I don't know whether this is sweet irony or simply a crime. Perhaps it's both.
Here's what happened: when a bunch of street artists displayed their artwork in Sao Paulo's Choque Cultural Gallery, a bunch of Pixadores (that's Brazilian for young taggers, I think) stormed the gallery and vandalized the place in protest against the "marketing, institutionalization and domestication of Street Art."
Wooster Collective has more pics: Link
Considering the theme though, wouldn't it just be contributing to the artworks?
(There's your next shirt there, neatorama. 'Contributing to the artwork') :)
It's a shame that they're dragged down while trying to better themselves, I suppose, but the victims of their former "street art" are probably laughing.
Vandalism is rude... no matter who's doing it.
The Pixadores are merely an example of anarchy triumphing over art. It's sad.
I guess none of those Pixadores got "domesticated" by any of their less art-appreciating victims yet :P.
As if most "street artists" do.
If the vandals were only taggers, their point is lost in that they don't really contribute to whatever street art culture they're making a statement about preserving. However, I think there is a worthy element somewhere in there, and to me it's located around the idea that street art is arguably what it is by virtue of its context both culturally, as a means of expression by those who generally don't have art world connections or gallery gigs, and physically, in that pieces are inexorably linked to the landscape in which they are created and displayed. The point would be (had it been made more effectively) that in taking the art out of the street and commodifying it, you lose a rather important chunk of its original meaning and purpose.