The Art Detour detour: a walk on the wild side

Posted on 05. Mar, 2010 by Tony Arranaga in Featured, News

UPDATE: city response

Graffiti artists in Downtown Phoenix are helping business owners battle tagging and blight, while creating a different kind of art walk during this weekend’s longest running self-guided art tour called Art Detour (here).

A collection of murals can be found in the Roosevelt District, and in an alley between 4th and 5th Streets in Downtown Phoenix.  Many business owners are allowing artists with some street cred to paint murals on the sides of their buildings.  One business owner tells me tagging work by respected artists is a no-no in the world of vandalism. Read my previous post on this subject here.

“It keeps the area vibrant,” says Derrick Pacheco about the murals in an alley behind his Roosevelt district store. Pacheco owns a bike shop called Hood Ride on 5th Street just south of Roosevelt.  Pacheco hopes the street art will “weed out all the crap.”

The city has a program called Graffiti Busters (here), however some business owners I spoke with say the city is slow to respond. I’ve placed a call into the city for a response, meanwhile business owners are now taking matters into their own hands by either commissioning artists to display murals or allow the artist to create one on their own.

Hood Ride owner Pacheco points to an example across the street from his store by well known graffiti artists Mac and Kofie (here and here). Meanwhile, in the alley behind Hood Ride, there are street art murals by nine different artists. Structures, trailers, even a dumpster all have works of art.

What do you know about the graffiti art in downtown Phoenix?  Be sure to post your comment below.

Want to do your own self guided tour of the graffiti art in Downtown Phoenix? From the METRO light rail, deboard at Roosevelt and head east until you get to the alley between 4th and 5th Street.  Information on how to ride can be found here.

Also, find out how the light rail stations in Phoenix can be part of your Art Detour weekend here.

UPDATE: city response

William Hogans runs the graffiti removal program in the city of Phoenix.  Hogans tells me his department, like many in the city, has seen a funding decrease and a case increase.  He averages about 1400 graffiti removal locations a week.  Two years ago he crew responded to about 1000 per week.  Hogan says his department averages a two week response time and that the ultimate responsibility to remove graffiti rests with the property owner.  However, there are city run programs available to help the business owner match paint and also an opportunity for people to volunteer to become ‘blight buster volunteers’ in their neighborhood.  Information can be found in the link above.

Tags: Art Detour, graffiti art, How to Ride, Kofie, Mac, METRO, My Blog Posts on DowntownPhoenix.com, rail, Roosevelt, street art