Comments on: Graffiti in Madrid – What are they going to do about it?

By: Stephen mason

Stephen mason — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 19:08:12 +0000

Having just returned from Madrid I found the huge amounts of graffiti depressing..for lots of reasons..

a. virtually none has any artistic merit, reason or purpose

b. It shows a tolerance for mindless desecration of some beautiful things – that people don’t seem too mind..and a real slippery slope.

c. A damming indictment of the youth of madrid that seem to worship at this alter of nihilism – though it is not nihilism, since that has some thought behind it.

I am all for revolution, free expression etc but writing your name on a wall or glass thousands of times just shows that you are just a self obsessed wanker!

By: Madrid Neighbourhoods: Malasaña - Still Putting the Mad in Madrid? - Notes from Madrid

Tue, 20 Nov 2007 10:12:31 +0000

[...] The mindless graffiti and affable goths seem a lukewarm legacy of La Movida Madrileña (the capital’s post-Franco wild years) which kicked off in Malasaña in the Seventies. However, some of Spain’s cultural revolutionaries (the ones who didn’t die of heroine overdoses) are still to be spotted slinking around the barrio, ensuring that the party spirit lives on. Meanwhile, gentrification has led to some great shopping and eating options. [...]

By: ben

ben — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 17:20:36 +0000

Thanks for the pic, I’ve never seen Muelle anywhere… I wonder what he does now!?

By: Carl

Carl — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 15:16:28 +0000

Wow – it’s automatic!

By: Carl

Carl — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 15:15:54 +0000

Found him:

http://www.valladolidwebmusical.org/graffiti/historia/05historia_spain.html

But, I’m ashamed to admit I don’t know how to make it a link – little help Ben?

By: Carl

Carl — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 15:12:21 +0000

I know it was before your time Ben – just because you were not in Madrid then. This was about 1985 to maybe even 1995 there was a few left. I bet Marina would know. I will try to post a picture of his work. Everywhere you went in the city there were big “Muelle’s” and little Muelle’s, always nicely done with different colors.

By: ben

ben — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 07:57:22 +0000

I guess Muelle was before my time… I remember a big saw that was sprayed on every hoarding in the north of Madrid, on the way up the A6 and into the sierra, but that seems to have gone now too…

By: carl

carl — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 23:43:36 +0000

I hate the grafitti. Dating myself, I remember when there was none. Only a handfull of “taggers” did graffiti and the best one was “Muelle”. It actually was art. Does anybody remember “Muelle”?