On Graffiti, Public Art And Snoopy

As a kid growing up in the suburbs of Boston, we often drove into the city, and a highlight of the ride was passing by the oil tank on the Southeast Expressway covered with splashes of paint in the colors of the rainbow. Initially, I had imagined that some renegade had poured buckets of paint over the top, allowing it to drip down the sides in random rivulets. It was only later that I learned that it was the creation of artist Corita Kent, which I found confusing and a challenge to my idea of what constitutes art (including my Type-A inclination towards symmetry). When my mother, educated from cradle to college by nuns, told me with pride that Kent herself a Catholic sister, it only made the work seem more remarkable, shocking and, yes, inspired.