LITHE monthly magazine
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Granite Dreams
Life as in aa foreign foreigner country in Aberdeen
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November 2014
art
crimes and other ways to leave a mark
Contents November 2014 Issue 11
3 Issue highlights 3 Art Crimes
Graffiti marks and the hidden meaning behind street art.
10 G r a n i t e Dreams
The history behind the choice to leave your motherland. Interview with Raya Encheva.
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11 Articles 17 T h e e r a o f v e ganism Is abstaining from the use of all animal products really healthy? 26 S o c i a l C r i t i c s How Instagram impacts upon our self-perception.
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17 Regulars 34 38 39 43 45
Letters Free issue downloads Subscriptions Reviews Next issue
art crimes
... and other ways to leave a mark I was doing research on a project about graffiti and I went looking for material the only place I could find it - outside. It is everywhere - carved in trees, scratched with a key on tables, sprayed on bus stops. People feel the need to express themselves, to share opinions, emotions and feelings.
All of those marks people have left behind them, are marks of love, hate, hope, concern...
Even the simplest of graffiti with no artistic value, once meant something to someone, somewhere (and maybe still does). We start drawing before we are taught to talk, read or write. Drawing is primitive, in a way, but it marks the blossoming of our lifelong, inherent need to express ourselves by creating images. Then there is writing. It is not much different, it is, in its essence, drawing certain characters to codify meaning. Therefore, writing is art. Drawing is creating images, writing is the same. Yet art is not just decoration. Humans have always taken advantage of their ability to make images and have used it to communicate with each other, to show social engagement. So why would anyone see the initials, bonded by a heart-shaped figure on the wall of a nearly empty car parking as crime? Or the bright pink heart on the side of a grey building? How could people not look for the emotion behind those
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symbols? The debate whether graffiti is art or crime is ongoing. And while some city councils (like Berlin’s, where they don’t approve of graffiti, but also don’t consider it a crime) put up blank canvases, cities with a bigger need of colour, like Aberdeen, have a total ban on street drawings. But as the flower finds its way to grow between the concrete tiles, people find their way to express themselves. Drawing on the ground is still legal, and so in the last weeks of October, someone wrote messages on Beach Boulevard in Aberden. The street was covered in what seemed to be reasons for the person who drew them to love their partner. It all ended with a big “YES”. So next time you go out and spot a drawing on a wall or a sign in the tree bark, take time to observe it. It, without a doubt, means something to someone, somewhere.
G rA NIT E DRE AMS The lives of foreigners, living in Aberdeen.
Living abroad is now becoming an Living abroad is now becoming an inevitable part of young people’s inevitable part of young people’s lives, rather than a goal. lives, rather than a goal. Bulgarian Bulgarian Fashion Management stustudent in Aberdeen dent in Aberdeen Raya Encheva Raya Encheva speaks about the speaks about leaving home and the ups and downs of moving away from ups and downs of life in the Granite home. City. 11
LTH: When did you decide to leave Bulgaria? Raya: I think of a person as a traveller who just spends X amount of time in the country Y. I love travelling and when I was little I used to spend my summers in Germany, so I never felt that living abroad would mean leaving my country in the way most people would probably understand it. So, I assume it was probably around those years of my life when my mind was already set in the direction of going out of the country that I was in. If I could and if it was up to myself entirely, I would have probably left
Bulgaria earlier. LTH: Did you ever consider staying in your home country? Raya: No, not really. But no matter what plans I am making about my life, I am sure it will end up totally different. LTH: Why did you choose Scotland and in particular Aberdeen?
came here - we had an amazing time and quickly made up our minds. And in the end I chose Aberdeen because of RGU and the high graduate employment rates! LTH: What do you most like and dislike about living here?
Raya: I don’t like that Raya: I have always had a there is no place to buy weakness for the UK... a cup of coffee at 2am! I mean, who doesn’t? How crazy is that?! Also, my best friend’s But I like pretty much dream had always been everything else. to visit Scotland, so two years ago for her 18th we 12