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Statistical Analysis of U of Chicago Graffiti

Posted by kdawson on from the off-the-wall dept.

quaith writes "Quinn Dombrowski, a member of the University of Chicago's central IT staff, has been recording the graffiti left in the Joseph Regenstein Library Since September 2007. To date she has photographed and transcribed over 620 pieces of graffiti; over 410 of them are datable to within a week of their creation. She has now published in Inkling Magazine a statistical analysis of the entire graffiti collection covering such subjects as love, hate, despair, sex, anatomy, and temporal fluctuations of each of these. After November, both love and despair graffiti drop off significantly until spring, while sex graffiti reaches its one and only peak in December before declining for the rest of the school year. The story includes links to all of the original graffiti photos, which the researcher has made freely available to use under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike license."

9 of 157 comments (clear)

  1. License? by Lorens · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Who is this researcher to relicense their works of art? Just because they can't complain!

    1. Re:License? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Nonono, it is modern art.

      You appear to not understand that you've walked into my "Live Art" exhibit which can only be appreciated by those within it. "Dicks and your mom", a minor part of the exhibit, encompasses the oedipal desire inherent in males. The "Call me at 555-5555 for a good time" portion speaks of the hidden desire for pleasure which exists in the male psyche.

      My exhibit, "Masculinity" encompasses all those themes and more, speaking largely of the sexual frustrations, desire for intimacy, and lack of release that all men feel. The bathroom is used because it's a place where men can feel comfortable and able to release their frustrations, if only for a moment.

      Now if you'll excuse me, I've got to get to work on "Femininity". No, no, I won't enjoy it. After all this is *art* good sir.

    2. Re:License? by totally+bogus+dude · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You can use the same logic to say that having laws against murder and rape is equally futile, because you can't physically prevent people from doing whatever they want to do without massively encroaching on their basic rights. In fact, the final conclusion of such logic is that every single law that exists is pointless because it contravenes the laws of nature, and therefore is unenforceable. Of course every law is about stopping people from doing things they're physically capable of doing. That's kind of the whole point. Why would you make legislation mandating the laws of nature / laws of physics be obeyed?

      This kind of "information is different and therefore laws to control it are stupid" thinking is therefore not in itself a compelling argument for why laws should be changed/scrapped and the idea of "intellectual property" should be completely rethought.

    3. Re:License? by theheadlessrabbit · · Score: 5, Informative

      Nonono, it is modern art.

      You appear to not understand that you've walked into my "Live Art" exhibit which can only be appreciated by those within it. "Dicks and your mom", a minor part of the exhibit, encompasses the oedipal desire inherent in males. The "Call me at 555-5555 for a good time" portion speaks of the hidden desire for pleasure which exists in the male psyche.

      My exhibit, "Masculinity" encompasses all those themes and more, speaking largely of the sexual frustrations, desire for intimacy, and lack of release that all men feel. The bathroom is used because it's a place where men can feel comfortable and able to release their frustrations, if only for a moment.

      Now if you'll excuse me, I've got to get to work on "Femininity". No, no, I won't enjoy it. After all this is *art* good sir.

      You could not possibly be more wrong. What you are describing is postmodern art, the antithesis of modern art.

      Modern art sought to find universal ideals in form and materials. Eg. Paint is colour on a flat surface, so a modernist painting should emphasize colour and flatness. A painting of landscape, or portrait, etc. is trying to be something other than paint on a surface, modernism saw that as false. Truth to materials was a primary concern.

      Abandoning all concern for a skillful execution of final object, and spouting pretentious bullshit descriptions about context and how an object relates to an audience is the domain of postmodernism. another big part of postmodernism was to attempt to just make people think modernism was wrong about everything.

      The icing on the wrongness-cake is your final sentence, where you talk about not enjoying it, since it is art. Postmodernism is the first time in art history where humour and a cheeky wit have been acceptable. postmodern artists sometimes do just do it for the lulz.

      --
      -I only code in BASIC.-
  2. Re:Window into their heads ... by chill · · Score: 5, Informative

    I remember being in a train in melbourne, riding past a few walls full of legal graffiti (union lane?) and wondering what the line between art and vandalism really was.

    You can stop wondering. The line is drawn with the permission of the property owner. Vandalism is a crime unrelated to the artistic merit of the work, it has to do with property ownership rights.

    From an artistic point of view, it is drawn when the intent is to deface or damage instead of create.

    --
    Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
  3. Re:Blah... by MichaelSmith · · Score: 5, Funny

    When the library at the local community college had a wooden tables in the study area, there was a rich history of graffiti from 20 years of students studying for exams. When they build a new library with modern non-wood tables, the graffiti no longer existed. The florescent pen graffiti on the condom machines in the restrooms was a poor substitute.

    Did any of it say "insert baby for refund"?

    --
    http://michaelsmith.id.au
  4. Re:Window into their heads ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    There is no line between vandalism and art, because they're not disjunct. They're orthogonal concepts. Vandalism can be art. But even when it is art, vandalism is still a crime. It boils down to two separate questions: What is art? What is vandalism? All four combinations (art and vandalism, art and not vandalism, not art and not vandalism, vandalism and not art) exist.

  5. Wish I had mod points by ericvids · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This may be the BEST counterargument ever to "all information should be free". Bravo!

    However, while I genuinely want to mod you up, I do believe that CURRENT laws to control information are stupid. Similar to how laws can sometimes be unfairly and maliciously used to allow known murderers to remain innocent and walk freely, many patents and copyrights are unfairly and maliciously used to prevent people from contributing to the greater good of humanity. Patents in particular are a minefield -- something's clearly wrong with a system that encourages trolls to cripple the true innovators.

    Back to the topic, I believe what the researcher did, copyrighting her photographs, is all right, regardless of whether she released it under Creative Commons. I don't believe she was copyrighting the actual message on the graffiti anyway, just the expression of it on photograph. (Of course properly the copyright should be attributed to both HER and whoever made the graffiti, but then I would suppose THAT's public domain since the original author didn't stake a claim to it...)

    --
    Pet peeve: Profane people propagating perfunctory pedantry.
  6. art/vandalism not mutually exclusive by k2r · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I don't agree.
    From a judicial POV some act may be vandalism / destructive act to property without the owner agreeing.
    From an artistic POV the same act may still be art.

    Of course "doing art" so someones property without agreement is a problem.
    However, the "lines" are not so easily spotted: What about chalking on the pavement or laser-projections on a publicly owned building?