For their Ivy wall project last fall, Smart Crew a Queens-based group of graffiti artists that enlisted the help of eight members who attended Ivy League schools. Although each of the eight artists attended an Ivy League institution, the artists do not represent all eight Ivies, according to Smart Crew members.
The crew's outlook is that its art belongs strictly on the street and not in galleries or on the art market. Rather than make a living off their art, members of Smart Crew see graffiti as "a hobby to get away from our day-to-day lives," five Smart Crew members said in an e-mail to The Dartmouth.
Because their identities are not public knowledge, the Smart Crew members asked to remain anonymous.
"The art world is all about money and politics," the graffiti artists said. "Everyone knows that, including the people that participate in it."
For the Queens project, eight Smart Crew artists created an Ivy League-themed mural from their tags, or graffiti signatures. The tags, which incorporated the colors and emblems of each Ivy League school, converged to form a stunning piece of artwork spanning the length of the wall. Working with the permission of the property owner in Queens, the artists spent a week completing the project.
The artist DCEVE, who painted the Dartmouth component of the mural, said he found inspiration for his piece in the letter D the first letter of both Dartmouth and his own name. His tag starts with Dartmouth's iconic block letter D, followed by CEVE in bold, graffiti-style letters. In these letters, one can make out the image of the school's shield.
The different tags included in the mural provide a striking contrast to the drab grey brick on which they are painted and the dusty, litter-strewn lot in which they are displayed. The wall has been painted to look as if the grey paint of the bricks was peeled away to reveal red bricks underneath, creating a pop-out effect. Painted green vines seem to grow naturally out of cracks in the wall, snaking around the letters and fitting seamlessly with the green Dartmouth piece. The font used by the graffiti artists is dynamic and animated, lending the mural a commanding presence.
According to Smart Crew, there is little clash between the medium of graffiti and the subject matter of the elite and intellectual. In fact, the project is one of many endeavors by Smart Crew to incorporate images of intelligence and education into graffiti art.
Referencing the group's name, the word smart appears in many works by crew members. The group's logo is a stylized letter S with a graduation cap floating above it.
Smart Crew members said people are often surprised that graffiti artists have attended Ivy League schools.
"It's funny that people assume that just because we are graffiti writers we couldn't have possibly gone to an Ivy League school," crew members wrote. "We have been reading some comments on the Internet saying that Smart Crew are not Ivy League graduates ... but we specifically selected the eight members that have attended Ivy League schools in the past to do this wall."
Smart Crew representatives added that their group does not fit the stereotype of a graffiti crew.
"You can definitely say we are a pretty strange group if you saw us all together in one place," crew members wrote. "We are probably [as far] away from a cliche graffiti crew as possible."
While the crew started in 1997 as a group of high school friends engaging in small-time bombing (illegal forms of graffiti), it is now comprised of an eclectic group of artists who focus on graffiti's artistic potential.
According to the contacted members, not all artists in the crew are trained graffiti writers, though most do have "roots in graffiti culture." None of the crew members attended art school.
True to their mission to keep graffiti art on the streets, Smart Crew members avoid formal art establishments like art galleries and museums.
Crew members expressed doubts about the value people place on the work of Banksy, a street artist who has gained international acclaim and is the envy of collectors and galleries worldwide.
Last year, the crew engaged in a brief yet highly publicized territory war with Banksy, tagging over multiple Banksy works in Chinatown, the financial district, SoHo and Dumbo mere hours after he had created them. Because Banksy is not a prolific artist, Smart Crew's actions had a significant impact on the success of his work.
Unlike Banksy, Smart Crew displays its work only in the streets and avoids sharing pictures of new pieces online.
"Don't forget that graffiti still has much more of an impact when seen in person," crew members wrote in a blog post with pictures of the Ivy League murals.
Smart Crew members do not reveal the exact location of their new pieces, instead preferring that people stumble upon them by accident.
However, for Dartmouth students interested in making a trip to New York City to see the crew's Ivy League designs, South Queens near John F. Kennedy International Airport might be a good place to look.
