A RailCar is their Canvas

By BOB KEYES, Portland Press Herald Writer
Copyright © 2005 Blethen Maine Newspapers Inc.


SOUTH PARIS — A lumbering freight car lurched past the railroad crossing, and Murad Sayen's eyes locked on a flash of color. Then another. And another. As Sayen narrowed his focus from behind the steering wheel of his pickup truck, he realized he was seeing fleeting images of graffiti, splashed in magnificent colors on the sides of rusted freight cars that rumbled before him.
These weren't a vandal's quick signature tag, but elaborate designs, executed with a deft touch by a graffiti writer.
It was, as he saw it that spring morning, a traveling art show.
Since that chance encounter last year, Sayen has made chronicling railroad graffiti a personal quest. The South Paris photographer, known for his panoramic digital images, now is focused on rail cars tagged by graffiti.
He still shoots landscape art, but documenting railroad-car graffiti inspires him in new ways.
Sayen appreciates the sincerity of the work. It's whimsical, spontaneous and full of intent. The graffiti writers pass visual notes to one another, creating a conversation in color that spans the continent.
Nearly every day, Sayen goes to a siding near his home to look over the cars and see what he can find. Respecting the danger of the rails, Sayen does most of his work from private land adjacent to the siding.
He's received the blessing of the landowner to roam the area along the tracks.
Recognizing that vandals are responsible for the artwork, Sayen is careful not to glorify their deeds. He is more interested in the social statement the graffiti conveys than the art itself.
"It would be hard to find an object more quintessentially heavy metal than a freight car," he said. "It's all steel, all beat up, scarred, rusted out and patched.
"It just rolls down the line, and along comes this gang of kids in the middle of the night that transforms this rusty piece of metal into a rolling piece of artwork."
Because of the illegal nature of the work - the graffiti writers are guilty of trespassing and responsible for damages to property, while putting the railroad companies at risk of liability - Sayen said he does not condone their work.
"It's vandalism, yes. No doubt about that. But it's also art, and I want to document it," he said.
A spokesman for Guilford Transportation Systems, which operates on the tracks where Sayen does most of his work, did not return phone calls to discuss graffiti and the railroad's response to it.
But in his research, Sayen has traced some of the graffiti he photographs near his home in South Paris to a railroad yard in Los Angeles.
During a recent visit to his local siding, Sayen came across a piece that stretched the entire length of the rail car, a genre of art known as "end 2 end."
In big, bold colors, a trio of writers from the "Seventh Letter" crew in California painted a huge rose, with thorns and leaves, along with the words, "Destroy Prisons."
It wasn't a quick hit, but a fully conceived painting that took hours to complete.
"This is their idea of a social statement," Sayen said, as he aimed his camera lens, focused and clicked.
"They are saying, no doubt, that in their social circles they know a lot of people who are locked up."
'PIRATE' ART
In the year-plus he has been tracking the cars that pass through South Paris, Sayen has amassed hundreds of photos of so-called pirate art.
He reproduces the images as small squares, tightly focused on the colors and texture of the graffiti as it adorns the metal surfaces.
As he photographs, he is both artist and sociologist.
"I think what this graffiti is about is a manifestation of the fringe of our society. It's the outside looking in, and I think it's true outsider art. It's folk art.
"It's done not out of a desire to please, but it's straight from the shoulder. It's done under conditions that guarantee its purity. No one is doing it for recognition. It's all about making a statement."
Sayen's photography caught the attention of Anne Zill, director of the art gallery at the University of New England in Portland.
Zill acquired one of Sayen's images for the gallery's permanent collection, and she intends to give the photographer an exhibition next year.
She appreciates Sayen's willingness to probe such a layered subject.
"He is looking at a phenomenon that is worth paying attention to. It's guerrilla art at large. It's street art of the 21st century, on trains that travel all over the country, that shows a collective artistic will at work. The subject matters are big issues - civil rights, war and peace," she said.
Further, Zill believes Sayen's art attempts to interpret, or at least capture for the sake of posterity, an important moment in the life of urban America and Canada.
She likened today's graffiti gangs to the beat generation of the 1950s and '60s.
"Let's pay attention to this. They are off the radar of regular middle-class folks going through their days, but they are presaging something. We are not sure exactly what, but we know it's not easy. It's not about whether we like Bush or not. It's about something else, something much deeper than politics," she said.
FINDING THE MEANING
Sayen worked as a youth counselor in upstate New York for several years, and his understanding of graffiti has evolved. Early on, he assumed the markings were the work of disenfranchised kids whose resentment of society caused them to lash out in acts of vandalism.
His thinking has changed.
In an essay he prepared to accompany the display of his work, he writes, " ... I am now convinced that this is not only art in the highest sense, but a more highly evolved form of it than most people are either aware of or willing to accept. I would even contend that railroad graffiti is one of the purest art forms that presently exists."
In the year-plus since he began his project, Sayen has had limited e-mail contact with some of the people whose work interests him. Eager to learn more, he began a thread on a Web site forum.
His outsider status was quickly revealed, and Sayen was asked to leave the forum.
But he persisted and eventually began a conversation with several graffiti writers.
In his essay, he describes the exchange:
"Many of them used the word 'addiction' to explain their inability to resist doing it. The possibility of getting caught, operating in a dangerous environment and the challenges of doing art under stressful conditions, all help to create the level of excitement that becomes so titillating that it is hard to find satisfactory substitutes.
"One youngster told me that the only time in his life that he truly feels alive is when he is on the prowl with some paint cans in his sack."
Staff Writer Bob Keyes can be contacted at 791-6457 or at:
bkeyes@pressherald.com