This beautiful piece speaks for itself when the overall message is translated: “Love your neighborhood: defend it from racism and gentrification.”
When you get to spend enough time in a foreign city, and if you’re really looking, you start to see past the brochure ideals and discover the city’s hidden quirks and political truths.
In the third year of my undergrad, I began moving towards an interest in urban geography and the role of urban planning/design in certain aspects of economic justice. The timing couldn’t have been more right, then, when I saw the application form for a Go Global Seminar in May 2023, titled Italy: Interpreting Urban Landscapes. I was immediately sold and after quickly applying I was happy to find out in January 2023 that I had been selected to attend the course, which was taught by Dr. Bernard Momer.
On paper, the course was an opportunity to practice site-based learning, deeply engage in the urban landscape, and learn from fellow students, who all came from several disciplines. Our learning largely revolved around space syntax and social condensation, critically differentiating Baroque and Renaissance architecture, and the inequalities that inform the city-as-a-palimpsest.
But beyond the technicalities of the course syllabus, I had been given the opportunity to immerse myself in a country I had long dreamed of visiting and was now able to seek out and critically explore the urban fabric on my own terms. This included, for example, unplanned trips to spaces like the MAAXI gallery in Rome and the Urban Innovation Lab in Bologna, as well as searching for and photographically documenting local activist graffiti. This was my spontaneous solo project.
One of the most beautiful and contradictory parts of walking in Florence or Rome or Bologna, where every building feels either monumental or historical, was that they were confronted with the often loud and unapologetic symbols or words. Scrawled onto old walls without permission, the graffiti told stories of activist presence, of growing right wing politics, of fighting for civil liberties and transnational solidarity. Sometimes it was also just a beautiful expression, some abstract art, an attempt to claim the city. In either case, there was always some greater tension between what the city is intended to be and for who (Lefebvre’s representations of space) versus what ‘ordinary’ people or communities employ the city to be, and what claims they make to it (Lefebvre’s representational space).
Now this was the most interesting and recurring set of symbols, and it came in varieties and popped up in every city we visited. You should note the double flag symbol and the lightning arrow symbol. After some digging, I couldn’t find an explanation for the lightning arrow, but the flag symbol originates from anti-fascist movements throughout the European region, including Germany, and seems to be a call to split with and de-naturalize the recent rise of fascist politics.
By the end of the course, we had to produce a website showcasing all that we learnt, and I dedicated a page to the graffiti, so please feel free to see in detail my analyses and to get a better look at the variety of symbols and claims I found in my three weeks in Italy.
Besides all that I’ll say that the course was a fundamental experience, I loved the people I met and the friends I made on that trip. The memories of simple moments and my constantly sore feet make me smile wide even now. There’s still so much I want to see in Italy, and I hope I’ll be able to take on another excursion just as fruitful, enjoyable and stimulating.
As with the image at the top left (and many more I encountered) we often saw these anarchist symbols and words relating to trans-fem and LGBTQ+ issues as well as other anti-discriminatory movements in the Italian urban landscape in relation to Meloni’s growing right-wing governance and regressive political moves when it came to civil and human rights
Again we encounter some familiar symbols, but the inscription “Aboliamo le Legge 107" caught my eye. At first I though it was a call made by antifa groups, but after some research and translating, I came to be very wrong. The black writing is calling against an inclusive education legislation for children and students with disabilities. This black spray paint is also used to cover up what I hadn't noticed at first was the same ANTIFA red flag with a Fascist symbol (fascist symbol being he black circle with the plus sign in it). This is then the first time I've seen graffiti where there is a clear layering of claims as a means to delegitimate the other. A palimpsest of political tensions.
This was one of many symbols relating to Palestine that i saw throughout the trip, but had mostly witnessed in Rome. My guess was that on May 15, on the anniversary of the Nakba (educate yourself if you haven’t already!), there had been some protests as part of the global day of recognition of the Palestinian struggle. This was the graffiti I was most excited to see represented in the streets because it was most surprising, reassuring, and grounding. Seeing transnational solidarity take space in unknown cities is always comforting.
“In order to appeal to “aesthetic justice” we must view how and why “graffiti writers and street artists […] colonise, appropriate and adorn the streets of towns and cities throughout the world with an alternative aesthetic creating a different semiotic for reading the city” (Zieleniec, 2018, 12).”
I share these last pieces as a testament to how obsessively I had been paying attention to the local graffiti in Florence. I was lucky enough to have found the artist responsible for such a distinctive work, and I wanted to give credit to his work simply because I think, like all the graffiti and street art I had seen, it served to interrupt the renaissance rhythm of the city, and return us back to a reality where many artists and even architects deserve our attention, rather than always turning our heads back to the past and the 'masters' of before.