We have had the Banksy Exhibition here in Adelaide over August and September, and I was lucky enough to go.
Surprisingly for me, my son was interested in going, and it turns out that he is quite a Banksy fan! A very unexpected but happy turn of events for me!
For those of you not in the know, Banksy is a UK street artist and activist. No-one knows who he really is, or even if Banksy is his real name. My son and I were speculating that maybe it is a group of people doing the work, rather than just one, but who knows – more on that later.
He’s been creating street art since the 1990’s, mostly in the UK. His subjects are often political and he provides a social commentary through his art that really makes you think. My opinion, Banksy is one of the greatest ever story teller artists, which is one of the main reasons we love his work and his messages.
The exhibition was a combination of originals, reproductions and photo’s. Obviously, we can’t see every original, as most of them were on buildings, and some were destroyed.
The blurb for the exhibition said that it would take 45 minutes to an hour to view, however, we were there for just over 2 hours, and we didn’t spend much time on each exhibit. There were a huge number of pieces and the stories to go with them were so interesting that it really needed the time we took. I would happily go through it again as I enjoyed it so much.
If you want to find out more about Banksy, check out the wikipedia site. I’m sure, however, that there are far more interesting sites to have a look at.
I found it really interesting that Banksy has set up installation art, such as the ‘theme park’ Dismaland. There was quite a lot of pieces from that installation in the exhibition, and I think it would have been amazing to see in person. Dismaland was based on Disneyland, but with a real emphasis on what I would call the negative parts of theme parks. Disappointing rides, loads of rubbish and efforts to just get as much money as possible were some of the themes. It was only open for about a month, but apparently, as with most of his installations, it was sold out!
Banksy has also done art overseas to make statements about issues that he is obviously passionate about.
He has visited Palestine a couple of times, painting images on the Israeli West Bank wall, and in 2017, setting up the Walled Off Hotel in Bethlehem, with rooms decorated by himself and other artists. It was and maybe still is, a hotel that people can stay at. In the exhibition was a reproduction of one of the rooms and also other artwork from the hotel.
In November 2022, Banksy went to the Ukraine during the Russian invasion and painted murals in several cities. One of them depicts a child besting Putin with a judo throw (see the reproduction of it from the exhibition below).
I also loved the story he depicted of buying a boat, painting it pink and donating it to be used to help save stranded refugees trying to get from Africa to Europe. You can read more about it in this article. On the refugee boat people issue, he also had this stunning sculpture that I absolutely love for it’s detail and message.
I had a couple of favourite pieces, for the message, the satire and the emotions they created in me.
The first is the anti immigration pigeons, having a go at a poor lone swallow. You can see my pic of it below. It’s funny how the same issues affect different countries isn’t it? We have similar issues here in Australia (along with a whole slew of our own!).
The next one is the Trolley Hunters. I absolutely cracked up laughing at this one. It’s so hilarious to see neanderthal hunters going after trolleys. On the write up about the piece it talked about something like the hunters attacking the trolleys, one of whom stands up defiantly (not exact words!). It’s actually a statement about our rampant consumerism, inability to fend for ourselves and incessant need to shop! Check out this interesting article on it.
I also love ‘Girl and balloon’, and this is probably the iconic image I knew about before going to the exhibition. There was also a great short film on this one that was amazing to watch as well. You may know about this one as it was the painting that famously got shredded once it was auctioned. The painting had a built in shredder in the frame! Imagine paying over one million pounds just to have that happen!
So, I guess, one question that people probably ask is ‘Can Banksy really paint, or does he just do stencils?’. The answer is a resounding, yes, he can definitely paint. There are some classic paintings in oil that he reproduced and added modern detail to (as part of the Crude Oils series). As you look at them, it is obvious that he knows how to paint. That doesn’t detract from anything that he’s done with stencil at all. I don’t buy into the whole argument that graffiti isn’t art. It is – art is an expression of the artist, so those marks are art. We might not like it, we may not understand it, but that doesn’t change the basic fact that it is art.
Anyway, off my soapbox and back to Banksy. The mere fact that he knows how to compose, use colour, and invoke emotions, means that regardless of whether it is fine art oils or stencilled art, it is still art. And, Banksy CAN paint and create. (See below for ‘Venus’ from the crude oils series).
This leads me on to my final thoughts about Banksy. After leaving the exhibition, my son and I had a big discussion about who Banksy is. Thinking about this later, I realised that it is probably better if we DON’T know who Banksy is. Regardless of whether he is a celebrity, a conglomeration of people, two people painting as one, or ordinary Joe Bloggs from around the corner, his art speaks to us.
If we knew who he was, would it have as big an impact, or would the man/artist interfere with the message? Food for thought!
Last, but not least, if you get the chance to see any Banksy exhibition, instalment, street art or anything done by him, just do it. It’s really impactful and well worth the effort.
The Banksy exhibition I’ve just seen is currently touring Australia and moves on to Melbourne and Perth soon.
If you’re interested in what I thought about other exhibitions, check out my blog on the Frida Kahlo exhibition.