Do you think graffiti is a kind of art or vandalism?

From my point of view, 'Art' is the artists' expression of feelings, thoughts and values regarding the world in which they live. Artists express their subjectivity through words to write texts, poems, and lyrics; or by means of lines, strokes, colours or painting shapes, with volumes to create figures, landscapes and portraits. Likewise, through sounds and melodies to create music. In this way, the artists with their creations show their inner selves to the outside world.

Apart from this subjective dimension, art possesses an objective dimension, because artists express in their works the characteristics of the world in which they live. In their works, the conflicts of their world become visible. Including their contradictions, achievements, failures, and their lies or truths. The word, sound, shape and volume, are not only an expression of an inner life, but also aspects of the world that, thanks to their artistic work becomes visible for those who find it to read, hear, see and touch and enough to try to understand it.

In this sense, I wonder if Bansky's graffiti shows these dimensions or on the contrary, if they are a type of vandalism. According to RAE, vandalism is defined as a spirit of destruction that does not respect neither profane nor sacred things. However, Bansky's graffiti does not destroy public or private property, but on the contrary, his work transforms the backdrop to denounce conflicts that define our present, while the mass media forgets them when they aren't trending topic.

Bearing in mind these two dimensions of art, Banksy's work expresses a rebellious, transgressive and imaginative subjectivity in his artistic discoveries and criticism of our society. Despite this, his work is also contradictory, considering that he denounces a society based on money while he is selling his work at high prices. Anyway, beyond his possible inconsistency, his work shows the contradictions of a society based on freedom, while the world is building walls between nations. Otherwise, it is based on the democracy and citizen participation while their movements are being controlled with the lastest techonologies or, what's worse, conditioning their decisions through advertising.