Reverse Graffiti Artist

[xghstx]

A street artist has got to have a serious bone to pick to keep on working in front of shouting, gun-waving cops. Then again, I guess Alexandre Orion had a bit of an advantage when the police tried to nab him in a São Paulo street tunnel: He wasn't painting city property, he was cleaning it. For over two weeks last year, the Brazilian artist selectively scrubbed soot from the tunnel until the white surface underneath stared through as a cemetery's worth of skulls.

Every night he worked, the reverse graffiti artist says, he had at least five encounters with state police or the city traffic department. They sound less than pleasant.

"The São Paulo state police are usually very forceful, often holding guns trained on my face, and shouting very loudly," he says. "When they had confirmed that I really was cleaning, they eased the authoritarian attitude and lowered their guns, a few smiled hesitantly, made a few remarks among themselves, and there were even a few words of support."

Orion’s explanation of his motivation for the project, called Ossario (ossuary), sounds as heavy as Sao Paulo's air:

"The skulls belong all to us. I wanted to bring a catacomb from the near future to the present, to show people that the tragedy of pollution is happening right now. I try to remind people of things they are trying to forget."

The only way the city could put a stop to this inconvenient spoof was to beat Orion at his own game. Early in the morning of July 26, they washed the skulls away. When he kept working on the rest of the tunnel, they washed the whole thing. Then, for good measure, they washed all the other tunnels in the city.

[amosb72]

i don't get it
what's reverse graffiti

[xghstx]

the tunnel was covered with soot from all of the cars that drive under it and he used a clean cloth to clean certain areas to create the skull images which were supposed to represent the tragedy of pollution. anywhere that was black is all dirt in the tunnel and the white of the skulls is where he wiped the dirt away.

[amosb72]

oh
that's cool
i thought he was using like chalk or something and that's how they hosed it off

[Sac Skimmer]

EDIT: NVM i got it

[xghstx]

he was simply wiping dirt off a dirty wall with a clean towel.

[Sac Skimmer]

thats really cool

[PmillerNC]

its funny how they simply spray it off with water releasing alot of oil soot and other shit into their water system..

[Eneres]

great find :] enjoyed the video

[DjMattyD]

I could have sworn I posted this here before a while ago but I think maybe i just email forwarded it. Oh well yeah it is kewl.

[dan.nj]

coolio!

[SkimNate]

awesome.

[skimfit]

Pretty sweet ass idea. GUY IS A GENIUS!

[xghstx]

he's got some pretty serous skills.

[PierlessExile]

Very cool. The skulls themselves all looked really good to. Nice find.

[RexSkimmer]

pretty cool

[junwin]

yeh ive seen this, at first i couldnt tell what he was doing, but it comes out looking awesome

[Tear Down Your Idols]

sucks they erased it, its artwork not just tags!!!

[fireball]

man why da 5.0 always gotta b hatin'

[Kude]

that was so sick,

[Jaleez]

that is soooo sick!

[TRKYSUB]

if you think about it, that artist actually did worse for the environment than good. If he would have never done any artwork, the city wouldn't have washed all of that shit into the sewer systems and eventually an ocean. and All he did by drawing those skulls was amuse and annoy some people making them wash it off. If anything they should have washed it off and soaked it up into a tank and taken it somewhere.

[Teddy Parker]

that was fracking AWESOME. the art was so sick.

[tails]

if you think about it, that artist actually did worse for the environment than good. If he would have never done any artwork, the city wouldn't have washed all of that shit into the sewer systems and eventually an ocean. and All he did by drawing those skulls was amuse and annoy some people making them wash it off. If anything they should have washed it off and soaked it up into a tank and taken it somewhere.

i think the whole idea was to take a stance and send a message by drawing the skulls, not to help the environment

[xghstx]

if you think about it, that artist actually did worse for the environment than good. If he would have never done any artwork, the city wouldn't have washed all of that shit into the sewer systems and eventually an ocean. and All he did by drawing those skulls was amuse and annoy some people making them wash it off. If anything they should have washed it off and soaked it up into a tank and taken it somewhere.

you don't think they would have ever washed that tunnel? they would have had to wash it eventually. they can't just let the soot and pollution from cars build up indefinitely. yeah washing it up and soaking it up into a tank is a much better solution but in a country like Brazil is that realistic? I think that either way when they washed the walls the solution would have ended up in the sewer system but at least this way some attention was brought to the amount of pollution that their vehicles are creating.

[TRKYSUB]

you don't think they would have ever washed that tunnel? they would have had to wash it eventually. they can't just let the soot and pollution from cars build up indefinitely. yeah washing it up and soaking it up into a tank is a much better solution but in a country like Brazil is that realistic? I think that either way when they washed the walls the solution would have ended up in the sewer system but at least this way some attention was brought to the amount of pollution that their vehicles are creating.

yeah, but i don't think that "some attention" to pollution vs. washing all the soot and shit into the sewer system at the same time is justifiable :mad

[xghstx]

they were eventually going to have to wash it either way.

[bhassan]

that was pretty cool. I like how they washed out all the tunnels just so he wont go somewhere else.

[omi one]

Pretty dope.

[nasolovesyou]

wow, that guy is a genius. i can't even comprehend the skills and patience it would take to make all those skulls.