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Winston... tell them... Tell them all... Whoever comes, whoever it is... I'll paint them. I'll paint them all.

---------Inspired by John Wick

The aesthetic appeal in the graffiti is no less than any traditional form of Indian paintings. The strong message being portrayed through this medium touches the rawest and basic strings of the spectator. For a change, this art is not made for fame or materialistic gains. Inanimate walls turn into an organic being alive and speaking. It is created for conveying the surge of emotions that are the outcome of repression and neglect. As graffiti is not exclusive to some high-end art gallery, its accessibility makes it a form of affordable art.

Types of Styles in Graffiti

But, Indian graffiti unlike European and American forms, is not an act of defiance against the ruling regime. It has been unconsciously a part of our culture. Many types of art forms are in vogue in India that are practised by Indian artists. Some of them are as follows:-

  1. Tag
  2. Throw-up
  3. Blockbuster
  4. Wildstyle
  5. Heaven
  6. Stencil
  7. Poster
  8. Sticker

Both male and female artists are a part of the young brigade of graffiti artists in India, such as:-

  1. Yantr Sawan
  2. Wink
  3. Harsh Raman Ganjit
  4. Anpu
  5. Tyler Zake
  6. Slik
  7. Amitabh Kumar
  8. Purswani
  9. Dizy or Kajal Singh
  10. Zine
  11. Bond
  12. Pawan

Some of them like Daku, who is officially a member of an international association for graffiti artists-156, have earned their name by operating from the shadows. Among them are artists who operate through mediums such as St+t Art.

Also Read: The Modern Imprints on Indian Paintings: Graffiti

Dizy- The Dazzler

Graffiti and street art is not fully accepted but it is not opposed as well. It may be considered as a form of offence against the property in other parts of the world. Here, people have more serious concerns than to worry about the defacing/beautifying of public property. So, India has become a brooding place for emerging graffiti artists.

Dizy aka Kajal Singh is a quirky 25-year-old college-going girl who is currently on a painting spree. Generally, a graffiti artist uses a moniker, an alternative name, to hide his identity. To Kajal, it is just another hipster ritual that attracted her to this. She has named herself ‘Dizy’, as in Dizzy without a Z. She thinks that it means out of the senses and being a graffiti artist makes her one.

She is mad about what she does but in a manner contrary to her alias. She doesn’t choose a random location or to paint without permission. She acquires it first and then starts her project even if it makes her off work for weeks and sometimes months.

Indians think the idea of the walls getting covered with bright spray paints for free a novelty. In western culture, this idea is not at all entertained. Its sheer vandalism for them.

She prefers Bandra in Mumbai as a location for her work rather than the National capital because people there are more open to these kinds of ideas and show warm acceptance when approached.

Rush- An adrenaline-filled Pact

She is one of the prominent faces of Indian graffiti. Rush has been spraying away since 2010. The Manipur girl doesn’t paint the usual motifs from Indian paintings. Her love is Dexter, Van Hallen, and Dee Dee from Dexter’s laboratory. Her tags are also visible in areas like Chanakyapuri, Hauz Khas, Kashmiri Gate bus Stand, IIT, etc. While two of her guardian angels look over her back, she paints in the darkness of the night.

According to her, the condition of the wall and its conspicuousness are the deciding factors for an artist in choosing a location. She is not painting nowadays as her gang is not around to protect from the terrors of the night. If her work is disrupted in middle due to some cop patrolling in the night, she comes back the next day to complete her work.

Without any political alignment, her paintings mostly consist of cartoon characters and tags with apparent domination of pink color. Rush has received criticism in her hometown for embracing the graffiti and hip-hop culture. She plans to shape her basic skills before moving on to take her pieces to make her pieces more vocal and politically motivated. She wants to interweave colors in such a way that people identify her work at a glance.

Treble- Teenage Trouble

He is the youngest of them all. He started painting at an early age of 13. He is a piano lover and he was named treble by one of his friends. Treble is assign used in music to tell whether to play a high note or a low note. His first attempt was painting a roof in Gurgaon. He was snared by this art form when he visited New York. He started making cartoon characters after his return.

He has now evolved and has his tag and style. What shaped his way was his early association with famous graffiti artists such as Daku. Treble considers him as his star motivator. He uses black, green, and pink in spray cans and wall paints to create the magic.

His areas of operates in Gurgaon, Phase I-III. He understood that maintaining anonymity comes as a big responsibility. So, only a few of the close friends know that he is Treble. He started making his work visible in Delhi in Malviya Nagar, Prithviraj Road which is one of the riskiest places for doing graffiti and the wall surrounding a metro station.

He recalls doing that. When he was out with his parents once. He saw the building that was abandoned. His parents dropped him off and he worked wonders. He jumped off the wall and ran when someone spotted him. He likes to express his feelings through a kaleidoscope of vibrant colors.

When people started demanding their walls be covered in art at Shahpur Jat, artists knew that their style has been accepted. So, we can say that graffiti would see many glorious days ahead!