graffiti - Political Ruminations

So I have decided that I need to dedicate an entry to graffiti. Now graffiti is pretty much a regular feature of most urban landscapes. I don’t remember seeing much in Toronto nor in Vancouver, and I have heard that Tokyo is incredibly clean, so there may not be any there either…but as a general rule of thumb, graffiti is a part of a city’s backdrop, though in varying forms.

In general – and I am not an expert -the most common forms of graffiti across the board seems to be “tagging” and the more general passionate statement – like “Bowie ROCKS!” Or “I LOVE LINDA!” Or even slander like “Keri is a Slut!” You also have as a common variety the names of sports teams – either on their own or with accompanying praise or loathing. [A comedian named Dmitri Martin talks about graffiti in one of his acts – he jokes about how graffiti is always the outpouring of an intense feeling, like “U2 RULZ!” or “I LOVE Kelly!” He ponders why there is no luke warm graffiti – like “I like Marcy as a friend” or “White Stripes are OK, but not really the best band out there.”]

In some places you have more political graffiti, and there have been historical moments, in our country and in others, when political graffiti was read as a sort of “voice of the people” – coming in unsanctioned ways, and often countering the “powers that be” in some way. From my experience, socially conscious or politically active graffiti seems to take the form of either impactful statements or images…and here is where the artistry of graffiti begins!

Now it seems to me that there is a lot you can tell about a place by the form and content of its graffiti. In Phillie, there is a fine line between graffiti and public/vernacular art, with tags and scrawling but also with many murals, etc., many of which speak to the racial struggles of the city’s past and the cultural diversity of its present.

A step up from this is the graffiti I have seen in Berlin (to which I have not been for quite a while, but from what I remember…). In Berlin there is, of course, regular graffiti, but I remember really enjoying seeing the remaining pieces and photos of the Berlin wall with so much really moving graffiti and vernacular art. Graffiti is so much a part of the landscape in Berlin that a WWII/anti-Fascist memorial that was built there about 10 years ago was intentionally constructed in such a way and placed in such a space so that the public’s range of feelings and debate over the monument’s meaning would take place through the graffiti that the artists anticipated people would layer upon the monument.

In Amsterdam the graffiti is rampant, and seems to take the more common “tagging” form…but I don’t remember much in the way of inflammatory or political statement. Paris seems to have a combination of activist and more personally general graffiti. In Spain I remember seeing a significant amount of Basque separatist graffiti. In Central and South America, Communist/Socialist graffiti and murals were an important part of the vernacular nature of those emerging movements. And on-and-on… in cities all over the world.

So…here in Belgrade, you also have your share of graffiti. There is some amount of proliferation of creepy nationalist symbols (like the cross with the “4 S’s” which means “only unity saves the Serbs” – a nationalist rallying cry that I will explain further in another entry) as well as names of bands (“Pearl Jam” – 90s bands seem to still be quite popular), sports teams (“Red Star” – one of 2 local professional soccer teams, the other being “Partisans”) and what appears to be either some kind of gang, or perhaps a favorite night club (“Alcatraz”)…not certain.

You then have a few more interesting layers or graffiti…

On the one hand, there is strong political feeling expressed through some graffiti - a lot of stuff about Kosovo, an occasional anti-Bush, or anti-US, or anti-NATO slogan, and various things, positive and negative, about local political parties and politicians.

Now given that most everything is in Cyrillic script, I have gotten used to just sort of spacing out and not paying much attention to the signs and writing. But I have decided to commit to learning Cyrillic so that I can improve my language skills faster, so this week I have been paying better attention (and have been speaking a lot more Serbian…but that is a story for another entry).

So…as I was making my way to the grocery store this week one afternoon, I was trying to read everything I saw…signs and graffiti…whether in Latin or Cyrillic. My favorite piece of graffiti that I saw this week said “Boris Tadic je lep covek, jebo bih ga…” which, if I am translating both the words and the sentiment properly, means “Boris Tadic [the Serbian president] is a good looking guy, I’d fuck him…” When I saw this piece of graffiti, in Latin script, I walked by it for a minute, when it dawned on me what it said. It struck me as so funny, both because of what it said, and because I understood it, that I turned around and went back up the block to be sure what I saw. I then had to photograph it.



