Girl meets spray can: ‘Graffiti camp’ teaches Bay Area teens how to tag

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Some of the most legendary muralists and graffiti artists in the world leave their mark in Clarion Alley.

Nina Wright, aka Girl Mobb, has spent nearly a decade making sure teenage girls know that this alley — and other public art spaces across the Bay Area — are places for them, too. 

Graffiti Camp for Girls originally started as a one-off project. Wright and a friend of hers, Deirdre O’Shea, got a grant from Southern Exposure, an arts nonprofit based in the Mission, to teach local girls how to use spray paint by making a collaborative mural. After the inaugural camp, held in Berkeley in April 2017, it was clear they were onto something.

The nonprofit now puts on a five-day camp, which culminates in the creation of a group mural and welcomes girl-identifying and gender-expansive youth, ages 12 to 18. It costs $250 a person. For every camp session, two to three scholarships are available. 

Wright noted that they sometimes make exceptions on ages; some campers are slightly younger or older. What they’re looking for are youth who can be “respectful and supportive.”

Wright and O’Shea hold camps all over the Bay Area, in spots like the Petaluma Arts Center and Omni Commons and Temescal Studios in Oakland and elsewhere in California, including the San Diego Art Institute.

Camp sessions have also expanded to cities in other states, such as Cincinnati, Ohio, and in other countries, namely Phnom Penh, Cambodia. 

While the camp has branched out to other San Francisco locations, like Blick Art Materials and Smitten Ice Cream Shop, annual sessions on Clarion Alley are a mainstay.

Wright appreciates Clarion Alley, where she has a dedicated space, for its existence as a public art hub.

In the decades since the Clarion Alley Mural Project (located between 17th and 18th Streets and Mission and Valencia Streets) was established in 1992, artists and groups have painted nearly 1,000 murals on the garage doors and backsides of buildings that line the alley.

“The alley is really one of the best mural experiences for kids,” said Wright.“You’re in this historic spot, where there’s a bunch of other murals. You can take inspiration from them.”

On any given day, the alley draws locals and tourists alike, strolling the alley for a close inspection of each artwork, with smartphones in hand for photos and videos.

“It really does challenge you and kind of put you on the spot,” she said. “There’s a lot of passersby, and they always check out the work and comment on it.”

For girls in the camp, there’s the additional pressure of learning to use new materials, like spray-paint cans, for the first time in a public setting. Wright has found that they handle the experience with poise and feed off of the attention they receive from onlookers.

“It really helps with their self-confidence and self-esteem to be able to do that in front of such a big group of people. I feel like it helps them get over this sort of stage fright,” she said.

The culture around graffiti art has changed somewhat since the camp began, Wright said. “At the time, there weren’t a lot of women street artists or women muralists that were really getting any attention.” 

“I had a little bit of an agenda when I started,” she added, with a laugh.

Still, asserts Wright, there’s work to be done. “Usually, it’s boys doing graffiti and street-art murals,” she said. “To this day, I think it’s important to push girls to do art forms that usually they’re not known for being a part of.”

The next Graffiti Camp for Girls in Clarion Alley will take place in June or July, after school lets out. To sign up, go here. For more information, contact Nina Wright at nina@graffiticampforgirls.com.