Graffiti Jam greatness

Went to the great All City Graffiti Jam two weeks ago, in the carpark of the Tivoli Theatre on Francis Street in Dublin city centre. The most beautiful piece of the Jam was this apocalyptic horse by Scie:

Absolutely stunning.

I liked DMC's gigantic piece on the right of the first carpark:

Seeing it in preparation the evening before, when just the outline of the lips was in place, I wasn't sure how it would turn out, but the layering of light on the lips, the smoke and the addition of DMC's signature skull really worked. I liked that it could be read as a subtle anti-smoking message as well.

DMC's piece was perpendicular to a large Maser piece, with a lot of the parallel lines he's currently employing in his work:

Also liked it, plus it allowed for some nice photo angles:

Around the corner from them was this excellent boxer, which garnered many admiring comments during the Jam and the next day:

Most of ESPO's work in the Tivoli has now been gone over, but you can see some of its remnants above DMC's new work.

With fine weather the day before, many writers and artists came down to get started on the Friday evening before the Jam on Saturday. Here are some hard at work having almost completed a sequence of three disparate pieces that they made flow together really well:

Including one of the most technically impressive pieces of the whole Jam:

It's always amazing to see the transformation over a few hours of a blank wall space, allocated to a particular artist:

Into an enormous and impressive finished piece:

This was the central wall, previously home to pieces by Flying Fortress and others, and this year painted by Etam. Well executed and clearly highly skilled, though I wasn't one hundred percent sold on the Baba Yaga/roving shed in runners subject.

Seeing the process from Friday through to Sunday also allowed some insight into the planning, sketching and multiple skills required to produce these multi-coloured and largescale pieces. The Jam gives an opportunity to see the normally secretive artists at work, and it's always interesting to see how the pieces evolve.

Moving towards this:

With cool details like flying speakers:

Always excellent to see Rask in evidence:

And great to see this dolmen art by mate Emily:

More female artists needed!

Also really delighted to see Wonky Tan reapplied by ADW:

A second piece by this artist, produced in a fairly astounding two hours or so:

Liked seeing Crap's neo-Celtic knotwork on display for TDA Klann:

Lots of young kids around, enjoying the artwork, or at least playing around it:

Or with bits of what went to make it:

Yes, aerosol can caps, the ultimate toy.

There were plenty of ramps and rails to keep the guys on skateboards and bikes entertained:

While it was entertaining me to see oblivious shoppers and texters wander through the paths of oncoming bikes:

Courage and skills on display and good to see the ramps and steps being provided temporarily, there is such a demand for them. Hopefully a decent skate park will soon be built in Dublin.

Seemed like only the menfolk were risking jumps in the ramp area, but plenty of women rapping and indeed emceeing while people rapped and beatboxed, not that you can really tell from this particular pic:

Happily the threatened rain held off for most of the Saturday.

Later with added bird:

Aerosol superheroes of various kinds in evidence:

I liked this freaky piece by Danleo:

Many other pieces looked even better in the sunshine the next day, the iconic church as always forming the backdrop:

I particularly liked this one, I think by Durex:

Last but certainly not least, this lovely piece by Le Bas:

Deserved kudos to James and the other organisers and to everyone who participated. On the day, I wasn't entirely in the mood to go to the annual Graffiti Jam, but it really cheered me up to see so many people producing such excellent graffiti and art, friendly to a fault and having fun reconfiguring this corner of the city once again.

Many more of my photos of the Graffiti Jam 2013.

Preventable death

I planned to write about ethical clothing. This is about preventable death.

Life is an incredible thing to me. What an incredible world this is. What an amazing time to be alive. All the possibilities, all the power, all the knowledge that humanity has. Here, now, on this planet, all of humanity could have good lives. Maybe great lives. Incredible, amazing, wonderful lives. But certainly good lives. Yet we don't. Why is there so much suffering and death? And what can we do to prevent them? These are the thoughts I have most days. Then I think, what can I contribute to understanding human problems? What can I do to prevent the suffering and death of so many? And also, how can I have a good life? When I was younger I used to assume that everyone thought about these things and acted with them in mind, at least some of the time. Maybe they do. I make fewer assumptions these days. And of course I don't have the answers. Clearly many people ask and try to answer these questions, and have done, apparently probably throughout human history. Clearly many people struggle with them and take action to try and make the world, or human experiences in it, better. And there are many definitions of 'better'. For me, roughly speaking, better means fewer deaths and less suffering of human beings. I care about the planet as a whole too, and other species, very much, but I have a bias towards humanity, and here I am focussed on that. We cannot prevent all deaths, of course, or stop all suffering. But we can do better. And one of my guiding beliefs is, do what you can.

