. The smartphone takes a deadly plunge right into water which is followed by freaking out and trying almost anything and everything to bring it back to life.
If your smartphones comes with a removable battery then remove the back panel and take out the battery as soon as you can after taking it out of water. Leaving it switched on can cause it to short circuit. If your smartphone comes with a non-removable battery then shut it down immediately by pressing the power button for 5 seconds to prevent further damage.
Remember in either case do not try to turn it on in any case as short circuit can occur and chances are fair that your phone will not be able to see another light of day. Shutting it down prevents it from short circuiting.
Remember keep it in screen up direction all times whether drying or not. Gravity is a fascinating thing and it will prevent water from reaching your display.
Open you phone up using necessary tools and gently use a dry cloth or paper towel to absorb the water by dabbing on the affected areas. Do not wipe hurriedly as you may spread water and it may do more harm than good. Moisture corrodes the circuit inside your phone so try to take out as much moisture as you can. You can use a vacuum cleaner to suck out the water from all the ports and openings as well as from the circuit board. Vacuum cleaner is the best hep you can get immediately when water is logged in your phone.
Saturday.
And already, our days in the heather-thatched cottage are coming to an end, as we leave here in two days. Oh dearie dearie me.
But before then, a major problem, in that we are running out of clean clothes. With our dongle-provided mega-slow internet connection, I find a post code of a laundrette in Hexham. With bags of rancid washing, we climb into the car and drive to the bright lights of Hexham.
The laundrette, or laundry, will do our clothes, and do them in three hours, so disaster averted. Waitrose opened at eight, so we stocked up on beer/cider and also got croissants for breakfast. So, despite being at the northern extreme of the empire, we could have a French style breakfast.
Outside, all was grey and gloomy; a light drizzle fell, so after discovering the car radio could pick up DAB radio, we tried the radio we brought inside, and with the radio in the one place in the living room that could pick up a signal, we sat listening to Danny Baker and his milk bottle-inspired stories.
As you do.
I look at some leaflets, and recall listening to a funny radio show by Mark Steel about Barnard’s Castle. The Bowes Museum looks like a French Chateu, has paintings and stuff. Which is why in ten minutes, we have loaded up the car and are heading to County Durham, again.
Up through Hexham, pausing to collect our freshly laundered washing, then up along narrow wall-lined lanes, up in the to foothills. Oddly, it all looked familiar, then it clicked: this was the road we travelled when we came up for a wedding on an old RAF friend of mine.
Anyway, past the Traveller’s Rest pub, and along roads that went up and down like a roller coaster, until the rad began to climb up and up. And just kept going. Soon we were ount on the moors, travelling along a road lined with wooden posts, used to find it when the snow fell. It was wonderfully bleak stuff.
The light was sensational, illuminating the rolling hills, covered with heather; glowing purple in the sunlight.
The road then started to descend, then drop like a stone into the town of Stanhope. We crossed the river, then the road reared up like a bucking bronko once again, in triple hairpin bends. Then we were crossing moors again, sunlight playing on the rolling moors. The fields were unfenced, so as well as the ducking and diving road, there were the silly sheep to contend with, who were prone to just wandering across the road.
A lone descent once again this time towards Barnard’s Castle, into a fine market town, the high street lined with interesting shops, and at the far end, a round building, around which a roundabout had been built. As you do.
We turned left to the Bowes Museum, and although we knew it was built to look like a French Chateau, to see it there, in the wilds of County Durham, is quite extraordinary.
We were able to park on the wide driveway, walk across the ornamental garden, thus ruining peoples shots, and up the steps leading to the terrace and entrance. The museum has just opened an exhibition of the French designer Yves Saint Laurent, is that how you spell it? Anyway, fashionistas of all ages were there, and us looking like two parcels of scruff. We paid for the ordinary entrance with out the YSL ticket.
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The Bowes Museum is a hidden treasure, a jewel in the heart of beautiful Teesdale. The magnificent building stands proud in the historic market town of Barnard Castle housing internationally significant collections of fine and decorative arts. Purpose built in the 19th century by John and Joséphine Bowes, the Museum has a wonderful story to tell.
John, the son of the 10th Earl of Strathmore, was born at No 13 South Street, Chelsea, London. His mother was a commoner, Mary Millner, who caught the Earl's eye when she worked on his Teesdale estate and ended up living with the Earl to all intents as his wife for many years. The Earl married her just 16 hours before his death in an unsuccessful attempt to secure his son’s succession. Two very long court cases ensued, finally settling the Durham estates on John, but not recognising him as the legitimate heir to the Strathmore title.
