//CITY IN COLOUR
OBSERVATION, INSPIRATION AND A FEW TINS OF PAINT HAVE THE POTENTIAL TO TURN DRAB CITY SPACES INTO VIBRANT AND INSPIRING WORKS OF ART. WE MEET SOME OF THE MURALISTS WHO BRING INCREDIBLE LIFE TO OUR URBAN ENVIRONMENT.
Picture it: you’re walking or driving your usual route to work or school. There are certain things you don’t notice, simply because they’ve never been that noticeable – maybe a decaying wall, a crumbling set of stairs, or just a grey expanse of concrete. But on this day, you can’t help but stop short, because where there was nothing, there is now a vibrant collared sunbird one-storey high. Or maybe it’s a series of hard-lined geometric patterns, their colours pulsing outwards. A transformation has taken place, a narrative has begun, and a public space has been transformed.
Just about everyone has an opinion about art – even a nonopinion is, in a sense, an opinion – and it’s almost guaranteed that everyone has an opinion about street art. A glorious mural to one person may appear to be vandalism to another. It’s a complex subject to navigate. Is tagging vandalism, but a mural is art? Because something is commissioned, does it have more value? Where does vandalism end and art begin, or is that even a valid question? This is heady stuff once you lean into it, but there is much to consider.
ART VERSUS ADS
“I think all scribbles under bridges are art. It doesn’t matter if the artist had permission or not. I believe that in this era of hyper advertising, where you can’t go anywhere without seeing some corporation convincing you to pay them money for their useless product, I see graffiti and public art as its antithesis. It is something that is put in the public space without asking for anything back,”
says Giffy Duminy, whose massive lifelike pieces focusing on nature adorn so many public spaces in Durban.
“People are okay with adverts and get angered by graffiti? It is strange to me because I see advertising as far more invasive than an illegible tag is.We need fewer adverts and more public art features. I think murals and public art are so important to stimulate the thoughts of creatives. Artists understand a rare thing – that is to relay ideas into visuals, sounds and forms.We need more individual creativity in our public spaces.We need light brought to issues, and artists are the key to this treasure chest of connection.”
TRANSFORMING NEGATIVE SPACES
Say we removed all illegal tagging or graffiti from our city walls – something municipalities regularly spend a fair bit of money on. The question is, would the community actually benefit?
“The most powerful way to honour society is to challenge it. Graffiti is valuable as a subversive expression which challenges the capitalist world we live in. Street art, unsanctioned but with meaning or a message beyond self-promotion, often develops in the wake of graffiti. Commissioned murals are valuable due to the labour and skills on display but can lack the penetrative power of uncensored expression,” says Mook Lion, a Durban muralist and fine artist whose iconic lino-cut-influenced painting style has left an indelible mark on many of Durban’s buildings.
“Art in the city is important because our urban spaces can be negative and depressing. We need to see a human touch in the environments we inhabit. We need to see what other people are thinking and feeling and to connect and share these things.There are emotional and psychological benefits to experiencing visual art and it should be a human right and not a privilege. I love seeing colours and forms and shapes and ideas but I understand that is not the case with most people, so I believe the public space should be democratic.
“However, in our current South African public spaces, we have an abundance of badly maintained massive walls, which could be transformed by artists.”
A SENSE OF ORDER IN A CHAOTIC WORLD
There is also a point at which the sheer size of a public work forces people to engage with art and not shy away from or ignore it.
“I think murals, just in their extra-large dimensions, act as a metaphor for inspiration to the public. Murals can help represent ideas, values, history and hope for a community. Public art can help transform a space into a story and give it personality. Murals can become part of the social fabric of an area,” says Wesley van Eeden, a Durban artist who goes by the nom de guerre Resoborg, and who has been commissioned for mural work all over the world.
If street art serves to inspire and add vibrancy to an environment, there is necessarily inspiration behind it. For Wesley, his mural work seeks to instil a sense of order in an otherwise chaotic world.
“A lot of my work aims at creating hope and is inspired by the rough organic shapes and textures that you can find in South
African cities. My work has evolved over the years into using a lot of masking tape to help create very clean lines which in many ways are in contrast to what I see around me – perhaps it is a reaction to the organic environment around me.
“When creating large-scale murals, one of my challenges to myself is to create a hand-painted version of a digital artwork, which can take many hours with masking tape and is almost meditative in the process of creation. In many ways, it is an attempt at controlling a very liquid and fluid medium – putting paint into solid bold shapes. Perhaps it can be a metaphor for the crazy world that we live in with all its unpredictable experiences, and how it can act as an inspiration for shaping our lives into something more solid and direct.”
NATURE IN THE CITY
Giffy’s pieces, on the other hand, predominantly represent nature, usually in a very biologically correct way and at massive scale. In a sense, he gives a voice to the flora and fauna which is often overlooked, ignored or under threat.
“I hope to be useful in the bridging of people and our natural world again. In an era of fast-paced urban lifestyles, a lot of people don’t spend much time in nature. The aesthetics found in our very own gardens and natural habitats really sparks something in me,” Giffy says.
“Living in KZN, I have been blessed to grow up in an incredibly diverse natural environment. I am in awe of nature, as you can see by the content I paint. I am absolutely in love with every living thing. I hope to bring people closer to the indigenous life that lives around their area. I hope to increase an appreciation for this life.
I believe that appreciation for something is a building block for conserving it. I hope to plant seeds of appreciation that may grow into actionable change.”
Seeds of hope, planted in paint. The next time you come across a mural, take a moment with it. Let it strike you. Listen to what it has to say. Consider what you have to say back.