Editor’s Note: You can see this story as it appeared in newsprint here.
NEW BRUNSWICK: The city is turning a 1.8-mile stretch of asphalt into a haven for graffiti, a move that marks a rare embrace of a persecuted art form.
The beautification project, spearheaded by local nonprofit art group Albus Cavus, is aimed at bringing the community together to transform the long-neglected Raritan River path that winds below the Route 27 bridge and alongside Route 18 north.
“Before, it was a place no one liked to come to. It’s kind of dark, and it’s behind a highway,” said Pete Krsko, co-founder of Albus Cavus. But now the Raritan River Art Walk represents an “opportunity to bring expression down here, play with the environment and make it more colorful.”
The concrete canvas may also save lives, said aerosol artist Mike Castellano of Old Bridge.
“If it wasn’t for this wall, a lot of kids would be running around the highways,” he said.
Graffiti art is a populist venture meant to be highly visible, but there are few spaces where it’s legally permitted. So graffiti artists risk arrest — and their safety — by spray-painting overpasses, trains and highways.
“Most people don’t understand it. This is probably the most hated art in the world,” Castellano said.
Wolf, a Manhattan-based graffiti artist who has been painting — or “writing” in graffiti lingo — since 1985, said he has grown accustomed to working in the shadows.
“That’s the state of graffiti,” he said.
But not everyone who came out to paint along the walkway Saturday operates under the radar.
Artist Will Condry of Trenton, who spent four hours on a Charlie Chaplin portrait with abstract elements, makes a living painting murals and designing T-shirts.
“This is straight-up expression,” he said, referring to the portrait. “You’re not doing a commission for somebody, you’re not doing an ad.”
City students from McKinley Community Elementary School and their siblings also contributed to the project, painting a 150-foot portion of the wall. Their participation was a product of two organizations — the Citizen Schools after-school program and the Community Art and Mural Project.
When the wall is completely filled in, it will be the East Coast’s largest mural. But graffiti art has an element of impermanence. Authorities, who usually treat the works as an unlawful eyesore, often whitewash paintings, inadvertently creating new canvases. And artists Saturday said they don’t expect New Brunswick’s permissive stance to change that aspect.
“The walls are constantly evolving, because the artists have a competition between themselves,” said Matt Camp, a self-described “ideas guy” for Albus Cavus. “People don’t always have respect. Someone will tag (spray their personal trademark onto) something, and someone else will come back to put something nice over it.”
The kick-off painting project this weekend was sponsored by the city, the New Jersey Council on the Arts, the Middlesex County Board of Chosen Freeholders, Johnson & Johnson, Frank’s Hardware, 21st Century Community Learning Centers, Citizen Schools, New Brunswick Community Arts Council and New Brunswick Tomorrow. Funds provided portable toilets, painting supplies and event promotional materials.
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