Marco Senaldi on the View from Inside: Graffiti as Occlusion

In an editorial for Artribune Magazine #43, philosopher and art theorist Marco Senaldi reflects on the experience of being inside a regional train car, looking out through a window obscured by a graffiti tag. He contrasts the external view of graffiti—where it may carry some meaning—with the internal view, where it becomes an opaque barrier that blocks light and landscape, trapping passengers in a claustrophobic interior. Senaldi draws parallels to historical artworks: Cornelis Gijsbrecht's trompe-l'œil painting of a canvas's reverse side, and Marcel Duchamp's The Large Glass, which requires viewers to walk behind the work. He extends the metaphor to broader acts of occlusion in the built environment—suburban sheds, asphalt, roundabouts, roads that destroy the landscapes they were meant to serve, and walls that attract hatred from those on the other side. Senaldi warns that this incessant addition of physical barriers risks subtracting meaning from the world, echoing a line from the poet: 'Un più nel mondo è un meno nel senso' (A more in the world is a less in sense). The editorial is published in Artribune Magazine #43 and is part of the magazine's regular features, alongside newsletters on the art market (Incanti), urban regeneration (Render), and cultural tourism (PAX).