Graffiti reading "Boris Tadic is a good looking guy - I'd fuck him..."


But, while that one was the original impetus for my writing an entry on graffiti, it is far from the most moving graffiti I have seen here…

There is a place in the center of Belgrade called “Studenski Trg” or “Students’ Square.” In this several block radius, I have lately become aware of all the sort of organized chaos of messages which appear - I can only guess - to have developed from student actions for social change. [Students here seem to generally take as a part of their college years a commitment to collective organizing for social awareness and change.]

So… The first strand of this graffiti looks as if it was done with stencils (b/c it is largely uniform in shape and size), and has black lettering. I gather it was done to show support for and encourage collective student organization. The main message of these is “Students for students” and “together we are stronger.” A nice, solidarity message, neatly written, and more cooperative than agitational. [will get a photo next time I walk by]

There is a second strand of Studenki Trg graffiti that appears more confrontational – more geared toward raising consciousness. The messages in this thread are done in either red or black, and they are apparently a response to what the authors regard as an outdated, hierarchical higher-education system. Here you have “Knowledge is for everyone,” “Knowledge is not a material commodity,” and my personal favorite “I know he wears no clothes,” – which I assume is a clever use of the Emperor Wears no Clothes in reference to the importance of critical thought, and more importantly, to make a statement about the authoritarian system of leaning here, wherein the professor is the unquestioned authority. I like these ones very much, and given their cleverness, they are likely effective with students. [will get photos next time I am near there]

When I started to attend to these messages, I was excited by the fact that there are these kinds of student groups here, and that they are seizing public space in this way! Still…while I do like these very much, they are still not my favorite…

There is yet another thread of graffiti that I have seen pretty much all over the city, radiating out from the Studenski Trg. When I realized what these messages were saying, and the fact that there is obviously many individuals who participated in this graffiti, based on how wide-spread it is and the uniqueness of each one, I got a little choked up…I actually get a little teary when I see it…especially when I discover new ones with messages I have not seen before.

So this one is also a stencil, but with different font than the others, and it is also in black. Each one is different, though some repeat. They all begin with the black stenciled words “U 2009 Zelim…” or “In 2009 I wish for…” (Or “I would most like…”). Then there are statements written after this – some in the same stencil, some in scrawl, some in other fonts, etc. And they say things like “In 2009 I wish for…world peace.” Or “In 2009 I wish for…more money in this country!” Or “In 2009 I wish for…no one in my country to be a refugee.” Or “In 2009 I wish for…no hunger.” [will get photos of these as well...]

And the one that brings me to tears…every time…“In 2009 I wish … to live in a country that I don’t want to leave.” This is not suggesting that the writer wishes to leave Serbia for somewhere “better,” but instead is suggesting that the writer wishes for this country to be a place where the young people want to stay. There is a “brain drain” here, like in so many other economically less-developed countries, which means that those young people who are, bright, talented, ambitious and who have big dreams seek opportunities go abroad for school and/or for work as soon as they are able.

People’s parents also want this for them, especially now, because many of the parents of these young Serbian high school and college students are of a generation who remembers growing up in Yugoslavia, when times were richer and more hopeful and whose own lives and dreams were disrupted in the 1990s when dreams of a future career, stable life and economic prosperity were frozen in time for more than a decade.

As the social, cultural, governing and economic systems they grew up with collapsed, their dreams and plans for the future were subsumed in the ruins - immediately usurped by the direct cost of war (military service was by mandatory conscription in Yugoslavia so some guys were mandated to go to war, while people were victims of violence), by an suddenly unstable political and economic climate (some lost their life savings almost overnight as Yugoslavia collapsed and inflation raged, and what was left in the banks was robbed by corrupt politicians), by family obligations (as there was no longer a social state to care for people), and most significantly, by the sudden need to worry daily, constantly, about survival – safety, heat, clean water, hunger.

As my landlord, who left the university in Belgrade during this time, told me, “There was no more thought about the future, no more living, suddenly we were just surviving and this is what consumed all your thoughts...”

