Program

Graffiti in many forms, shapes and sizes is a familiar everyday sight in Paderborn’s urban environment. As part of Paderborn University’s 50^th anniversary celebrations, the research project “Information System Graffiti in Deutschland” (INGRID), which has been studying the phenomenon of graffiti from a scientific point of view since 2016, staged a photo exhibition showing the diversity and incidence of this special art form in the region.

Whereas in the course of the project INGRID to date, graffiti from cities such as Mannheim, Cologne and Munich were compiled on an image database, the focus of this exhibition has now switched to the local scene. Inhabitants of Paderborn took photos of graffiti they had encountered in their everyday lives and uploaded them via the app Lingscape, which is devoted to the research of writing in public places. The inhabitants could also submit questions about the motifs or the graffiti scene itself. Scientists in the team headed by Prof. Dr. Doris Tophinke, Professor for German and General Linguistics at Paderborn University, analysed the images submitted, paying particular attention to their history, special local circumstances and linguistic form. The results of this citizens’ science project – a selection of the submitted photos – were presented at the exhibition.