John was educated at Eton and became a very successful businessman who profited from the coal reserves on his land. From 1847 he spent his time between France and England exploring his interest in the arts. It was here he bought a theatre and met the Parisian actress Joséphine Coffin-Chevallier.
Joséphine was born in 1825. She was an actress in the Théatre des Variétés, Paris, owned by John Bowes. Joséphine was a talented amateur painter, who shared John’s love of the arts; she was interested in a range of art forms including paintings, ceramics, furniture and textiles. Once the couple married in 1852 they soon began to develop the idea of creating a world-class museum back in John’s ancestral home of Teesdale in order to introduce the wider world of art to the local people.
The prospect was daunting; nothing had matched the scale, grandeur or location of this colossal proposal in their lifetime. Plans were meticulously scrutinised and painstakingly formed in order to give the North East a truly magnificent edifice, a home suitably fitting for all the precious treasures which would be contained within it.
The Bowes’ enthusiasm was immeasurable as Joséphine laid the foundation stone in 1869. She said: ‘I lay the bottom stone, and you, Mr Bowes, will lay the top stone’. As the building grew, so did their collection and an astounding 15,000 objects were purchased between 1862 and 1874.
Suddenly the project was blighted when Joséphine died in 1874. John’s motivation towards their lifelong achievement took an enormous blow and he virtually ceased collecting. Fortunately the building did continue, but John, like his late wife, never saw its completion. He died in 1885 and never did carry out Joséphine’s wish of laying the top stone.
Despite the death of John and Joséphine, momentum for the project had reached such a scale that it continued under the leadership of Trustees and The Bowes Museum was finally opened to the public on 10th June 1892 and attracted nearly 63,000 visitors in its first year.
John and Joséphine ensured that their Museum was filled with treasures; since collecting has continued since the opening, storage and display space comes at a premium. At every turn you can see important and precious works from all over Europe, and each piece has its own story to tell. However, it is the 240 year-old Silver Swan that is the best-loved object in the Museum. The Silver Swan is an English silver automaton, a unique attraction that was bought by the Bowes in 1872. The life size model is still in working order and is operated at the Museum on a daily basis.
The diverse collection spans three floors of the magnificent building and contains items too numerous to list. Whether it is paintings by Canaletto or Goya, porcelain produced at Sèvres, or marquetry attributed to André-Charles Boulle it can all be found at The Bowes Museum, which has received Designated status from the government in recognition of the outstanding collection.
Visitors to The Bowes Museum today can not only learn of John and Joséphine’s wonderful story and marvel at the fascinating collections but can also enjoy an exciting programme of exhibitions. Activities in the park and a popular café and shop add to the visitor offer at the Museum, making it fit for purpose in the 21st century. The magnificent legacy that John and Joséphine left to the people of Teesdale retains its charm and intrigue yet sympathetic developments have made the attraction a popular, vibrant and exciting day out for all.
Four days after the beer was brewed, the fermenter's lid fell in due to natural decay of the fermenter. Not all that surprising, but this is not a good state of affairs, as it leaves the fermenting beer exposed to tasty beer-unfriendly microorganisms like bacteria and wild yeasts. Note plastic control fermenter at right; its lid did not fall in.
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GEORGE PLANT
George Plant was born on January 5th 1904 in St.Johnstown, Co.Tipperary,the second child in a family of nine. Three of the children died in infancy and George’s father, having developed an alcohol problem left the family and returned to his native Co.Wicklow. Catherine,his wife was left to raise the children and run an eighty acre farm alone.Not surprisingly the family had little time for politics.George attended primary school and then left to work the family farm full time.His conversion to the Republican cause came at the hands of the Royal Irish Constabulary one Sunday in 1916.George and his brother Jimmy were arrested and beaten by the police after attending church in the village of Fethard. Apparently they had been seen in conversation with a local Republican, Sean Hayes. The police wanted information on Hayes and another Volunteer, Dan Breen. The two boys developed a hatred of the police and joined the Irish Republican Army(IRA) in their late teens towards the end of the War of Independence.They were unusual members and probably unique in Tipperary at least in that they were Protestants and should have leaned towards the Unionist end of the political spectrum.
The two brothers took the anti-treaty,Republican side in the Civil war though information is sketchy on their activities.They did however take part in an ambush which is locally famous as the Ambush on the Grey Ghost. The Grey Ghost was a name given to a Lancia armoured car which the National Army had fitted with railway wheels and used to patrol the railway line between the towns of Clonmel and Thurles. He is also reputed to have been the “executioner” of 7th Bn of the IRA. I take this to mean he was a Security or Intelligence Officer. After the Civil War (1923) the brothers fled Ireland for Canada and later the USA. They did return Ireland to conduct such missions as the IRA saw fit. In 1928 they were involved in a bank robbery in Tipperary town for which they were imprisoned. George returned to America on his release and finally returned home for good in 1938. He was still ann active member of the IRA.
