Schenley Park Taggers (Pittsburgh: crime, camps, property)

[nuwaver88]

Somebody painted on a sculpture of Christopher Columbus in Schenley Park. They painted his hands red and made some kind of signs in red spray paint on other parts of the statue. I never minded the graffiti on box cars, industrial buildings, and along the busway. However, when they start tagging public sculpture, it shows what pieces of s*** some of these people are. They have no respect for culture and the sort of things that make Pittsburgh great. It will be hard to find out who did it because it was probably done in the undercover of the night in a huge park. Still, if they are caught, there should be no slap on the wrist. They should do a few years minimum. An art preservation company has to come in and restore the damage. I hope this is not a trend. Here is an article and a video newsclip.

http://www.thepittsburghchannel.com/news/23101004/detail.html (broken link)

[BrianTH]

From the PG report it isn't clear to me it is graffiti, but in any event I agree this is unacceptable (and against the informal rules of the graffiti world, as I understand them).

[nuwaver88]

It is also obvious to me that they tried to emulate a crime scene of the Manson Family. At the Labianca residence, "Death to Pigs" was written in blood on the refrigerator. The writing is very similar in style, size, and also at an angle like it is here. I am almost positive there was an influence. Of course, nobody got killed here, but an influence just the same. Patricia Krenwinkle has been in jail for forty years, so she is of the hook for this one, but that busted her the atrocities in August of 69.'

[ajl777]

it's probably some hippies or anarchists or something

[Copanut]

I'd be willing to bet that those that "tag" have never owned property. Just low life scum looking for 15 minutes of fame.

[Impala26]

Generally speaking, I hate to see graffiti. There are almost two kinds of camps I imagine: there are actually graffiti "artists" and then there are taggers. Artists actually plan out and articulate work more with a generally non-descript wall or something that may or may not be in plain sight. Taggers on the on the other hand, are scum in this case finding any well seen monument or bridge just to be make themselves feel better.

I can imagine that artist types, like Shepard Fairey for example, absolutely hate taggers. It also gets especially nuts when taggers "tag" on top of already existing graffiti or actual art. Anyone who "tags" monuments and bridges in this city (or any), already crowning pieces of art all their own, should be regarded as selfish sub-humans.

[szug-bot]

eww, how radical. spray painting a statue - what brave, fearless warrior of peace and justice did that?

that statue was vandalized a number of times in the past.

[Hopes]

The article says it was politically motivated. Christopher Columbus is controversial. I can understand the statue being targetted.

[Copanut]

I don't care if they tagged the Willy Stargell statue, when they find them, have them clean off the paint, then shoot them.