“Imagine a city where graffiti wasn't illegal, a city where everybody could draw whatever they liked. Where every street was awash with a million colours and little phrases. Where standing at a bus stop was never boring. A city that felt like a party where everyone was invited, not just the estate agents and barons of big business. Imagine a city like that and stop leaning against the wall - it's wet.”

Bansky

The City

No one takes the time to appreciate graffiti, but it can transform a city and shows its true character. I have always been fascinated by graffiti and the raw and unpredictable quality that it has. I am attracted to the energy and spontaneity that graffiti expresses and how it conveys the need of the maker to communicate their thoughts and emotions with no concern for location and reaction. I wanted to take the idea of graffiti and make it my own, and bring it to a “fine art” level without displaying it in an obtrusive and defacing way. I was given the idea that I could graffiti the outside of a junkyard car. I started thinking, what if I was to invent a world where graffiti and its location are switched? The graffiti would be on the outside while the city lay within the confines of the car. So I began building my city one building at a time, giving each individual structure its own personality and painting them with the qualities of graffiti in mind. Suddenly my city had become my main interest and it started taking on a life of its own. As it grew it became more important than any actual graffiti. I loved the idea of finding a junkyard car and bringing it here on campus for my city to inhabit. I still wanted to build my city in an unexpected place. I went to a junkyard to see if I could find a car, and was instead given a beat up dark blue door that was missing a window. I was thrilled with the potential that this door had to be transformed into a whole new world. The next step was to add my modern buildings, but the question became ‘how?’ I played with having the door horizontal and vertical. When the door was vertical, the city spilled out of the door transforming it, but horizontally it possessed the landscape and sprawling quality that all cities have. It created the feeling I wanted my piece to have, so the decision was made, and all that was left was to allow my city to grow. - Heidi