In the summer of 1940 an IRA man from Maudlinstown,Co.Wexford by the name of Michael Devereux, was arrested by the Garda Siochana. and after questioning was released without charge. Shortly afterwards some IRA arms dumps were discovered by the Gardai and Devereux was suspected of revealing their locations. IRA HQ in Dublin ordered that he be executed, in September 1940. Devereux’s Divisional Commander selected three men for the job, Michael Walsh from Kilmacow Co.Kilkenny, Paddy Davern from Grangemockler, Co.Tipperary and George Plant.
The plan to kill Devereux could have been written in Hollywood.Called to a meeting with his Battalion Commander, Tom Cullimore, in Wexford, on the 19th of September, Devereux arrived to find Plant and Walsh waiting with the news that Cullimore had been killed and that the three of them had better leave Wexford immediately. Devereux drove into the night with his executioners towards Walsh’s home in Kilmacow. From there they moved on toward Grangemockler, arriving on the morning of the 24th. On the journey they convinced Devereux that he would be blamed for Cullimore’s death and that all three of them should go on the run after disposing of the motor car which would have been a rare commodity in 1940 Ireland. To this end they sheltered in the area for the next three days. Devereux must have been very naïve to fall for this deception and not to have suspected something in the week that his companions spent planning his execution.
On the night of the 27th Plant, Davern and Devereux moved safe houses again, crossing the mountain of Slievenamon on foot. Not far up the side of the hill Plant ccused Devereux of being an informer. Devereux just had time to protest his innocence, Plant drew a pistol and shot him in the head. Devereux’s body was buried in a nearby pit and the grave camouflaged. The car was hidden in a hay stack on the farm of a William Phelan until the following March. When the Gardai broadcast an appeal for information on the whereabouts of Devereux the car was buried on the farm and an onion bed planted on top of it.
Devereux’s disappearance might have remained a mystery but for another suspected informer. This time it was no less than Stephen Hayes, the IRA’s Chief of Staff. In the Spring of 1941 Hayes was arrested in Dublin and held in custody by members of the IRA’s Northern Command. After being court martialled and sentenced to death, Hayes confessed and agreed to write out the details of his activities in a bid to prolong his life. It was well worth the effort because he managed to escape and made immediately for Rathmines Garda station and turned himself in. It now seemed that Hayes was indeed an informer and was probably responsible for the acts for which Michael Devereux paid with his life. Hayes was a former Commanding Officer in Wexford and had ordered the execution of Devereux personally. Whether he was an informer or not George Plant was arrested shortly after Hayes handing himself in to the Gardai.
The trial of George Plant for the murder of Michael Devereux opened in the Special Criminal Court on the 9th of December 1941. Sean McBride SC appeared for the accused. The case collapsed on the 11th because Plant’s companions refused to testify against him. Plant was acquitted but re-arrested under an Emergency Powers order issued on 30th December. Davern and Walsh were also arrested and all three were tried and sentenced to death by Military Tribunal. The sentences hande d down to Davern and Walsh were later commuted to life imprisonment. In fact they were released in early 1946 after four years in prison.
George Plant was not so lucky. On the morning of March 5th 1942 he was escorted from Arbour Hill prison in Dublin to Portlaois Prison by military Escort. There he was executed by firing squad,He was philosophical about his fate. Before his execution he remarked to a prison warden that those who live by the gun,die by the gun. Before he left the prison he gave his sweater to a fellow prisoner with the remark that it wouldn't keep him warm much longer. After execution his body was interred in the prison grounds.His family received no notification of his impending execution and news of the execution was broadcast on national radio before they were officially informed.
Though George Plant was not the only man to be executed under the Emergency Powers act, his is the most famous case because his treatment was grossly unfair,d espite the fact that he undoubtedly murdered a man who was in all likelihood innocent. The case is a stain on the history of the Irish system of justice because the forces of the state acted in the manner of the terrorists they were supposed to combat. By doing so they created a martyr for the IRA, a martyr who is still commemorated annually by a gathering and oration at his graveside in St.Johnstown churchyard where George Plant was re-interred in 1948.
I have been trying to upload an image all day and all I get is this. The same problem has occurred twice more in the last few days.
What is the point of paying for Flickr Pro ???????????????
From a set last fall. I forgot I had these. This is Faith on expired Portra 160VC. We had an awesome afternoon shoot. Wardrobe by Ellene McClay
Camera: Plaubel Makina 67
Film: Expired Kodak Portra 160VC
The worst problem, one that would happen in public places, one that was difficult to fix while keeping a modest front, was a misbehaving garter.
