“Tr: To Drink and To Penetrate Jubilantly,” Jean Faucheur

Every time I turn a corner into a bookstore, at least a dozen new graffiti books threaten my faith in this form. Ostensibly “art books,” these publications simply flood shelves with terrible photographs of mediocre wheatpaper posters and wall-scrawls as empty as the cans that were wasted on them. Art book? No — and it undercuts the value of graffitti to give these paperweights that pretense.

Then there are the gems, few and far between. Graffiti Paris, available this month from Abrams, is not exactly a gem, however. It suffers from the kind of documentary, head-on photography that leaves the graphic in the frame but little else, decontextualizing the work from the neighborhood that produced it. Especially in Paris, where geography permeates identity, that context is key.

But Graffiti Paris is still one of the better books out there. Paris is full of strong, living, fighting and politicized graffiti and Fabienne Grévy, the art historian and photographer who created Graffiti Paris, has a great eye for picking the quality pieces off a wall overrun by quantity.

As Grévy notes in the introduction, Graffiti Paris includes photographs taken over the last 15 years. The project’s priority was to preserve a record of Paris street art from the 1990s and late-80s, street art that will soon be worn away. In other words, the point here was never to make an “art book” exactly and, as a record of some of the best graffiti to grace The City of Lights in the past decade, Graffiti Paris is really rather good!

June 14th is certainly a day you should mark on your calendars in regards to art. Two events will be taking place, The Art of Digging and the Sonic Visual Arts Expo.

The Art of Digging will be going down at theLightGalleries in Costa Mesa, California. The event, which pays homage to the advancement and progression vinyl culture, brings awareness to the discrediting of music artists due to the increase in downloading. The event will include vinyl art and rare wax displays, live performances, record sales and exchange, and a special guest DJ. For more information click here.

Those on the East Coast can enjoy the Sonic Visual Arts Expo in Hamden, Connecticut that evening instead. Unlike The Art of Digging, this event focuses on the more conventional means of visual arts. Here, artists will be displaying and selling their work, along with a vast number of music acts. The headlining performances will feature Stephanie D’Ranged and Hellfire Graffix. Click here for ticket and location information.