It’s nearly impossible to drive through Española without spotting a patch of graffiti in the form of barely legible scribbles. But there’s a growing movement in the city to try to turn youths’ predilection for spray paint into a cultivated art form.
Jaime Martinez, the city’s lone graffiti officer through Española Municipal Court, runs the city’s graffiti abatement program. He said graffiti is usually gang-associated and comes in the form of “tagging.”
“They’re smart,” he said. “They do it quick.”
Martinez said gang members will use spray paint or permanent markers to throw up their gang’s name in another gang’s territory. That provokes the other gang to tag its name on top of the first gang’s sign, he said.
Martinez said most gangs tag more actively on weekends and during warmer months. He said graffiti offenders often operate under the cloak of night, so it’s hard to catch them red-handed.
“It’s been hard — the police are so shorthanded,” Martinez said. “Police are having to deal with bigger matters.”
Española Public Safety Chief Leo Montoya did not return calls for this story.
Martinez said it’s best to get the graffiti down as quickly as possible because the longer it remains, the more credit it gives the gang. He said he gets a lot of help from members of the community who call him when they see new graffiti.
“People out there are my eyes,” he said.
Once he’s spotted a few tags or received a few phone calls, Martinez said he’ll gather community service workers to paint over the graffiti or use a biodegradable paint remover for surfaces like metal and glass. The program has five colors of paint: dark brown, light brown, green, gray and white. Martinez said property owners are free to provide his workers with their own paint.
Martinez estimated the abatement program costs the city about $30,000 a year, including his $25,708 salary. Martinez said five-gallon buckets of paint cost more than $100 each, and that’s at a discount.
Vandalism vs. Art
Martinez said unlike hurried gang tags, others in the community make an art form out of graffiti.
“(Gangs) don’t do it the right way,” Martinez said. “Their stuff is so ugly.”
Martinez said he’s been working with Española elementary schools to teach younger children about preventing graffiti and often brings Española Plaza Director Andrew Herrera to talk to youths about the difference between graffiti and graffiti art.
Herrera, who had Martinez’s job two years ago, said it’s better to start young because children may have older siblings who are in a gang and do tagging, and they may stray the same way. He also said most of the gangs in the Española Valley aren’t really gangs at all.
“They’re wannabe-gangsters,” he said. “They’re going into other people’s territory to tag in your hood — that’s all they’re doing. (They) are no different than the Eagles or Knights of Columbus, except those groups do things in a positive way.”
He said some gangs put in a lot of time and effort to paint the background and block the text in their tags.
“It’s a form of expression for them and the excitement they get from doing something illegal,” Herrera said.
But tagging, whether it’s done well or not, is still illegal.
“Authorized graffiti art is in a controlled environment in a designated area, with the owner’s permission,” he said.
Mural Walls
Herrera said there are several designated mural walls throughout the city including off North McCurdy Road, at the fire station on La Hoya and near the Mel Patch Art Space next to Lovin’ Oven on Riverside Drive.
Mural walls are supposed to deter unauthorized graffiti because it’s usually something people can respect, Herrera said.
“Some people are giving up wall space so that we can put something artful there,” Herrera said.
He cited as an example the 230-foot Michael Jordan mural on the side of the Española Recreation Center. Herrera said graffiti artists from Albuquerque, Santa Fe, Los Alamos and Taos joined with Española artists to paint the mural. He said before the mural existed, that wall was continually getting tagged.
Herrera said the key, though, is to not allow artists to tag their names or signs on the work because those in the graffiti community know each others’ tag names, which can lead to rival tagging.
Herrera said he’s also been turning people on to what he calls “space art,” in which the artist creates “space-scapes” of planets and stars using spray paint. He said he’s planning to go the YMCA Teen Center in Española to teach teens how to create space art.
In the past, graffiti artists have showcased their work at the Misión y Convento’s art gallery, Herrera said. One of the artists, Felix Rodriguez, has gone on to do other artistic pieces.
He said a common problem is that the community may not understand the difference between tagging and art.
“If we were to take those same concepts and put them on a giant canvas in an art exhibit, well, what was the difference?” he said.
Herrera said because graffiti isn’t going to leave the Valley anytime soon, the community should embrace it as other communities in San Diego or Chicago have. He said those cities have commissioned artists to spray paint murals.
“It’s outdoor art,” he said.