PS Please if you do not want your picture to appear here, tell me and I’ll remove it
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For "Our Daily Challenge ... play". Cooper is not usually allowed to play with the light switches but he was so intent on working out which switch turned on each light I left him to it and he didn't even notice when I took his photo.
Ever wondered what's inside an air compressor cylinder head? I didn't until my less than three year old, two piston Cambell Hausfeld 60 gallon 3.2. Hp stationary air compressor took too long to build pressure and was making a strange sound broadcasting from its air intake filter. I'm getting close to spraying primer on the Bluejacket topsides thus not good timing for the compressor to fail.
Pictured is the compressor's valve plate which has reed valves to control air intake and outflow. A reed had snapped off of a cylinder's outlet port causing the problem. This failed reed covered (from the backside of the plate as pictured) ) the lower left oval shaped port. A $44 replacement valve plate with gaskets is now on order and will require about 30 minutes of my time to install.
I wish I could quickly find the definitive answer why my Boston Whaler's Mercury outboard has ignition spark problems and why my Saturn auto is leaking voltage and killing the battery if the car has been at rest for three days or more. With a golf cart battery recently exploding (shredded the battery top) about two feet from my face as I examined it, I have been having a run of bad luck with stuff breaking or attacking me. This explosion taught me that a lead acid battery gives off hydrogen gas when discharging. I thought it only happened when charging.
Edit 04/14/2014 : My bad luck continues as the fan in one of our outside central a/c cabinets stopped turning thus the upstairs portion of our home was un-air conditioned. An advantage of multiple outside A/C cabinets is having the means to obtain comparative numbers when running electrical tests as well as swapping parts. The suspect fan motor's run and start windings passed my resistance tests, and the start capacitor tested good via my capacitance tester. Perhaps the fan motor failed because the thermal overload protector went bad. I swapped this failed motor out for the fan motor in the A/C cabinet for my workshop. Upstairs A/C restored and off I go to the Internet for a replacement motor.
I await the next equipment failure...
Edit. 08/20/2014: The fan in the AC compressor for the upstairs again stopped turning. Not on the scene in Texas, I called in a HVAC technician. The start capacitor had failed. The technician reported that when a fan motor fails as mine did in April, it is very common for the start capacitor to soon fail.
Edit 09/15/2018: Another start capacitor failed. With power applied to the unit, the compressor was running and the non-turning fan was humming. My son arranged for a service technician who took a long handled screw driver and spun the fan blade. The fan immediately took off running normally. The technician said the start capacitor was bad. My A/C cabinets get much afternoon sun thus I speculate that the start capacitors may have their life shortened by heat.
Dover Castle reveals another striking difference in tower design – geometry. Originally, castle towers were predominately square. Unfortunately, this configuration leaves the castle vulnerable to areas that archers can’t cover. In the 12th century, medieval engineers begin to design circular and semicircular towers to solve this problem. Because it was built over several decades, Dover boasts square and circular towers – the former being attributed to construction under Henry II, the latter to work that’s believed to have been carried out several years later under his son John. Additionally, the castle has several polygonal towers, including the Avranches Tower, which was specifically designed to maximize the garrison’s firepower.
Battle Castle is an action documentary series starring Dan Snow that is now airing on History Television and is scheduled to premiere on Discovery Knowledge in the UK in Spring 2012 and on various BBC-affiliated channels in the near future.
For the latest air dates, Like us on Facebook (www.battlecastle.com/facebook) or follow us on Twitter (www.twitter.com/battlecastle)
This show brings to life mighty medieval fortifications and the epic sieges they resist: clashes that defy the limits of military technology, turn empires to dust, and transform mortals into legends.
Website: www.battlecastle.tv/
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Castles conjure thoughts of romantic tales, but make no mistake, they are built for war.
Dover: Prince Louis' key to England. Malaga: the Granadans final stronghold. And Crac des Chevaliers: Crown Jewel of Crusader castles. Through dynamic location footage and immersive visual effects, Battle Castle reveals a bloody history of this epic medieval arms race.
As siege weapons and technology become more ruthless, the men who design and built these castles reply ... or perish. Follow host Dan Snow as he explores the military engineering behind these medieval megastructures and the legendary battles that became testaments to their might.
Each episode will climax in the ultimate test of the castle's military engineering -- a siege that will change the course of history. Which castles will be conquered and which will prevail? You'll have to watch to find out.
But the journey doesn't end there --in fact, it's just beginning. Battle Castle extends into a multi-platform quest, taking us deep into the secret world of medieval warfare and strategy. Become the ultimate 'Castle Master'. Stay tuned for more on the Battle Castle experience.