Liquid Gold
Golden hand sanitizer graffiti in CLT, NC
I found this wild design while I was visiting my brother in Charlotte, North Carolina a couple of weeks ago. I chose this design to show off because I believe it means a lot especially during the pandemic of Coronavirus that we are all dealing with. I believe the artist of this graffiti made this purposefully to talk about the current times and what is being affected due to COVID-19. Hand sanitizer has been treated as a holy grail recently due to the pandemic and everyone seems a lot more fond of it because they are scared of getting sick. Everyone is buying a ton of hand sanitizer and treating it like “liquid gold”. I personally think this design is incredibly creative and fits in perfectly with what is going on in the world. Minus the message of the art, I think it just looks really cool in general, The splash of the golden hand sanitizer looks amazing with the mix of black and white to show the lights and shadows being reflected off of the gold. The fact that it looks exactly like a hand sanitizer really impresses me too, the words on the bottle are perfect and it makes me really appreciate the art that some people can create, I can imagine that making graffiti art this detailed is challenging.
If anyone is interested I believe that the symbol at the bottom is more or less the signature of the artist, if it is too small to see on here it says “DAFLEMINGO”. I encourage you all to check out this artists work as it is very creative and touches on contemporary issues.
Andrew, I like the subject you chose for your Wild Design. You’re right in suggesting that this graffiti is commentary on what is going on in our world; the words, “New! Available Nowhere” attest to that. Isn’t it so strange how an ordinary product like hand sanitizer can suddenly become like a currency to people? Just a few weeks ago when it was normal to go to the store, I was in Target with my boyfriend and we were looking for travel-sized hand sanitizers before he flew to Chicago. Now, a few weeks later, you can’t even travel like that!
Another aspect of this graffiti that strikes me–but may not be intentional by the artist–is the sense of movement that the sanitizers’ drip displays. The small specks of sanitizer depart from its origin, like the virus has, moving quickly.
While this is definitely me reading into the art too much, I also see how there is a depression made from the sanitizer as it lands on the surface much like how the stocks took a toll, suggesting we could be heading into an economic depression.
It’s hard to imagine that a virus could impact so much of our way of life, just as it is hard to imagine that hand sanitizer is such an object of desire now.