Tag 1973

Stay High 149 painted this tag in yellow, and probably in the dead of night – you can almost see him looking over his shoulder to check no one is coming. Look at the dripping paint, a record of the hand's movement: a perfect, almost cartoon-like halo, but really, a form of rebellion. It makes me think about my own painting practice. There is something so beautiful about seeing the trace of an artist's hand, and the raw directness of graffiti art shares something with the immediacy of abstract painting. I love the way the yellow pops against the drab and gritty urban landscape. And it's funny, the way artists think they are doing something completely new, but they are always in conversation with the artists of the past. So, here we are, looking at a piece of ephemeral street art and thinking about how it speaks to the history of painting.