Reverse graffiti | Hacker News Reader

Reverse graffiti

en.wikipedia.org

106 pointsbelter29 comments

There is (or was) a pretty smart reverse graffiti in a tunnel of Brussels, Belgium.

The tunnel's walls are covered in white tiles, but are all black because of the cars' pollution. The graffiti goes in two parts (written in French), facing each other:

  * "LE MAL PROPRE" - meaning "the shoddy" has been written by cleaning the tiles composing the letters, hence white letters over a black background.
  * "LE BIEN SALE" - meaning "the pretty dirty" uses the opposite technique: the tiles outside the shape of the letters have been cleaned - black letters over white background.

The graffiti really plays around the concept of mirroring:

  * by the way how the words are revealed: cleaning the letters or their surrounding
  * by the play on words in the two commonly used expressions: "mal" - badly - being the opposite of "bien" - well -, and "propre" - clean - being the opposite of "sale" - dirty:
    * "mal" has a negative connotation and is used with "propre" which has a positive one.
    * "bien" has a positive connotation and is used with "sale" which has a negative one.

I only found one photo of half of it online: https://www.brusselseyes.com/le-mal-propre-2014/

I think an english interpretation which retains the original spirit would be something like: "the poorly cleaned" / "the well soiled"

I'd translate to "the clean evil"/"the dirty good" Edit: but I think I've missed the point that there are multiple understanding so multiple translations and probably a pun on "malpropre"

It's funny to learn there's a term for this. It reminds me of something that happened in our church parking lot a couple of years ago. Someone (presumably a neighbourhood kid) had drawn a big black phallus on the nice white-ish concrete path. It was there for a few weeks, so I decided to get some turpentine and a scrubbing brush and clean it off. However, I scrubbed it so well that after I'd finished there was big white phallus (much whiter than the surrounding path). The white phallus remains to this day, though it is fading.

I'm partial to the secondary graffiti that accumulates over time when half-hearted attempts to cover up graffiti with leftover paints seem to create a whole new mural of its own.

https://www.designboom.com/art/brian-kosoff-graffiti-abstrac...

Thanks for the link, that's brilliant. I've been watching the slow development of one of these murals on a walking path near me. Maybe I should start taking my own photos to see if I can get a timelapse.

“The Subconscious Art of Graffiti Removal” is a tongue-in-cheek documentary short film with a similar take on the art of graffiti removal. The filmmaker interviews Portland city workers about the process and follows them on their day painting over graffiti. The film is available on YouTube.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Subconscious_Art_of_Graf...

My favorite example of this: https://imgur.com/8QyMe

Use a mild acid wash to get the whole area clean, power wash it, and then re-seal the concrete.

On the bright side, at least your church building isn't shaped like a literal phallus [1].

[1] https://www.google.com/maps/place/Christian+Science+Society+...

It isnt so simple. This can often remove the patina from a surface. By doing this you are deciding what is "dirt" and what is not. If you cut the ivy from someone's wall it would be considered vandalism. So too if you strip a layer of moss to emblazen a garden wall with your own advertisements.

Try doing this to a Lincoln memorial, mount Rushmore or any number of "dirty" statues across europe. Those who "cleaned" the Elgin marbles remain hated down the years.

It is always interesting the way that different social media will absorb content from other platforms. Like Twitter is text based and Instagram is photo based, so we can screenshots of tweets on Instagram. Apparently HN's version is looking up a Wikipedia page to explain a popular post on Reddit.

https://www.reddit.com/r/BeAmazed/comments/1auwmvz/reverse_g...

noticed this as well, didn't think as far.

This effect is also seen on buildings where old signs have been removed, revealing the cleaner surface that was covered up.

Reverse graffiti has been described by promoters as an environmentally friendly form of advertising

It could literally be called "greenwashing".

greenwashing already has a definition though.

I feel like the moral equivalent of this on the Internet would be buying lapsed domain names and restoring the original contents, wiping away the grimey ads of the domain parking page.

Eh, "reverse graffiti" is still graffiti - unauthorized works of art - it's just usually less permanent.

In this situation, it'd be more like buying ads for those parked domains to reflect the previous content, or whatever else.

Some of the examples in the Wikipedia article are authorized. Maybe you consider authorized (reverse) graffiti to be a (reverse) graffiti aesthetic on a mural though.

It popped into my head today why I think this is the right comparison. When you power wash a wall, you reveal the color/texture it had before it was degraded by exposure to the environment. In an analogous way to how walls grow over with ivy, moss, and grime if they aren't maintained, websites tend to fall into disuse and become parking pages. So restoring the original content feels analogous to power washing the grime off a wall and revealing the original bricks.

It's subjective though, reasonable people may disagree. If someone did what you proposed and called it reverse graffiti, I wouldn't argue the point.

WD40 is used on concrete to make tags that show up only in the rain

and of course:

https://www.googlesightseeing.com/2010/10/hawaiian-rock-graf...

This is my favorite: https://thatoregonlife.com/2023/09/how-to-catch-a-glimpse-of...

This should not go unmentioned here: https://youtube.com/watch?v=JwsBBIIXT0E

That's the first video I think of when I hear Reverse Graffiti. Alexandre Orion.

I would call this cleanliness graffiti, maybe graffiti sculpture. The term reverse graffiti should be literally removing graffiti or covering up graffiti with paint.

subtractive graffiti

It's cool to see, but I've only seen it done to advertise Lollapalooza via the sidewalk. A nice festival that's getting more outrageous in fees every year sadly.

I like the concept of using moss as a graffiti medium.

Does not mention additives like cleaning + stencil lotus surface sealing.

Also there are in theory bio ones with lichen and moss.

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