I had planned for some time to write about ethical clothing. I uploaded photos of fairtrade and environmentally conscious clothes yesterday, with a view to writing about this. This issue was connected, as likely it is in many people's minds at the moment, to the collapse of a building in Bangladesh less than a week ago, on Wednesday 24th April. The building housed garment factories among other businesses. At least 380 people are now confirmed dead due to the collapse. Those deaths were preventable. I planned to write about that. And about fairtrade and environmentally conscious clothing, clothing produced where the workers have decent conditions and that doesn't destroy the environment on which we all depend. And about how these provide better alternatives to the systems and practices that resulted in the deaths of those hundreds of people in Bangladesh. That's what I'd been particularly thinking about. And it will be worth writing about, some other time. There are many particulars by which we can do better.

Instead I am thinking once more about the bigger picture. I felt grateful and honoured to spend today in the company of people who came through the Holocaust. Men and women in their seventies and eighties who were children during World War II. Men and women, some of whom themselves survived the concentration camps, whose relatives were killed during the Holocaust, whose parents and sometimes entire families were killed, who suffered terrible trauma. And these children have all survived. They have lived their lives. They have families and children of their own. Sixty-five years later, they were returning to Ireland to visit a place that had provided recuperation and recovery for them after the War. That too is a story for another day, an amazing story. It was a powerful and unique experience to be in their company today. They suffered and millions of other people died during years of organised persecution and murder by the Nazis and the millions of ordinary people who collaborated with them or stood by while suffering and death were visited on their fellow human beings. There is still much suffering and death today that is organised and deliberate. We must not forget this, and we need to fight against it. It is preventable. We can do better.

But it is also the case that much of the suffering and death that happens today is not seen or presented as deliberate in a similar way. Here, now, I feel gratitude for the life I have. This evening, I turned on a tap and drank clean, safe water, easily available, and as much as I wanted. For dinner, my concerns revolved around what to cook or what restaurant to go to, not whether I had any or enough food. I sat in my warm, comfortable, secure, rainproof home, and I will go to bed tonight with no worry about whether I will still be safe in my bed tomorrow morning. I have (relatively ethically produced!) clothes to wear. I went to a fully-stocked pharmacy this morning, and I can get high-quality healthcare if I need it, within minutes. I am writing this on my own computer, with access to the internet, and the freedom to publish whatever I want. Legal, economic and political protections are benefitting me invisibly right now, from the money in my bank account to the building regulations enforced in the construction of my home. I am lucky to have family and friends I love, but it is not luck that allows me to share my life with them, and to associate with whomsoever I choose. The combination of all these things, that I am grateful for tonight, most people in the world today do not have. We, as human beings, have created systems and taken actions, and continue to do so, with the results that most people in the world do not have clean water, enough food, proper shelter, security, medicine, healthcare, computer use, internet access and key protections, and large proportions of humanity lack each one of them. People are suffering and dying because of this. This suffering and death is preventable, and it is the direct consequence of systems we create and participate in and actions we take. Systems and actions that can be changed. We can do better.

Two hundred thousand

On 27th February 2013, I reached 200,000 views of my photos on Flickr. While it's somewhat arbitrary, reaching that rounded figure felt good. Perhaps there is some 'official' way of counting it, for me it was that the 'All Time' total view count reached 200,000. That included the views of my Photos and Videos (nearly 178,000), Photostream (just over 13,000) and Sets (nearly 9,000). I didn't get to see it flip from 199,999 to 200,000, but caught it at close to midnight on the 27th, when it had reached 200,112, having passed the numeric milestone some time that day.

