Understanding social critique in graffiti art from a (non-)Western perspective: Chinese students comparing Banksy and Zato through photo-elicitation

Abstract

Although obvious in Western Europe and the US, the controversy about graffiti is not as pronounced in mainland China. While the creative/destructive act of vandalising public spaces and even private property brings with it certain issues and notions attributed to culture jamming, protest action, and subversive aesthetics, this is not necessarily how graffiti thrived within the leftist context of China. Unfortunately, since graffiti practice in China is still an understudied area, many questions would soon be left unanswered as this street art form swiftly vanishes under the communist country’s rapid development in pursuit of globalisation. With the aim of demonstrating why graffiti culture in China functions quite differently from graffiti practices in the UK (and similar ‘Western’ cultures), we investigate how the art of graffiti is understood and defined by Chinese students who participated in our comparative study. The participants contrasted Banksy’s art with the works of Zato, who is quite popular in China’s contemporary graffiti scene. Through a blended method of visual ethnography, photo-elicitation, and focus group discussions conducted via video conferencing, we visualised the two graffitists against a backdrop of clashing social constructs and political contexts. Our findings provide valuable insights into persisting issues surrounding the differences between Western and Chinese graffiti practices. Graffiti art in the UK and in China may have proven comparable in terms of medium but incommensurable as to message. Due to Covid-19 lockdown restrictions, the images included in this article and cited throughout the study were all sourced online.