New Orleans, Louisiana.  The Grand Movie Theater has sat vacant for 10 years and its expansive walls have proved an irresistible and frequent target of graffiti attack.  

Then Muralist Brandan Odums and other local artists decided to change the blight and negativity into a symbol of peace with an extensive mural.  Odums has successfully created graffiti-styled murals on several other vacant buildings in New Orleans.

After four days of priming to cover the graffiti tags and prep the wall for the mural, the thanks from the local graffiti taggers was a fresh round of graffiti tags.

Two steps forward, one step back.

The hope is to have the Peace Wall completed in time for the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina.

Chris Campagna is a Chicago resident of Historic Pullman neighborhood.  He is also and artist, a father, a advocate for his community, and very creative.  When his garage door was spray painted with graffiti, he decided to turn it into a giant chalkboard for his kids and other kids in the neighborhood to draw on any time.

Brooklyn, New York - Based on the lack of complaints from local residents, the positive message of a rash of "Believe in Love" graffiti tags seems to have won some over. Does the message matter?  How about a positive message tagged over a well established mural?  How about on your building?

More at  NYDailyNews.com including photos.

Ontario - Under the leadership of Trustee Dale Robinson, secondary students are helping to beautify Thorold Ontario. Since 2005, they have painted murals over 20,000 square feet of wall making it the largest mural in Canada.  Based on the New York City's "Broken Windows Policy" abandoned and derilict buildings have been targeted for graffiti removal and murals. 

“The murals were painted on two buildings that were previously covered in graffiti as a response to the graffiti,” she said. “Since we put the murals up, they’d never been tagged before until this winter and they’ve started to deteriorate in spots, so now it’s time to get back at it and take care of it by cleaning up the graffiti and repairing things.

 “It’s the largest mural in Canada – it’s over 20,000 square feet – so we’ve got something to be proud of here.”

More at St. Catherine's Standard

Fascinating article which explores murals, tagging, and the increasing frequency of murals as targets of tagging.  Published by the Phoenix Newtime and written by Claire Lawton.

"Taggers have realized that their tags stayed up longer on murals because the building owners and the commissioners of those murals can't afford to bring back the original artist to repair the mural," Greg Esser says. "So tagging on a mural has become code for longevity."

Toronto Mayor Rob Ford is fed up with the graffiti that detracts from the vibrancy of Toronto’s neighborhoods. To help launch the Clean Toronto Together campaign to eradicate graffiti,  the Mayor rolled up his sleeves and working with volunteers to remove a graffiti tags. 

“Everybody’s had enough of the graffiti,” Ford said. “We’re fighting back.”

Ford said the city removed 8,000 square metres of graffiti in 2012 and he hopes to improve on that record this year

More detail at The Toronto Star.

Success.  The wall has now been transformed into a great mural.  Check out the photos at National Post Toronto