The Splasher, Abridged

In New York City, there is a very vibrant street art scene. But, some have become disillusioned with the fact that the art world is trying to commercialize this very organic and anarchic art form. Instead of dialogue, these someones have decided to take the issue into their own hands. This person is known as the Splasher.

The Splasher goes through the city and splashes on other people's art with a spiel of avant-garde art rhetoric pasted with it. The battle is interesting, and, while I'm sad to see the work that is being damaged go down, I have to say the new works are really interesting. It's sort of like SAMO (Basquiat's old tag questioning the nature of graffiti and society) but not like the shitty tags thrown up by CAP in Style Wars. The replacement is very interesting and a stunningly effective critique of the street art work that is now destroyed. A lot of the work destroyed is very generic street art; the splashing leads one to question the original art on its merits, as hard as that may seem.

Unfortunately, like every art movement that calls itself avant-garde like the Futurists, it has a manifesto. Gothamist has posted excerpts for everyone else who doesn't have the time to read a ridiculously verbose statement about the nature of art and the splasher's action or want to cop a copy of it. It's really, really ridiculous. I can't summarize it because it's unsummarizable. Gothamist did the best they could, but it's really challenging to compress anarchist ideals about art. Anarchist ideals are confounding to begin with; summarizing them is even harder. So, make up your own mind, but I think that anything that shakes up the stagnant art world is always an advancement. When a street artist is getting patronage from Angelina Jolie, the movement is in dire need of a shake-up. The Splasher is providing this, and I have to respect that as a fan for the advancement of art as a form.

She Just Cut A Bitch

Usually, well-intentioned feminists are pigeonholed as non-shaving, man hating lesbians. While this is not true in many situations (feminists are fantastic people), it is in this one. According to MSNBC, four lesbians attacked a straight man on the street in front of the IFC in NYC (That's so hip. All in acronyms!).

Now, before I saddle the lesbians with all the blame, I will let MSNBC's reporting give you the background on this story:

The four sentenced Thursday were convicted April 18 after assaulting Buckle, who had made advances at one of the seven as they walked past him outside the Independent Film Center in Greenwich Village on Aug. 18, 2006.

Johnson testified at trial that her group told Buckle they were not interested and he became loud and rude, called them names and threw a cigarette at them while saying that having sex with him would make them straight. She said the fight started after Buckle pushed and shoved them.

Now, these women live in New York City. While I'm not saying that what Buckle, the man, in this situation is acceptable, I am saying that these women are probably yelled at a lot and receive a lot of rude comments. But, that doesn't justify getting shanked, which this guy did.

Before I get a lot of hate from feminists, I am not defending anything this man did. I am saying that the women should have never let the situation get this far, especially when they are seven strong against his one. Additionally, he was bootlegging on the street. Most cops would have been happy to rough him up a bit for the ladies because if cops hate nothing more than black people, they hate bootleggers.