Graffiti art is constantly changing. Fresh coats of paint and newly pasted posters appear overnight in cities across the world. New artists, new ideas and new tactics displace faded images in a perpetual process of renewal and metamorphosis. From Stockholm to Tokyo, Barcelona to Los Angeles, Melbourne to Milan, wall spaces are a breeding ground for graphic and typographic forms as artists unleash their daily creations.
Current graffiti art is more reflective of the world around it. Using new materials and techniques, its innovators are creating an original language of forms and images infused with contemporary graphic design and illustration. Fluent in branding and graphic imagery, they have been replacing tags with more personal logos and shifting from typographic to iconographic forms of communication. Subverted signs, spontaneous drawings, powerful symbols and curious characters represent an unstoppable worldwide outdoor gallery of free art.
Street Logos is an international celebration of these developments in 21st-century graffiti, an essential sourcebook for all art and design professionals and a delight to everyone excited by the vitality of the street.
With 485 illustrations, 463 in colour.Tristan Manco is a freelance designer and art director - see www.tristanmanco.com
Other books by Tristan Manco - Stencil Graffiti, 2002, Thames and Hudson
Other articles by Tristan Manco:
"The Paris Commune" - article published in Creative Review June 2003
"How artists took over the street without your permission" - article about stencils and street art published in Maison Neuve Magazine (Canada) August 2004
"Painting Outside The Box" - article published in Modart Magazine, 2005
Forward for "Izastickup" - new book on street art stickering, 2005