Said Dokins Noticias: SAID DOKINS-POSTÓPOLIS.

SAID DOKINS-POSTÓPOLIS.

13:21 Publicado por Said Dokins

Many thanks! to Wayne who invited me to participate al Postópolis Wayne is ethnomusicologist who studies the hip-hop phenomenon in different cities and has a very interesting blog: http://wayneandwax.com/

This news was taken directly from his Blog, which reported:

Said Dokins discusses his Avionazo intervention at El Eco (Photo Wayne)

My final guest at Postopolis, Said Dokins, brought some trenchant thoughts to bear on all of this. Said has been praised in global street art circles for his work, but he is no Banksy-come-lately. Said has long been deeply engaged with the local graffiti scene, among other efforts producing a book about female graffiti artists in DF, and he also places his work in the storied tradition of anarcho-critical muralists in Mexico City, some of whom are his mentors and teachers.

He is also rather thoughtful — and self-consciously so — about the work that he does, and the work thatit does (culturally and politically). For his presentation at Postopolis, Said delivered a strong statement about his art and how it expresses ideas about urban space, dystopia, power, subversion, and, among other specificities, how the omnipresent symbol of the skull in Mexico might represent the tragedy of history. (I quite like the idea of Benjamin’s angel of history wearing a máscara de calavera.)

Allow me to quote a passage that seems particularly relevant to the central questions of this post:

Desde que hago graffiti mi relación con lo no autorizado, con el acto ilegal ha marcado muchas formas en las que opero, trato siempre de salirme con la mía, de hacer lo no esperado, de estar en el límite de lo legal. En el caso del avionazo, no había una intención de acción directa contra del sistema hegemónico y el poder en un acto de choque, si no más bien aprovechar para que desde el sistema, es decir de los mecanismos de validación establecidos, ya que el proyecto en sí mismo fue apoyado, actuar como agente que de alguna manera señala problemáticas políticas y sociales, a través de la burla, infiltrando el desorden.
…
Since I do graffiti, my relationship with the non-authorized, with the illegal act, has marked many ways in which I operate. I always try to get my way, to do the unexpected, to be on the edge of legality. In the case of the plane crash, there was no intention of direct action against the hegemonic system and power through an act of shock, but rather to benefit from the system, from established mechanisms of validation, since the project itself was supported — to act as an agent that somehow fingers problematic political and social issues, through mockery, infiltrating the disorder.

Given Said’s indisputably radical, if practical, attitude about his art, it’s worth noting that the first comment on Saner’s post about his Kid Robot success is from Said himself: