Everything has politics, graffiti included. – GUESSWHO
In 2008, when John Palfrey and Urs Gasser tried to define the creation, maintenance and simultaneity of digital identities, they might not have anticipated the advent of a new game involving the politics of seemingly hiding but vividly establishing and popularising pseudo identities, in all its dynamicity. Evolving as a strong subculture in certain artistic domains, this game of identities has drawn public attention to the art and to the artists. Articulating a strategic and finely woven subtext, these pseudonyms mark a milestone in the evolution of street-art culture.
GuessWho — an anonymous artist – contributes to just such an eye-catching esotericism and is currently the talk of the town in quaint Kochi, as it hosts the Kochi Biennale – an international exhibition of contemporary art. Street art proclaims the basic necessity of public manifestation. Be it scribbles, caricatures, paintings or random drawings, a layman’s urge to manifest his thought processes, anxieties, opinions and preferences gets reflected in any street art form.
“You can see a very realistic picture of the Mullapperiyar dam burst flooding the ‘down lands’, drawn on the wall of a dilapidated building in Kochi. If you look closer, you see the trauma of a common man — the anxiety he suppresses, the unspoken political contempt and the confrontation of the feared — perfectly expressed in that,” says Favor Francis, a media activist and analyst. Thus, graffiti becomes the social expression of the ‘mass’, drawn by that faceless anonymous artist.
In a digital world, where art is no more just an artist’s cup of tea, where anybody can create graphical figures and ‘spread’ these online, the trending of manually-installed solid pieces of art underscores the distinction they hold in characterisation and thought. Capturing that solid piece of art digitally and spreading it online, GuessWho thus paves the way for a larger media convergence. Printing pictures, pasting them on walls, making soft copies and posting these on social media — the process covers all media formats! As GuessWho put it: “Ideally we would like the work to speak for itself. But given the nature of the medium, it does not have a longer life by itself; sometimes it would be removed within minutes.
So, digital documentation and sharing becomes crucial. It is like making a video of a performance piece. You can’t get the same results, but it helps. After all, the idea is to reach out to as many people as you can. Right? How many people would have seen a work of art by Banksy or Shepard Fairey in real life?” In the line “Sometimes it would be removed within minutes” lies a redefining of a much popular notion of the lifespan of art. A reasonable ground for digital documentation, it proclaims that a piece of art may have a celebrated viral life online but what gets lost is that indigenous localised aspect unfamiliar to the public – much like in India.
People praise Banksy and Fairey, pasting on their walls: “Thanks for keeping my wall clean.” Making Identity Irrelevant GuessWho have combined indigeneity with the global and ‘glocalised’ the concept. Significantly, by hiding the artist’s identity, by portraying people in contradicting identities, GuessWho mark ‘identity’ as their distinctive domain. The old facelessness and anonymity no more describes the generic works in graffiti.
GuessWho present a juxtaposition of distinct identities and place themselves in the middle. “The idea is not to keep it (artist’s identity) mysterious, but to make it irrelevant,” they say. One would nod to that, had they left their works unnamed, unbranded. GuessWho leave a signature with every work, on every social media post. Any other name would not have evoked such a massive amount of public attention and curiosity. In a liberal digital society like ours, where fake identities are accepted and pseudonyms are okayed, a larger politics of curiosity is employed in the selection of a name. The artist(s) does not make his identity irrelevant but expects the general public to guess or predict his face, name, intention, politics, the characters he has demolished and rebuilt and the relevance of their new identities.
“Femininity is expressed less in the physical graffiti culture. Street art itself is an assertion and exploration of masculinity. Every piece of street art announces man’s urge to conquer and establish the material marks of his inner trade,” says Philip Paul, who has extensively researched graffiti culture and is presently pursuing M Phil at Kalady Sreesankara University, Kerala. “GuessWho clearly follows a subtext, one of diffusing pop culture in the art, of attention-grabbing and of self-marketing,” adds Paul.
Merging Possibilities As if taking a cue from Paul, GuessWho have merged the possibilities of both the physical and the digital world, each of which is restricted to certain sections or to the other. “Graffiti as a medium of expression departs from the hierarchies and definitions imposed by traditional art institutions. It is a very dynamic form of art. Being removed or whitewashed is also a part of the process. It’s also very interesting to see that some people do not approve of these works as ‘pure graffiti’ since GuessWho doesn’t use the most popular medium in street art like spray paints and stencils!!!!” assert GuessWho, thus proving Philip’s argument right. People are not just their faces.
GuessWho have attempted a vast universalisation of homogenous entities and effected down-to-earth localisation of global and international figures in Marx and Engels as sadhus and Michael Jackson, Bob Marley et al as classical singers. Their latest work — Santa Claus in Mahabali costume – proudly proclaims that two-way process of ‘glocalisation’. Many well-known graffiti artists are often interrogated about being or having known the artist behind these works of art. Having explored that profound beauty of anonymity, let’s not guess who. Let’s instead ruminate on the free flow and acceptance of a pre-planned “subtext” of script. “When we say politics, it is more personal politics, an individual awareness and concern about social issues, a sense of responsibility to self as well as to society. It is about using the visual language as a tool for expression, a means of speaking out and being heard. It could be a critique, a perspective, sometimes also a provocation. We never said there is no politics. Everything has politics, graffiti included,” say GuessWho.
According to Favor Francis, the person, or probably the team, behind GuessWho is asserting their identity and slowly building a new global brand. Release of ‘GuessWho T-shirts’ exemplifies this. “They successfully work with a dynamic tool of self-marketing and of establishing their new brand,” says Francis. Dividing the graffiti era into two, we have an earlier stage when street art was popular, local and indigenous. We would find scribbles and drawings on every rural junction, on walls of public baths and even on trees. Then, when extremists took over all forms of street art, graffiti was feared and partially banned by the ‘ruling class’. Later revived, the modern Indian graffiti is no different from the global street art culture.
Lately, GuessWho has outgrown the strict premises of curiosity and compelled prediction. He/they are no more an anonymous artistic entity. GuessWho has a well-known identity, regardless of the semantics of its name. Their work is timely and place-specific. The Kochi Biennale, has, of course, propelled their increasing fame. After all — “Traditional art practices and state-sponsored art will always restrict itself to certain definitions and constraints. Most of them are meant to be immortal pieces.” Hitherto, graffiti may not have been popular in Kerala. But now, it has its growing share of popularity and is gaining acceptance with each passing day.
Is this article a joke or is it serious? Stop patronizing the mythical ‘common man.’ Seems like the author is in line with ‘the common middle class’ that’s desperate for an ‘international cool.’ The artist you mentioned is making middle class poster art with no original techniques. Another village was burned down today, go report on that.
Can you send me the link for the T-shirts? I`ve never seen them around.