The tools for creating graffiti are simple. It takes cans of spray paint along with varying sizes of cap nozzles to get the right line sizes or widths of color for designs. Industrial paint markers, oil-based color that is weather- and fade-resistant with a chiseled marker tip, also add color to the spray-painted work.
Originally subway cars and underground tunnels were the canvas of choice. Hip hop graffiti artists also used the outside walls of public buildings as well as some private buildings. Graffiti artists started using canvas and wide sheets of paper that were bought by collectors, such as the late art dealer Sidney Janis.
Lettering in the hip hop art form are wide with generous curves. Fonts on computer programs mirroring this style are called "Standout" and "Impact." The colors used are deep, bright colors. What the single artist or group of artists called "crews" depicted at first were the names of their favorite hip hop bands or their own names. Some artists moved into creating murals. Two Washington, D.C. grafitti artists, Tim Conlon and Dave Hupp, were commissioned to create four 20-foot length murals by the Smithsonian for their "RECOGNIZE!" hip hop exhibit installed in 2008.
Using the collection of the late Sidney Janis, the Brooklyn Museum put on an exhibit called "Graffiti" in the summer of 2006. The Smithsonian Museum installed an exhibit called "RECOGNIZE! Hip Hop and Contemporary Portraiture" that paid tribute to the entire hip hop artistic movement in 2008. This show included four murals commissioned from local graffiti artists. In April of 2011, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles installed its exhibit "Art in the Streets," which features installation from 50 different artists. This exhibit closes in August 2011.