Graffiti Vocabulary


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:: Graffiti Vocab ::

All City - To get your name up in every burough/neighborhood in town.
Bite - To copy another writer's style.
Bomb - Prolific painting or marking with ink.
Bone out - to leave (eg. "Ayo Cops!! Bone Out").
Buff - Any means employed by the Transit Authority to remove graffiti from trains.
Burn - To beat the competition.
Burner - A well done wildstyle window down whole car; a burner is a winner.
Cap, fat or skinny - Interchangeable spray-can nozzles fitted to can to vary width of spray.
Cop - To steal or get. (eg. "I gotta Cop me some fatcaps")
Crew - Loosely organized group of writers, also known as a clique.
Def - Really good (derived from "death").
Ding Dong - Relatively new stainless-steel type of subway car, so named for the bell that rings just before the doors close.
Down - In, part of the group or action (e.g. "He's down with us.")
Fade - To blend colors.
Flat - Older slab-sided type of subway car; the most suitable surface for painting.
Gangsta - Really good (eg. "That piece is Gangsta")
Getting Up - Successfully hitting a train.
Going over - One writer covering another writer's name with his own.
Hit - To tag up any surface with paint or ink.
House - To steal.
Ill - really cool or the state of silliness (eg. "Yo, it's time to get Ill").
Kill - To hit or bomb excessively.
King - The best with the most.
Lay-up - A siding where trains are parked overnight and on weekends.
Married couple - Two cars permanently attached, identified by their consecutive numbers.
Panel piece - A painting below the windows and between the doors of a subway car.
Piece - A painting, short for masterpiece.
Piece book - A writer's sketchbook.
Rack - To steal.
Ridgy - Subway car with corrugated, stainless-steel sides, unsuitable for graffiti.
Spank - To steal.
Straight - to emphasize or exclamate (eg. "That shorty is Straight ill").
Tag - A writer's signature with marker or spray paint.
Taggin up - Writing signature with marker or spray paint.
Throw-up - A name painted quickly with one layer of spray paint and an outline.
Top-to-bottom - A piece which extends from the top of the car to the bottom.
Toy - Inexperienced or incompetent writer.
Up - Describes a writer whose work appears all over the city.
Wak - Substandard or incorrect (derived from "out of whack").
Wildstyle - A complicated construction of interlocking letters.
Window-down - A piece done below the windows.
Word - an affirmation.
Writer - Practitioner of the art of graffiti.

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