It was cheering to see the individual photos that had been viewed that day, which brought me past 200,000 views. The photos were quite a cross-section of what I've photographed in the close to six years since my first upload. The most viewed photo (a whole four times) was this one from Occupy Dame Street in February 2012:

It is a photo of a poster that itself was a reproduction of a 1846 Punch Magazine illustration, which appears to represent a destitute, demoralised Irish family during the Famine being offered food by a well-dressed, rotund British gentleman, with the original slogan 'Union Is Strength'. For Occupy, this had been adapted to Ireland's economic woes over 150 years later with the addition of 'plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose.' Participating in Occupy Dame Street was something very important to me, and I certainly took many photos of Occupy Dame Street during the five months it existed.

Next up was a photo from February 2010:

This one was taken during a workshop of a piece of hyperbolic crochet that I made for the Irish Hyperbolic Crochet Coral Reef at the Science Gallery in Dublin. I'm fairly sure that that is my purple piece underneath which we paired temporarily with another crocheter's white piece, before leaving them to be 'basketed' and more artistically arranged by the volunteers for inclusion in the exhibited reef. Crocheting again after close to two decades and participating in the reef which a a great experience, which I wrote about here and in proper depth here. And I certainly took many photos of the complete international and Irish Hyperbolic Crochet Coral reef exhibitions.

Next most viewed on 200,000 day was this street art photo from September 2011:

A photo of one of Mark Jenkin's sculptures from Road Works, the street art exhibition of Dublin Contemporary. The next few most viewed photos (don't get excited, we're talking 2 views each, pretty typical for me) were also from Road Works, which I revisited during daylight hours:

That one is by Maser and is still in situ.

And that one, also still viewable in Temple Bar, is by the very talented and always wonderful Scie. Lovely person too.

And then there was this one, a photo of a poorly graffitied van close to Scie's stag – I liked the contrast at the time most likely.

You can read more about the guided walk of some of the pieces here and see plenty more photos of Road Works here.

Among the many other photos that got a single view that day, was this one from Burning Man in August 2008:

Of course. A giant mechanical hand that picked up cars. In the middle of the desert. Just one element of a very wonderful week spent in Black Rock City, Nevada. You can see plenty of photos of Burning Man here.

There were also photos of the Artbots exhibition in Science Gallery in September 2008:

Some low-brow graffiti from my by now very extensive (and usually much more interesting) graffiti set:

Hello I have a penis. Succinct, informative, classic.

More photos of Burning Man, this time the beautiful temple which was burned on the last night:

Of wire animals on sale in the Maputo market in Mozambique, May 2009:

A photo of a large number of HIV and AIDS ribbons, taken in December 2004 but uploaded in December 2009:

Representing another important dimension of my life.

Then a photo from March 2010:

I wrote more here about this sexist painting of 'boobs' and the multiple responses to it, beginning with this 'you don't have to accept sexism'. And documented the evolving conversation on this wall here.

There were lots of other photos of the Hyperbolic Crochet Coral Reef viewed by someone that day, in fact they accounted for quite a lot of the views, and it seemed like someone had gone through looking at most of the set. I like that feeling, imagining someone, rather than a robot, paging through image after image, interested enough to follow the trail, after one photo caught their eye. I think this one included another of my small pieces:

And they stuck with it despite the fact that I recall now, looking back over this set, that very disappointingly many of the photos taken with my Olympus came out blurry, a source of eternal frustration to me with this camera.

There were photos of Glastonbury turning 40 in June 2010:

And many photos of something I have photographed many times, graffiti in the carpark of the Tivoli, on Francis Street in Dublin. The photos viewed that day were mainly from June 2011:

Also fittingly, graffiti by Canvaz at the Kings of Concrete festival:

My inflatable globe during a protest on O'Connell Street, proclaiming Another World Is Possible:

Romantic Ireland From the Streets – a street art exhibition on the Anglo Irish Bank site in Dublin for St. Patrick's Day 2012:

Beach volleyball at the Horseguards for the Olympics in London in August 2012:

And the Festival of Urban Art Sandyford in September 2012:

And plenty more photos and videos from Occupy Dame Street, including this one from its anniversary on 8th October 2012:

All in all a significant milestone in my online photographic history, and one that provided an eclectic but oddly representative account of where my camera has taken me to reach 200,000 views.