City in/as graffiti. Chennai's many cities.

The article focuses on the importance of graffiti in Cities. It presents a case of Chennai, India. The visual artifacts, already brought to life by and through different intent, have lives of their own. They circulate and produce different meanings according to the world they inhabit and the lives they live. The city is ordered in the map but the contestations within are made visible on streets and spaces through graffiti. The artifacts produced here are creatively innovated and deployed to effect. They blur the boundary of private and public of the city as a space. If a pedigreed art circulates in a legitimate medium, popular culture thrives on the chaos and uses the city as its canvas.