Over the years, street art as become a culture. People display all manner of painting on buildings to express their opinion, a privilege attached to free speech. Which means, in some countries, the policy that protects freedom of speech also protect this act. But is it safe to say, this act is harmless, not entirely.
As an artist this I can say, every work of art is created for a particular purpose. An artist might not even realize it at the moment but as time goes by it becomes clearer, that is why you see some artist create art works and would be unable to find a name for it at the moment, it suddenly feels like there is no right words to describe their creation. For every art work with a purpose or reason for its creation, its meaning is carved out of it and its message is embedded in its meaning. The lowest of all art work have a meaning even if its meaning is unidentifiable to most people.
Which means, compared to other forms of art, murals and paintings carved on walls and building communicate messages in a way other forms of art might not be able to. A simple painting can evoke sense nationality. It might seem harmless to people but what about the owner of the buildings.
Seeing painting on walls as freedom of speech doesn't mean, anyone can wake one morning and start painting all kind of stuff on my building. You want to express yourself, exercise your free speech but not on my building. What if it is some kind of religious image that I don't believe in or something I wouldn't want anywhere near my home? I believe there should be some kind of limitations for stuff like that.
It can be entertained in public spaces but it should be banned for private property. We all perceive art work differently, Which means criticizing art work is subjective to individual ability to interpret it meaning due to differences in individual perspective and taste but apart from this, we also have societal standards set by the society, created by scholars to judge art work and rate it. It based on this highlighted guidelines that most people tend to derive their judgement from when deciding if a specific art work is good or bad.
This write-up was inspired by weekly featured content titled Free speech in hive learners community.
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