Whenever I’m in France, Italy or Spain (which is not nearly as often as I’d like to be) I do find myself shocked at the sheer quantity of graffiti, almost everywhere.
I don’t like to see graffiti as vandalism, but let’s face it, on this scale it really is. Still, there’s always a positive, and here it is the fact that the vandalism does have a large degree of artistic merit. And a heart opposite.
I think I’ve blogged about this before, probably after returning from Barcelona, but mostly what you see are tags. There’s something surreal about seeing huge urban graffiti on bridges in rural Normandy as you drive down from Cherbourg towards Paris. I hope somebody’s documenting them – I wish I had the time to. I’d pick a route and would stop and photograph every bridge along the way. Many of them are simple crossings from field to field, some with a footpath, others there perhaps for livestock.
Driving into one particular town (off the top of my head I forget where it was) we drove beneath a huge overpass with at least two levels, and on the lowest level was a heart along with some text. My instincts told me to stop, but the children were asleep in the back of the car, the entrance to the bridge was in some location unknown to me and it just wasn’t possible… sometimes I have to let them go.
This photograph was taken here in Lisieux, where we stopped for breakfast. We took a stroll – rather a long stroll as it turned out, as the Basilique Sainte Thérèse is stunning and we couldn’t resist walking up to it – and this was on the way back to the car, in a covered space between two buildings. I love the juxtaposition (but hate the word) between the traditional French window and the elaborate and bizarre graffiti.
And I’m sure the owners of the house were delighted with it.
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blue route, from Norway to Russia along the Arctic circle.
ready when you are...
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