Graffiti for God

A city map mashup of Graffiti, Goggle and God, based on Google Maps. It mainly locates flat roofs in the centre of Berlin and reinterprets them as skyward canvases for graffiti “authors”.

The idea of mapping rooftop graffiti was inspired by “Waxt” and “Nemo”, whose piece in the centre of Berlin is already visible on Google Maps.

In the style of medieval maps, where Jerusalem was often represented at the centre of the geographical drawings, with God as the heavenly observer from above, this piece marks the centre of “Graffiti for God”.

In addition, several other location categories are depicted and correlated: police stations, hospitals or monitored areas, as well as religious institutions such as churches or graveyards.

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As soon as a map is printed, it’s already out-of-date. World and map never coincide. A map always has to decide what to show and what to omit. Like the human eye, a map always has its blind spots.

Jens Meinrenken in “Cartographic Physiognomy”

Put in a light box of about 1 x 2 m in size, the map was part of the international street art exhibition „Planet Prozess“ in Berlin, as well as the exhibition “Vertrautes Terrain – Contemporary Art in/ about Germany” at The Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe.

Since we as humans are unable to see the rooftop graffiti, I would say those graffiti are made for God. I don’t know whether that was the graffiti writers’ intention, but it’s possible. We could imagine them to be pious sprayers who want to talk to God. What a beautiful idea.

The Absolution by Teja Begrich,
pastor

© 2020 Lars Hammerschmidt, Berlin   -    CV | LinkedIn | TumblrSoundcloudVimeo