Second night of street arts in Helsinki

Second night of street arts rocked Helsinki in night between 24nd and 25th of August, causing tens of thousands of euros worth of collateral damage. For account of the event last year, check out here

After humiliations cops faced in last years event and in mayday eve riot in Helsinki, police was present with an unforeseen strength - around 10 PM square in front of museum of modern arts (Kiasma) was surrounded by police cars and Jouha riot cops from all sides. A mixed crowd of up to 200 punks and banlieu kids was waiting there - but meanwhile march started in another squarein front of brand new shopping center of Kamppi just one block away, this location was kept in center but up to a hundred people was there anyway.March headed towards Simonkatu, but at this point riot cops had woken up and they surrounded march and took over the sound system. Luckily most of the people managed to escape, apparently police did not yet attempted to arrest everyone. Some windows got crashed and some buildings got tagged.

As march never made it to Kiasma, most of the people there were lost but eventually 100-150 people managed to regroup in front of Kamppi shopping center. Cops were stunningly absent, thus crowd could rush to the mall, trashing windows and tagging everything they saw. Mall doors have to be kept open overnight, as bus terminal to Espoo direction is inside of the mall.

After this rush, people should have splitted but apparently due to inexperience people were wandering Eastwards in larger groups, and eventually around Hietalahti square cops could round up dozens of people. Police claims that they arrested 56 persons overall, perhaps a success for them after their dismal failure last year and in mayday eve. However it remains to be seen how many people may be indicted as few or none could be arrested on the spot of action.

Media reporting has been rather exaggerating and cops claimed situation "severe" and damages "substantial". However I would say that event was almost completely non-violent - property was destroyed but cops were not targeted.

Below my "unofficial" translation of the declaration distributed by organisers in prior to event

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Night of the street arts 24th of August 2006 10 PM @ Kiasma

Are you tired of all the hype and lies which water down any news mainstream media is making of graffiti culture? That nobody understands that graffiti is art, but keeps complaining how painted places are so dangerous, and nobody wants to go there as they will become victims of crimes? We are sick too.

We may not influence to people so that they could fall in love with graffiti or street arts, but we also may not remain passive. Almost all biggest towns in Finland have adopted zero tolerance, introduced in USA, in which no graffiti nor other forms of street art are legalized. Not even propaganda in the walls as in socialist countries. Only corporations and capitals are allowed to own space in the city. This is not acceptable for youth who want to create culture, not just commerce.

Due to these and many other issues we want to take action. For solidarity with those people whose life has been messed up with prison sentences and absurd criminal compensations. In the end, graffiti costs society very little. Opposition of the officials should not take a form of despotism as it takes now. Walls should not be more protected than human beings, and painters should not be treated unhumanely. We demand that nobody should not be given even probational sentences for graffiti.

This year we organise night of street arts second time, last year we decorated walls during night of arts and gave a good exposure for our cause. March is a demonstration and a happy event of arts, to which a wide spectrum of various artists will participate. Among others, theater Poleemi is about to join the march to perform some street theatre.