Graffiti Writing in Sofia: Identity Construction and Urban Space

Abstract

The article is based on the analysis of fieldwork studies of the local graffiti and street art production in Sofia, Bulgaria. The author argues that at present the majority of the graffiti writers there tend to produce TTP graffiti following the global graffiti tradition and taking into consideration its conventions and heritage. As a result of that the meaning of the local TTPs and street art is quite clear and understandable to the foreign TTP writers, to the majority of the young people in the city as well as to a growing group of connoisseurs. The rest usually see in the same writings either strange art or nothing but scribbles, oddly deformed letters and unclear symbolic images. The article interprets the processes of mutual understanding or misunderstanding which contribute to the creation of new types of coherences and differentiation in the local urban milieu.