It reminds me of “Maslow’s hierarchy of needs,” which uses the visual metaphor of a pyramid to note the ways in which we rank and fill our basic human needs. At the bottom of the pyramid, you have things like food, shelter, etc. Then you have safety. Then you have belonging – being a part of a family or close “kinship” group. Then higher socializing type needs, and finally at the top, but the smallest bit, you have wants, desires, aspirations – general fulfillment. You cannot work for the next level up if the lower level is not stably fulfilled. So it you don’t have food and shelter, you cannot concern yourself with bigger safety needs. If you do not have safety, you can’t worry about socializing with friends, and especially not about working for some kind of larger future goals of personal fulfillment.

So by the time things stabilized, more than a decade had passed, and this generation was no longer of the age or innocence for dreams. Besides, there was no longer money or investment in the country, and largely even if one had held on to those dreams one had prior to this point, they were no longer viable. And so these many of these parents have a dream now for their children. Most often this involves getting them 1st – out of the village and into the city, and then out of the country and working abroad where this younger generation can taste some of the possibility, and cosmopolitanism and hope and zest for life that their parents had seen vanish in front of them.

So that’s what makes my heart ache a little about that graffiti, “In 2009 I wish … to live in a country that I don’t want to leave.” It reminds me that the people here went from living, like us in the US, in such a way that the lower pyramid needs were taken for granted, and many people’s lives were consumed by higher social status needs and personal fulfillment needs. Then – in an instant –these “top of the pyramid” needs were no longer a relevant pursuit as suddenly safety, hunger, shelter, water…the basic human needs were thrust to the forefront of most people’s existence. There is a lot about being here – in Serbia specifically - that reminds me of stories of the “Great Depression,” but many people who live in this country remember a time, not that long ago, when there was wealth, promise, peace and a greater freedom of travel than was enjoyed by any other nation’s people in the world at the time [as a result of Yugoslavia’s conscious and strategic “non-alignment” with neither the West nor the Soviet bloc – more about this in another post].

I think a lot about the way different generations experienced the region’s 1990s conflicts– whether I am here in Serbia or in Bosnia or in Croatia – because I often hear similar stories from people in their 30s and 40s. And this can happen to any of us, at any time…the rug can be pulled out from under us! (I mean something very similar happened to many regular people living in Bahgdad a few years ago…)

On another level, the “In 2009 I wish … to live in a country that I don’t want to leave” message makes me sad because the message suggests both that the writer loves her country, and yet that she knows she will have to leave if she is to achieve her potential. The content of the message, in the context of the last 15 – 20 years in this region, suggests to me that the writer is cognizant of the things that need to change, and yet her words suggest a sense of frustration and powerlessness.

So what this all leads me to think is that, while it is nowhere near the same political situation or level of intensity, I realized as I was thinking all of this through in the past few days, that nearly a decade ago, when Clinton was in his last term and the possibility of a W. Bush presidency was first on the wind, a friend in Budapest joked with me that “W.” would be the next president. I believe I said both “No Way! That’ll NEVER happen!” and maybe something like “anyway, how bad could he be? Even if he wins, he’s out in 4 years like his father.”

Then came the Bush/Gore-Florida-Supreme Court election drama, then came 9/11, then came the vicious silencing of dissent, then there emerged a sort of black-and-white, with-us-or-against-us cultural attitude - nationalism disguised as patriotic duty and moral superiority - reinforced by the triumvirate of FOXNews, the rapid politicization of Christianity, and terrifyingly nationalist country music.

Along with this came a new ferocious racism, then the wars, and the normalization of dehumanization and violence reached its zenith with Guantanamo Bay and Abu Gharib.

Then came the contempt and wrath of most other world nations. And even after all of this, “W” was elected again!

And then there was the mess that was the aftermath of Katrina, and the state and federal governments’ complete mishandling of the situation, and finally the crumbling of the financial markets and what could potentially be economic ruin the likes of which could change the social, cultural and economic landscape of our nation for ever.

Now don’t mistake me here, I am not trying to imply it is all “W”’s fault. He is only one man, and seems largely to have been chosen by his party’s leaders b/c he is easily a “company man” – I see him as like the tip of the iceberg – the part you see, which may look frightening, but much larger and more dangerous part is there below the surface.

