Graffiti art: oxymoron or lawful expression?

Organizers of an upcoming graffiti-themed event will pose that question to a judge today in hopes of reinstating a permit that was revoked on Monday after critics, including Mayor Michael Bloomberg, said it would encourage vandals.

  The event, scheduled to take place Wednesday, was to have noted graffiti artists create murals on replicas of subway cars as a promotion for Manhattan-based Atari's fall release of the video game Marc Ecko's Getting Up: Contents Under Pressure. Ecko, the fashion designer whose company was the event's main organizer, said he received a permit for the party July 18.

"What we're seeking is an order from the court ordering the city to permit the block party to go on without permitting the city to dictate how our art is expressed," said Gregg Donnenfeld, assistant general counsel for Manhattan-based Marc Ecko Enterprises.

But earlier this week, Bloomberg and City Councilman Peter Vallone (D-Astoria) objected to the graffiti theme, saying it glorified the vandalism the city had worked hard to eliminate. The permit was then revoked, on the grounds that it was not an art exhibition but a commercial event, which would require a different permit.

Bloomberg has said a new permit would be issued if organizers agreed to ditch the graffiti theme, including the murals. Donnenfeld said the company instead would strip the event of all commercial promotion, but it planned to keep the graffiti art exhibition.

Organizers were to file suit today in U.S. District Court in Manhattan to ask for an emergency hearing to allow the exhibition to go on as planned.

"The city isn't obligated to permit an event on a public street that encourages the vandalism of subway cars in the name of selling T-shirts and video games," Bloomberg spokesman Ed Skyler said in a statement. "The courts should uphold our ability to protect New York City's quality of life."

The video game, set in the fictional city New Radius, "features a world where freedom of expression is suppressed and graffiti has been outlawed by a tyrannical government," according to Atari. Players control the character Trane, who uses graffiti "to expose an oppressive mayor and rid the city of his stranglehold on New Radius," the description says.

In a statement, Atari said the game's focus is on expression through art, noting that the main character is equipped only with paint and not guns.

"Atari Inc. does not condone or encourage the commission of any criminal act, or the wrongful suppression of the freedom of artistic expression," the company said.