"Sometimes you put up walls not to keep people out, but to see who cares enough to break them down"

I really enjoyed reading these articles together-the contradiction of the physical division of Jerusalem and the symbolism of graffiti really struck a chord with me.  I have really enjoyed how throughout the class we have looked at numerous viewpoints regarding the transcendence of barriers (physical or otherwise), such as the homosexual community, the feminist groups, musicians and now the lesser-known and sometimes invisible graffiti artists.  When reading about graffiti I was immediately reminded of Banksy (the anonymous graffiti artists whose documentary Exit Through The Gift Shop was nominated for an Academy Award this past year.  I did a little background research and found out that Banksy actually painted nine images on the Israeli West Bank barrier in August of 2005. These images included a ladder going over the wall and children digging a passageway through the wall itself.

Although graffiti has a negative connotation here in the United States (along with the fact that its' illegal), I personally think it may be a more productive way to get messages across in a non-violent manner while being extremely powerful.  Graffiti is a basically free art form that allows you to publish artwork and ideals to the general public in a timely manner.  While in Spain over the summer, many students and I looked at the graffiti which is omnipresent in the cities and in fact on the city walls in Toledo, to learn about the culture of people our age.  Hopefully people in Israel and Palestine are given the right to express themselves in such a manner to hopefully diminish the amount of violent actions taken towards peace.