Tuesday 29 March 2011

Black Rock graffiti


The downside of the back of Black Rocks being easily accessible, is that it is well visited; and sometimes not by those who would take the best care of it. As a result, there is a fair amount of graffiti. Thankfully, it is not the spray paint kind of graffiti, but the 'name carved in rock' kind. Looking around, some of it appears to date back quite a while.


One wonders whether Messrs Bircumshaw, Eyre, Kew and Abbott were a quartet of local lads hanging around up here in 1910. If they were young men at the time, it would not be long before they were living in a world embroiled in war.

At some point, a more artistic chiseller has etched out this horses head. It's certainly more recognisable than anything I could have drawn, even on paper!


The last one is undisputably modern. Console gaming meets outdoor adventure.


What do you think? Artistic expression or criminal damage?

6 comments:

  1. Hmmm... I'm not really sure what I think of rock carvings. I like to see the old graffiti, but hate to see the modern.

    What about the 13000 year old ibis, reindeer and bison at Cresswell Crags? If the prehistoric hunter gather hadn't carved those we'd be missing an important insight into their lives.

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  2. Difficult question as there is something quite poignant about old graffiti and as soon as I saw 1910 I thought of WWI and how might they have been effected by it. Bircumshaw and Eyre are old Derbyshire names so they are part of history now, I guess. At least it isn't in spray paint which would somehow jar the senses.

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  3. Criminal damage if it is new, artistic expression if it is old. Which, of course, means that whether it be a Lascaux cave painting or a freshly painted tag-line, at some point it changes from being one to the other. But change happens, night becomes day and ugly becomes beautiful. Life is odd isn't it?

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  4. I agree with Alan, above. It seems to be all about age.

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  5. Alan says it for me too - but it makes me wonder at myself....

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  6. The selection you've shown here is not unsightly. I agree that spraypaint is really horrible and the tendency to deface with crudeness, as is most often the case, is intolerable...but what you've shown here, isn't an eyesore. I think Alan has summed it up well!

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