Mission Mission

This seems to be less subconscious and more art. Or maybe it performs some other kind of function I don’t understand.

Cosmic Amanda, one of our favorite people we’ve never met, sends word from the east coast of a graffiti controversy so fiery it just might rival our own Clarion Alley bitch-ass taggers spat. From the Salem News:

A graffiti artist spray-painted the underpass of the March Street bridge earlier this month with a large red and yellow sign: “City of Salem … The Witch City.”

The bridge, which crosses over the bypass road, was painted under the supervision of the Police Department and with the blessing of the mayor’s office.

It was done as a community service project by a 17-year-old who was arrested for graffiti vandalism. It was intended, an official said, almost as a welcoming sign to the hundreds of motorists who drive that road daily to and from Salem.

But more than 30 residents of March Street Court and other nearby streets have signed a petition protesting the sign and demanding its removal.

“As residents, we are horrified that the mayor considered this to be appropriate for our neighborhood,” the petition reads.

Read on.

Soledad Dolores, my new favorite irreverent commenter, weighs in on the tagging controversy:

Taggers must be glad that most people don’t realize how glamorous tagging is and how great the kids feel doing it. It would be sad if it didn’t make Citizens want to beat, torture, and kill a kid for altering the surface color of a wall without permission. Put taggers through a wood chipper like Saddam’s kids did to their victims. It was sad they were killed before they could chip up more people. The chipped-up people never tagged much again. Maybe some of their victims had tagged their grammar school desk or something. Taggers are pretty much the worst things going on in the world it seems. It sad and makes my cry now.

(link)

(Thanks KayVee.INC!)

Previously: Open Letter to Bitch-Ass Tagger

Who says Davis, California, is totally boring?

(Thanks, Elisa!)

On Friday, the Examiner suggested that SF residents take “time to enjoy your own back yard” by going to beaches, museums and other shit like that.  What a smashing idea!  I took a stroll through the Lower Haight because, generally, if it’s not the Mission, I don’t go there.*

So, thank you, SF Examiner, because had it not been for this suggestion, I would have not seen this KILLER TREE.

* I mean, who has time for other neighborhoods?  Long distance relationships don’t work. I won’t even look at girls who don’t exist in jpg form.

(In completely unrelated news, my parents also had an encounter with a Killer Tree yesterday.)

This week on I Heart Street Art, we take a trip to Morocco.

Photo by KayVee.INC.

Vandals strike again, this time befouling Her Majesty’s Secret Beekeeper‘s beautiful hand-painted sign. I guess that’ll teach local business owners to leave so much tempting white space up there for anyone to see. Link.

Previously:

HMS Beekeeper Opens Soon

(Can be found at 22nd St. @ Lone Palm)