Further, any person in the White House at that time would have had a lot on their plate - the terrorist attacks, hurricane Katrina, those things would have happened on anyone’s watch to be sure. AND... while there is no doubt that his handling of these traumatic events exacerbated the nation’s problems, and there is no doubt in my mind that there were much more insidious minds behind the choices – rhetorical and material – that “W” made, the American public needs to take a share of the blame here as well. This guy was elected! At least once, and for all intents and purposes, TWICE!

“W” in-and-of himself is less like some evil genius that tricked the public and more accurately the pinnacle of the ethnocentric, uncritical, willfully globally unaware, non-politically participatory, indolent, consumerist culture that we as a people had allowed to build up around us (since at least the late 1970s or early 1980s as far as I can tell). Democracy only functions when people participate in an active an informed way!

Still, in the decade since I glibly disregarded my friend’s teasing, my political innocence has totally disintegrated. There have been many times, given what I study, when the parallels between the political discourses, in conjunction with the sensational and inflammatory ethnocentric media, and the supporting pop-culture threads in the US in the last decade have reminded me so much of the crisis regions that I study.

While I realize this is an oversimplification… Like the US, Yugoslavia was a prosperous nation. Like Bush, Milosevic, initially, was a popular leader who claimed to be acting on the will and in the best interest of protecting the Serbian people, and with his rise to power came the corresponding flattery from state sympathetic media (which then curbed the critical journalism of other media outlets). Popular culture (specifically in the forms of patriotic themed films about history and Serbia’s counterpart to American “New Country,” a type of music called “Turbo-Folk”) as well as a clear, though unofficial, renaissance of religion and its inference in political life followed suit.

When the wars of secession began, they were not fought on Serbian soil (in fact not until the 1999 NATO bombing did the Serbian nation see actual attacks on Serbian soil). And so, it was through media depictions and political discourses that the people learned what was happening in the course of these wars, and the events were framed in such a way as to convince the people that the wars were being fought for their protection, and that the enemy they were fighting was vicious, inhumane and subhuman. Popular culture reinforced these messages, reinvigorating patriotic/nationalist identity and reinterpreting important historical moments to fit the needs of the present.

Meanwhile, Serbia became synonymous with war and nationalism within the wider world, and when all was said and done, they were left with a horrific legacy, a traumatized populace, and abject poverty – partially b/c of the war, partially b/c of NATO sanctions, partially b/c of the corrupt government who grew fat on both the war and the people’s money. When the Serbian people finally stood up and ousted Milosevic, and elected reformer Zoran Dzindzic as their new leader, there was a huge swell of hope. (Sadly, it was short-lived as Dzindzic was assassinated.)

So while we are nowhere near to the steep “fall from Grace” that the Serbian people & nation have experienced, I do see parallels in our national situations, and I understand the feelings of frustration and hopelessness/helplessness expressed by the wish “ … to live in a country that I don’t want to leave.”

The hope that Obama represents in my mind – a hope for a new era for our nation, for changes in the way we do things - has made me realize that I had become completely disillusioned and disenchanted with the United States over the last decade, and that I too, for a long time, felt hopeless and helpless and wished that I lived in a country I didn’t want to leave.

I hope for the person who wrote that statement that Serbia will become that place that young people no longer want to leave– some days I really can see it happening and others … well… not so much!

For our own country, I hope that the new government is a sign that our own country is emerging from the decade of what seems to me to have been, in retrospect, the apex of all the potential pitfalls of wealth, power and capitalism – excess, conspicuous consumption, willful (blissful?) ignorance, and increasing emptiness and meaninglessness of the proclaimed pillar of our nation – participatory, representative Democracy.

I hope that the extraordinary passion the American people showed for this last election, with its many historical “firsts,” and its unprecedented voter turn-out, signals the fact that the American people are ready to take back their nation, and to take an active role to create and maintain the type of nation that the people want.

I am optimistic about the possibilities for our nation’s future, and I hope that through the work and will of the American people that our country will be “a country that I don’t want to leave.”