Talented artists or alley tagger?
A little humor to keep alley clean. (photo by Jack Siebold)
Is it art or graffiti in that downtown Rapid City alley? That’s the question the city council’s legal and finance committee pondered Wednesday afternoon.
Art Alley, between Sixth and Seventh streets, is a hodgepodge of colors, messages and sometimes who knows what … scrawled on buildings and dumpsters. Then there is the garbage business owners are left to pick up.
When it was established in 2005, there was some cohesiveness to the artwork up and down the block but now, most of the talent has been buried under so much other “art” that local business owners have a hard time beholding the urban beauty.
Jeff Patterson says the alley has lost its focus. “Over the last four years it seems like there’s a lot more tagging, a lot more graffiti. Initially there was a lot more art in Art Alley,” the owner of Cranky Jeff’s bicycle shop said.
Traditional artist James Van Nuys, who has a nearby art gallery, agrees with Patterson. “Occasionally a really talented artist will paint some beautiful thing in there but for every talented artist there are 20 really un-talented people who just want to get their names all over everything,” he critiqued.
It is an assessment fellow artist Tyler Read (AKA Siamese) doesn’t share. “People are used to looking at art in a framed space type of corridor and in art
alley it’s not like that, you have to search for art,” Read said. Read is a graffiti artist who has participated heavily in Art Alley since 2005, and is the arts education co-director for the Rapid City Arts Council.
Art Alley, between Sixth and Seventh streets, is a hodgepodge of colors, messages and sometimes who knows what … scrawled on buildings and dumpsters. Then there is the garbage business owners are left to pick up.
When it was established in 2005, there was some cohesiveness to the artwork up and down the block but now, most of the talent has been buried under so much other “art” that local business owners have a hard time beholding the urban beauty.
Jeff Patterson says the alley has lost its focus. “Over the last four years it seems like there’s a lot more tagging, a lot more graffiti. Initially there was a lot more art in Art Alley,” the owner of Cranky Jeff’s bicycle shop said.
Traditional artist James Van Nuys, who has a nearby art gallery, agrees with Patterson. “Occasionally a really talented artist will paint some beautiful thing in there but for every talented artist there are 20 really un-talented people who just want to get their names all over everything,” he critiqued.
It is an assessment fellow artist Tyler Read (AKA Siamese) doesn’t share. “People are used to looking at art in a framed space type of corridor and in art
alley it’s not like that, you have to search for art,” Read said. Read is a graffiti artist who has participated heavily in Art Alley since 2005, and is the arts education co-director for the Rapid City Arts Council.
There is more to the problem that a question of art. Business owners say they see elements of society that they would rather not have to deal with. “We see people using the alley as a bathroom. We’ve seen potential drug deals; we see a lot of things out there,” Patterson explained.
The council’s committee wants to develop a task force that will take a look at how to clean up the alley’s image. For their part, local artists say they
will have a community meeting to discuss the alley’s future.
The council’s committee wants to develop a task force that will take a look at how to clean up the alley’s image. For their part, local artists say they
will have a community meeting to discuss the alley’s future.