[HN Gopher] Novel hydrogels can safely remove graffiti from vand...
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       Novel hydrogels can safely remove graffiti from vandalized street
       art
        
       Author : pseudolus
       Score  : 26 points
       Date   : 2021-04-18 10:57 UTC (12 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (arstechnica.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (arstechnica.com)
        
       | doitLP wrote:
       | "Novel hydrogels found to be highly persistent and toxic to
       | marine species at 1ppb"
        
       | nynx wrote:
       | There was a Banksy on my street in San Francisco that had paint
       | thrown over it. Perhaps this method could help recover the art.
        
         | friseurtermin wrote:
         | I'm gonna be the one who says it: why is the Banksy worth
         | saving but the thrown paint is not?
        
           | johtso wrote:
           | I guess a better question is, why is the Banksy stencil
           | something that needs to be protected, but the work by the
           | unknown street artist not.
           | 
           | Because Banksy is a famous brand, and his work has big price
           | tags attached to it.
           | 
           | The whole thing is totally unique and fascinating. Banksy has
           | developed his concept so well. He clearly also acknowledges
           | the absurdity of the situation. His self shredding painting
           | is clearly a comment on the contraction between the ephemeral
           | and the valuable.
           | 
           | Street art is inherently ephemeral. It's the wild west. There
           | are no rules (although sometimes etiquette), because by its
           | very nature it is breaking the rules.
           | 
           | Seeing newspaper articles where people are talking about a
           | Banksy piece having been "vandalised", or that someone
           | cutting out a piece of their wall to sell it is "stealing
           | something that belongs to the community".
           | 
           | At the same time, street art in general is viewed as
           | vandalism. The law doesn't try to make distinctions based on
           | the artistic merit of a specific bit of unauthorised public
           | space modification.
           | 
           | But money and fame, that's something anyone can understand!
           | If something is worth money, then it's good. You painted on
           | my wall! How lucky I am! Oh yeah and the pictures great too,
           | what a clever image!
           | 
           | I personally think his work is pretty good. But much more
           | interesting is how society has reacted to it.
        
           | wizzwizz4 wrote:
           | Why is any state preferred over any other state?
        
           | pie420 wrote:
           | Why do you prefer to breathe rather than hold your breath?
        
           | 8128js8121 wrote:
           | Why does anything humanity think matter.
        
           | dehrmann wrote:
           | For all we know, Banksy was the vandal. He did build a
           | shredder into a picture frame...
        
           | prvc wrote:
           | In that particular case, because people will pay money for
           | them, and in the other cases in the article, because people
           | agree with the political messages or like the appearance of
           | the approved graffiti better. More to the point, though, the
           | conceptual distinction which the article is trying to draw
           | between "graffiti", as opposed to "street art" is just made
           | up philosophically bankrupt nonsense.
        
           | pcl wrote:
           | To my eye, pieces attributed to Banksy have a unique and
           | appealing aesthetic, and the art generally is thought-
           | provoking. He also has a knack for pushing all sorts of
           | buttons. See his immigration piece in Clacton-on-Sea [1] for
           | an example of all of the above.
           | 
           | A paint splash hastily thrown on his art is less compelling
           | to me, on all these dimensions. Perhaps it's a particularly
           | well-splashed bit of paint, but even so, the closest it can
           | really come to commentary is something along the lines of
           | "Banksy works in a transient medium, and all things in life,
           | including street art, are destined to be painted over" or
           | perhaps "this, too, is art". But at this point, that is a not
           | particularly original bit of expression, and I'd just as soon
           | have the Banksy on display.
           | 
           | [1] https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-essex-29446232
        
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       (page generated 2021-04-18 23:01 UTC)