Illegal (Bilingual edition) : Street Art Graffiti 1960–1995

Wild, free and ephemeral – street art and graffiti are a worldwide phenomenon. From Brassaï, who led graffiti into mainstream art around 1960, via the Sprayer of Zurich in the 1970s to the first Banksy works in the UK – Illegal tells a prehistory of street art and graffiti. Hardly any of the works of this short-lived genre still exist today. They were also often documented illegally and under adverse conditions. Illustrated here are key works and rarities that have never been shown. All were created illegally, i.e. without permission, directly for an audience on the street – not for museum contexts. “People say graffiti is ugly, irresponsible and childish. But that’s only if it’s done properly” [Banksy]. Long-standing picture research has condensed a selection of works by some 100 artists from over a dozen countries and their references to pop music, avant-garde art and literature. We discuss why these artists in particular were significant trendsetters for street art and graffiti before Banksy.

The history of street art up to Bansky—four decades of trailblazing graffiti in Europe.

Graffiti has always been a wild, free, and ephemeral art form—from its origins in the 1960s through the photographs of Brassaï, who transformed graffiti into art, to the Sprayer of Zurich in the 1970s and the appearance of the first works by Banksy in England. This book studies the illegal roots of the art form with over 120 vandals from more than a dozen countries, tracing its journey to the dawn of the new millennium.

Where do the origins of street art and graffiti lie? In the far-flung region between Paris, Düsseldorf, and Zurich, European graffiti developed not in the gallery but outdoors, for the general public. Who were the pioneers of street art and concept artists who left their signatures in the rue Visconti in Paris between 1962 and 1986? What are the links between pop music, graffiti photos, and records? And who was Rimbaud, the queer revolutionary nineteenth-century poet to whom countless street artists referred? Find the answers to these questions and many more in this compelling story of how graffiti began.