Via: INAH

Migration has favored development of graffiti in the world as a form of expression against injustice and repression, and has become the main means of identity and union of a wide sector, declared Said Dokins, graffiti specialist and practitioner in Los Angeles, United States of America.

The specialist participated at Coloquio Internacional Migración y Revolución (International Colloquy Migration and Revolution) organized by the Direction of Historical Studies of the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH).



At the academic forum where 15 specialists from the United States, Canada, France, Italy and Mexico gathered, migratory processes and their influence in Mexican Revolution were analyzed. Dokins exposed that graffiti began in New York in the 1960’s decade as a form of expression product of the boredom of a depressing society.

“With migratory phenomenon, this urban manifestation expanded to different countries, becoming a worldwide expression. It proliferated in Los Angeles and it is from there that it began diffusing to the world, since it is in the United States where most immigrants live”.

In Mexico, graffiti began in Tijuana, at the beginning of the 1980’s decade; “American practitioners began leaving their imprints, such as signatures and letters”, commented Roberto, another urban artist that participated in the paintings at the façade of the Direction of Historical Studies part of the colloquy activities.

The group did not allow Mexicans to incorporate and this is how the urban artist group named Hechos en Mexico emerged, decorating Tijuana, the border crossed by more migrants from Mexico and Latin America to United States.

“This urban manifestation began diffusing in the national territory as well as in countries such as France, Germany, Spain, Argentina and Brazil”, mentioned Roberto.

“Messages are varied but promote union, better social conditions, and fight against discrimination to immigrants” declared Venus, another practitioner.

In Mexico, “there has been persecution because they do not realize we are looking for a way of expressing and it is in the street, not in the museum or the gallery”, added artist Libre.

Part of the activities of the INAH colloquy was a match between practitioners, where these urban artists captured how migration influenced social revolutions.

Ten graffiti practitioners from Los Angeles (USA) Tijuana, Oaxaca and Mexico City painted a 1.8 by 40 meters screen installed at the façade of the DEH.

Rosario, one of them, declared that the first stage of a design is to determine the message and then you begin to choose the images that will help to transmit it, to string characters and concepts together. There is place for improvisation”.

Almost 10 graffiti works were created during the colloquy; they will be exhibited until late June 2010 at the DEH facilities, and then will travel to different INAH centers. DEH is located at 172 Allende St. at Juarez, Tlalpan, D.F.