Two weeks ago my friend Jordan and I began looking up "Borf", who is a fucking awesome graffiti artist based out of D.C., seriously look his work up, it is amazing. Within the video though Borf and his friends film themselves just walking through alleys and finding various items, clocks, microwaves, journals, books, and notes. Inspired by this Jordan and I decided we would go an a alley walk of our own, we went outside smoked a cigarette and decided where to go via the heads or tail procedure. It ended with us going to Wilson off the El,when we started walking we began looking through various dumpsters that were unlocked and, both of us being equipped with Sharpie's, started writing on the signs we saw. All the fences had signs posted saying " Absolutely No Trespassing", "Beware of the Dog", and "Speed Hump". We helped these signs spread a better message than ones rejecting human interaction and warnings. "Beware of the Dog" was reasoned by us, Beware of the Dog He Is Very Sarcastic, Speed Hump became Speed Hump, Drive Quickly. The walk itself was fun, we went to a few alleys, found ourselves some black beans that would not expire until 2012, we're still waiting to cook them up if you'd like to join and cook with us drop a line, it'll be a blast. So we walked ourselves down to the Sheridan stop, and along the way found a restaurant that was blasting some tunes from Mr.Marley; we walked in and were greeted by the coolest people just jamming out to reggae, everyone just dancing and drinking, not ourselves of course, and celebrating the fact that it was Sunday and that we all wanted to listen to music.
About a week later or so, I attended a seminar that discussed the current state of slavery, and how it still exist...the estimated number of slaves in the world today is 27 million,that is the highest number of slaves ever, although since the world has about 6 billion people it doesn't seem like alot. One of the officers of the group said that they were looking for media outlets to get their message out, and to show the fact that a group does exist. I decided to help them out, by plugging the various open mics my friends and I attend, but also by tagging some walls near the fine Loyola campus. While preparing to go tag I though about how some people just don't take the time to notice their surroundings unless they are prompted to by a sign, to cure this I created my own sign on the walls, so that people could take notice of the building and just share the admiration for the craftsmanship present. My paint upon the walls read two things, "Will You Free the Slaves?" and "FRESH PAINT"; I hope by doing this at least one person walked by and was just drawn in by the fact that paint was present only to find themselves in awe by the craftsmanship present in the wall.
I feel like people should just go walk late at night and enjoy all the various forms of art present within Chicago, and spread their own art themselves, just before you leave the house equip yourself with a marker of some sort and let the city be your canvas, you are a tax paying citizen if you decide you'd like to share some of your art with people than do so, it's your right. Don't limit yourself in anything you want to do, just carry a marker with you and when the moment strikes express whatever it is you want to, it'll make you happy to see your work and who knows your action might spark the creative fuse within someone else.
