Uncovering The History And Impact Of Graffiti Writing In Los Angeles

Keep up with LAist. If you’re enjoying this article, you’ll love our daily morning newsletter, How To LA. Every weekday, you’ll get fresh, community-driven stories that catch you up with our independent local news. Graffiti writing as a common form of street art makes a lot of sense in a place like Los Angeles. Long, frequent commutes make boulevards and freeways the ideal canvas for artists to get eyes on a statement they’re trying to make or a conversation they’re trying to start. Like many forms of art, graffiti writing is not without controversy — it is often used in acts of vandalism and has been associated with gang activity because of its use by those groups to mark territory. But graffiti writers will tell you their art form is not only about communicating with each other as artists, it’s about starting conversations about things like identity, politics or movements the artist feels aren’t being had. LAist talked with local experts on street art and graffiti writing, as well as graffiti writers and artists themselves, about the earliest iterations of this type of street art in Los Angeles, how it morphed into the graffiti writing we see today and its...