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Stencil graffiti is a form of graffiti that makes use of made out of paper, cardboard, or other media to create an image or text that is easily reproducible. The desired design is cut out of the selected medium and then the image is transferred to a surface through the use of Aerosol paint or roll-on paint.
The process of stencilling involves applying paint across a stencil to form an image on a surface below. Sometimes multiple layers of stencils are used on the same image to add or create the illusion of depth.
Stencils can be done quickly. Together with being cheap and easily repeatable, the short amount of time required to paint a single stencil illegally onto a wall is a key characteristic that makes stenciling attractive.Ulrich Blanché: Instant Public Art. A Street Art History of Stencil Graffiti, Heidelberg 2025, p. 7-18.
French artist Ernest Pignon-Ernest stencilled life-size silhouettes of a nuclear bomb victim in the south of France in 1966 (Plateau d'Albion, Vaucluse) with paint and a brush.Ulrich Blanché: Instant Public Art. A Street Art History of Stencil Graffiti, Heidelberg 2025, p. 76-84.
Conceptual artists and other artists worked illegally with street stencils in public space since the late 1960s, among them Canadian artist group General Idea in 1969, Chaz Bojorguez in Los Angeles, who started in the same year, Polish conceptual artist Jerzy Trelinski in 1975, New York environmental conceptual artist John Fekner in 1976 or Moscow conceptualist duo SZ group in 1980.Ulrich Blanché: Instant Public Art. A Street Art History of Stencil Graffiti, Heidelberg 2025, p. 119-132, 153-180.
Alex Vallauri began with stencil graffiti in his home town Sao Paulo in 1978 and was the first to start a larger stencil graffiti movement there. Vallauri's (anonymous) stencils were published in France since 1982 and had a larger impact on the New Yorker and later Polish stencil graffiti movements around David Wojnarowicz and Thomaz Sikorski.Ulrich Blanché: Instant Public Art. A Street Art History of Stencil Graffiti, Heidelberg 2025, p. 132-140, 153-161, 213-248.
Dutch artist Hugo Kaagman is one of the key figures of the Amsterdam punk movement. While studying social geography at the city’s municipal university, he became interested in art movements like Dada and Fluxus. He started stencil graffiti in 1978 as part of the punk movement to demonstrate against the Dutch government.Ulrich Blanché: Instant Public Art. A Street Art History of Stencil Graffiti, Heidelberg 2025, p. 286-290.
Blek le Rat claims his first spray painted stencils appeared in Paris in 1981. This early start is apparently based only on his own statements; verifiable press reports on Blek do not appear until July 1984.Ulrich Blanché: Instant Public Art. A Street Art History of Stencil Graffiti, Heidelberg 2025, p. 87-100. Blek stated he was influenced by the graffiti artists of New York City but wanted to create something of his own.
Australian photographer Rennie Ellis documented some of the earliest examples of stencil art to appear in Sydney and Melbourne in his 1985 book The All New Australian Graffiti. In the introduction to the book, Ellis noted that US photographer Charles Gatewood had written to him and sent him photographs of similar stencil graffiti that had recently appeared in New York City, leading Ellis to speculate that:
... unlike our subway-style graffiti, which is nothing more than a copy of a well-established New York tradition, the symbols of Australia and America had originated separately and unknown to each other.Ellis, Rennie; The All New Australian Graffiti, Sun Books (Macmillan), Melbourne, 1985 ()
Over the years this form of graffiti has become a worldwide subculture. The members are linked through the Internet and the images spray-painted on the urban canvas they place throughout the world. Many of its members connect through blogs and websites that are specifically built to display works, get feedback on posted works, and receive news of what is going on in the world of stencil graffiti.
Stencil graffiti is illegal in some jurisdictions, and many of the members of this subculture shroud their identities in aliases. Above / Tavar Zawacki, Banksy, Blek le Rat, Vhils, Shepard Fairey and Jef Aérosol are some names that are synonymous with this subculture.
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