Writing Urban Space

Street Art, Democracy, and Photographic Cartography

Bibliographic Data

ID2408833
AuthorsJasmine Brooke Ulmer (0000-0002-8711-0151, corresponding author)
Year2017
Volume17
Issue6
Pages491-502
Publication date2017-12-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueCulture Studies ↔ Critical Methodologies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1532-7086 • E-ISSN: 1552-356X
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/1532708616655818
OpenAlexW2460925475
LanguageEN
Citations received17
References cited28

In this article, the street is both a place of travel and a space for critical discourse. As tensions between public and private spaces play out in the streets, street artists claim visible space through multiple forms of art. Through a critical performance geography and a qualitative inquiry of the street, I photograph the movement of art across walls, doorways, windows, sidewalks, lampposts, alleyways, gutters, and dumpsters over a 7-month period in the Eastern Market neighborhood of Detroit ( N = 806). After describing street art as a fluid genre that has developed into a diverse spectrum of post-graffiti, I explore how street art contributes to a changing visual terrain through discussions of racism, decolonization, gentrification, and the role of art in spatial justice. Photographic cartography is introduced as (a) a visual method of performance geography that illustrates material-discursive 'fault lines' and (b) a critical means of analyzing conversations in contested public space. Significantly, street artists simultaneously work within and against urban renewal policies in 'creative cities' such as Detroit. Given that the arts are at the center of sophisticated visual discourse regarding neoliberalism, democracy, and the battle over public space, researchers might continue to examine how street artists inscribe social justice in, on, and around the streets

Art · Art history · Art world · Cityscape · Democracy · Gentrification · Graffiti · Media studies · Neoliberalism (international relations · Performance art · Political science · Politics · Public space · Right to the city · Social science · Sociology · Visual arts · Visual culture · Engineering · Geographies of human-animal interactions · Public Spaces through Art · Urban and sociocultural dynamics · Law · Urban Studies

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