Art critic or vandal...or have we forgotten something?

It was interesting to see the New York Times reporting on The Splasher. It seems some people are getting fed up with the successful street artists Shepard Fairey and others whose graffiti-inspired tactics have propelled them to modest levels of art-stardom. It would have been fun to get a copy of the Splasher tabloid...

But is adding to a work (or, some might argue, destroying it) a form of criticism? Street art is often discussed in terms of vandalism, and the response of the Splasher to the comodification of extra-gallery art is described an act of vandalism on top of that. But what about iconoclasm? Maybe the Splasher is a form of leveler, one who seeks to obscure or eliminate images based on the degree to which they are attracting un-deserved attention…

…but no one in the art world -- let alone the world of street art – is anyone getting un-deserved attention are they? No way!