You can't find a decent bit of graffiti when you need it - but is it art ?

One of the advantages of being a photographer without the millstone of a studio with four walls is the ability to find interesting places to shoot people

Grungy town & city centre locations are often popular as backdrops, this is particularly so of walls plastered with colourful graffiti.  Some people see graffiti as art (or at least sometimes as art) and there are many people who see it as undecorative vandalism that creates eyesores across the landscape.

I fit into the "sometimes" category

I've been out on one of my regular location scouting expeditions to check on the status of my local graffiti hotspots and it has all been a little disappointing so I though I'd share some images from my local area and also some across Europe where I have been shooting.

There is plenty of graffiti around my home town of Hitchin in North Hertfordshire

Some of it is rather dull tagging and I suspect this was done by someone other that Fuse who I believe is a big time London artist

and some of it just seems to spraying over the top of other artists work

You can come across something that has the makings of a photography location

But they never seem to go far enough

And some that look like they might be good if the next stage of colouring was completed

and some of it is a dead loss

and will possibly never go anywhere

There are some very popular locations with the local artists, unfortunately these locations are also popular with the clean-up teams from the local council or Network Rail

This is another popular location that shows a little promise sometimes

But then a walk down another popular backstreet location showed some new promise

and some recently completed work that if it managed to remain intact may well be appearing in one of my photoshoots very soon

It is also interesting to see graffiti with some sort of political message although in this case I'm not at all sure what the message is

and in some cases I don't agree with the message, copyright is definitely something I am in favour of to protect my work

Looking further afield, I saw some great graffiti when I was in Vienna Austria working. These images were all seen along the banks of the Danube in the city centre

This one must have been 10 feet tall so must have taken quite a lot of planning and perhaps a step ladder

Most of the Vienna work seems to contain a message

Some of the messages were quite clear

and some were a little too clear. I certainly looked out for what I was treading on after reading this (and wondering why it was in English rather than German)

and then back to England and my home town of Hitchin

This guinea pig stencilled image in the centre of Hitchin has always amused my son and I'm sure there is a message behind it too but from my experience with guinea pigs the message may well be Squeeek

If you'd like to talk to me about a photoshoot for yourself, your company or band please call me on 07866 719730 or email me on caterham@gmail.com

Also if you know any good graffiti locations please do leave a comment below