Canvassing (Parts of) Tuscany - Part 1 - Graffiti in Florence

I was in Tuscany recently with the family unit, and I took the chance to sample some of the local urban/street/graffiti art in two of the cities there. I passed through Florence (Firenze) very briefly on my way to Arezzo (Arezzo), where we spent a number of days.

From the point of view of street art, this was doing things exactly backwards, as I found out. While there is a lot of art in Arezzo, and lots of basic graffiti, there does not seem to be a great deal of the kinds of street art I usually feature in this blog. Florence, on the other hand, seems to be a virtual Mecca for street artists. So, I was able to capture only the smallest fragment of what's on display in Florence and I had to hunt around a good bit for what I was able to find in Arezzo...

In this post - part 1 of a mini-series I'll do on what I found - I'll start by sharing the few bits I was able to photograph in Florence. I saw plenty street art there, but this was mostly through the windows of taxis and trains as we passed through. It was pretty frustrating. I suppose I will just have to visit Florence again, budgeting more time to wander around....

While taking the train, I found the stations around Florence to be rife with graffiti, naturally enough I suppose. I was able to take videos of some of this work as we flew by. I have uploaded two of the better videos to YouTube and I have provided the links below here. Though the graffiti does whiz by as the video rolls, you can pause the flow to get a better look at particular pieces if you wish.

Video 1:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3VpXyxegE8

Video 2:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKQxkf0h8KE

I also tried my hand at taking some screen shots from one of these videos, so I will include the better ones here.

In my next posts, I'll share the interesting bits and pieces I found in Arezzo. Ciao!


LINKS!!! 

I found there is a small Tuscany graffiti group on Flickr. The link is below here. In a way, though, you can get more results by just typing in searches on Flickr with terms like "graffiti" and "Tuscany", "Florence", "Arezzo", etc.
https://www.flickr.com/groups/1277232@N20/

This is a news story of sorts about good and bad graffiti in Florence. It shows some great work and lists areas of the city that I should try to check out next time I'm there. I saw the piece at 1:40 when passing in our taxi and longed to jump out and photograph it.... but we were on our way to the airport. Next time.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9OD7gSv7K6I

Here is a video I came across of some graffiti writers at work in Firenze with a sweet soundtrack:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SPXECkIMY8Y

And video of a graffiti fest in Florence back in 2009:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5wPH_p2KFEw

If you are inspired now to visit Florence, there is a plethora of travel videos about the place. Here is a video giving you Florence in a nutshell:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0_zfTN5_jI