Subway Art

Rating:
Summary: A nice addition
Review: Almost as important as Norman Mailer's The Faith of Graffiti, Chalfant and Cooper combine efforts to compile a near masterpiece. Biggest fault: the title. What the kids in New York created was not a form of art but a form of communication.

Rating:
Summary: Subway art: - visually impressive, a graf "bible"!
Review: Although a bit superficial textually 'Subway Art' could be considered a good introduction into graffiti culture. This book is visually quite impressive and just the extensive amount of photos make this book a good buy. 'Subway Art' is and has been a true inspiration for many graffiti writers all over the world (be it good or bad!) and therefore it is a true 'bible' of the graffiti culture. However, better books about graf-culture have been written but not too many photographed.

Rating:
Summary: FROM HERE TO FAME...
Review: Cutting right to the chase, Subway Art is the official guide to subway graffiti (or "bombing") in New York. Photographer's Henry Chalfant and Martha Cooper are on point like snipers with their visual masterpiece on early subway graff. Packed with unforgettable "pieces" that once graced New York's "iron horses", the book also captures New York graffiti legends at work and provides informative text on the culture as well. Subway Art takes the reader on a colorful train ride through New York's subterranean art world and explores a youth based culture which has transcended the very dark and dangerous underworld in which it was conceived. It's to no surprise why Subway Art was reportedly the most stolen art book in the U.S. and abroad. Although subway graffiti in New York was sadly abolished under the Koch administration, it's legacy lives on through Subway Art and the worldwide graffiti culture. Subway Art is a definite for all "graff-heads" as well as those seeking the skinny on subway graffiti in New York. --James "Koe" Rodriguez

Rating:
Summary: FROM HERE TO FAME...
Review: Cutting right to the chase, Subway Art is the official guide to subway graffiti (or "bombing") in New York. Photographer's Henry Chalfant and Martha Cooper are on point like snipers with their visual masterpiece on early subway graff. Packed with unforgettable "pieces" that once graced New York's "iron horses", the book also captures New York graffiti legends at work and provides informative text on the culture as well. Subway Art takes the reader on a colorful train ride through New York's subterranean art world and explores a youth based culture which has transcended the very dark and dangerous underworld in which it was conceived. It's to no surprise why Subway Art was reportedly the most stolen art book in the U.S. and abroad. Although subway graffiti in New York was sadly abolished under the Koch administration, it's legacy lives on through Subway Art and the worldwide graffiti culture. Subway Art is a definite for all "graff-heads" as well as those seeking the skinny on subway graffiti in New York. --James "Koe" Rodriguez

Rating:
Summary: Dondi's train work in this book
Review: Dondi (Donald J. White) a King of subway art. His work is photographed in this book. May he Rest in Peace,4/61-10/98.

Rating:
Summary: Images of a by-gone era
Review: I stumbled across this book almost 10 years ago and it was like reliving an old dream. Incredible! This book will take you on a ride through the 5 boroughs of NYC and the graffiti that embraced her during the 70's and 80's. This "bible" of sorts has helped preserve images that are no longer in existence.

Rating:
Summary: review for hard-working graffheds who sketch and learn style
Review: If you're a graffwriter it's very important you see this at least once, which doesn't mean you should buy it. If you're a writer and you've adopted a sort of scholastic approach to learning style (ie observing style in photos and trying to sketch what you see to learn), then read this:
If you've already mastered the basics (ie letter proportions, basic connections, simple letters, blockbusters) and you're counting on this book to teach you some new tricks, don't.
All this media hype about the bible of graffiti has influenced a lot of people to overestimate this book. Let us not forget that this book is only what the photographers saw. These guys were not writers. Many crews which contributed to the evolution of style (fba, tc5, tds) are not documented. Books can only reflect the writer's quality but not quantity of pieces done. So who was king where and when is another question. Where are the real style burners in the book??!! They're not there.
Well that's up to you to look for them, if you're a true writer, document yourself, dig for those gems, this culture is underground, and there are many wack pieces in this book.
Now don't get me wrong, it still is essential to have seen it at least once to understand what old skool is. But just get it from a friend, or check it out at the bookshop. What you really should be looking out for though is old issues of tight magazine, and old underground graff zines having new york specials, there are a lot, and especially in european magz.
And if you're new to this culture, then this book won't bring you the initial spark to start your career in writing. You're better off watching Style Wars by the same author, that is worth your money at 200%, trust me. This is it ! This is it !

Rating:
Summary: Whos who in old school graffiti!
Review: Meet the real writers who started it all! On location footage and tons of old school graffiti flavor makes this book just about as real as it gets. Check out the old school writers and their early masterpieces. Dondi, Skeme,Futura,Lady Pink and Zephyr are just a few of the kings of the New York Metro System you'll get to meet in this bible for studying the styles and the people who made graffiti what it is today. Wanna do your graffiti homework? You'll be a graduate in old school style New York Graffiti after having read this one!

Rating:
Summary: If not for this book, who knows?
Review: No one can deny, not even hardcore NY graf heads from the 80's, that the publication of this book (in connection with the release of the two films "Wild Style" and the PBS documentary "Style Wars") caused thousands and thousands of wanna-be b-boys all over the country to quit spinning on their heads on cardboard at the mall and go steal a bunch of markers. They changed their names from "Kid Fresh" and "Mr. Wiggles" to far-out four-letter tagging names like "HAZE", "DAZE", "KAZE" and "MAZE" and started destroying the hell out of their bedroom walls, their lockers at school, and their brand-new Lee denim jackets. They were wack toys, but they were the new "old school"; if it wasn't for them, or this book, there probably wouldn't be any worldwide graf art movement.

So that's why it's important, but is it a good book, a fair representation of what was going on in the tunnels in the early 1980's? Well, yeah, they left some crews out, but those sour grapes must die, because there's some stuff in here that WASN'T very "important" that ran, and that shows that a diverse selection of pieces was chosen for the book. There are sections in here that are so full of life and chaos and flat-out funk that I sometimes can't believe this stuff was even painted on trains in the first place, which makes it all the more special.

And if you're still not convinced, let's go back to the year it was published. The only photo evidence of graf that I knew of at the time was the Craig Castleman book "Getting Up" which hardly had any pictures at all, or if anyone was lucky enough to actually own or to have taped either "Wild Style" or "Style Wars" and could freeze-frame it. Besides that, you had to go to the public library and look for articles on trains in "Art In America", "Artforum", and "Print" magazines (those are a few I recall having big huge photo essays on the "new" graffiti movement, as it was called back then). So this book, at the time, was a revelation, pure and simple, and all those wanna-be HAZEs and MAZEs at the mall had their lives changed for good.

Rating:
Summary: GRAFFITI BIBLE...
Review: ONE OF THE THREE GRAF ESSENTIALS - 'STYLE WARS', 'WILD STYLE' AND 'SUBWAY ART'. YOU DON'T NEED ANYTHING ELSE. PUT ON A TAPE OF 'CRIMINAL MINDED' AS YOU READ IT AND REMEMBER....