Graffiti Artist Banksy Arrested In London, Identity Revealed

[Guest Atom Dowry Firth]

I used to think Banksy was pretty good but then I realised a lot of other people thought so too and then it was no longer edgy so then I decided I didn't like him any more and now I pretend I never liked him in the first place really.

 

Art with MESSAGE (in capital letters, like war = bad)

 

http://youtu.be/0WxAlIPSxlE

[chenGOD]

Art with MESSAGE (in capital letters, like war = bad) makes me run away, i'd rather look at julie mehretu's painting for (evil) goldman sachs, than look at (mr nice) banksy's paintings.

 

What do you think about Picasso's "guernica"?

And how do you know Banksy is nice? Maybe he's a real dick? I don't know anything about him as a person.

[PhylumZunami]

its so fake just look at that awful photoshop job of the blacked out face interview camera angle from exit through the gift shop

[khov]

 

What do you think about Picasso's "guernica"?

And how do you know Banksy is nice? Maybe he's a real dick? I don't know anything about him as a person.

 

 

Guernica is a masterpiece, pretty clever also, & its not just a WAR is BAD painting indeed, its quite modern & all fucked up, its a black & white painting about a slaugther, without any red color /blood & the bombing (plane?) is figured as an eye / lightbulb, that can be interpreted as last judgment or deadly photoshooting, a fear of modern weapons ?, what the hell, you could talk for hours about that painting. regarding "Mr nice", i was talking about the Bansky pieces in general.

[Rubin Farr]

HOAX

[digman]

if you like Banksy you have shit taste in everything

[MisterE]

the guernica also has lots of really great symbolism, thats how you know picasso was a genius. because he would put in objects that were supposed to represent entirely other objects. its like when jim morrison sang about a 7 mile long snake, you know he actually wasnt talking about a snake that long, but something else. symbolism. its the tool of artistes.

 

guernica wiki:

"A light bulb blazes in the shape of an evil eye over the suffering horse's head (the bare bulb of the torturer's cell). Picasso's intended symbolism in regards to this object is related to the Spanish word for lightbulb; "bombilla", which is similar to the word "bomba" for bomb in Spanish."

 

its genius because its a light bulb and in one language that sounds like another languages word for bomb so he paints on the light bulb but really its a bomb. just painting a bomb wouldve been laaaaaaaaaaaaaaame.

 

 

maybe picasso was the banksy of his day? or banksy is the picasso of this day?

[Braintree]

Another article from the same site: http://nationalreport.net/obama-nominates-dr-oz-surgeon-general-vows-cure-ebola/

 

I think some of Banksy's work is pretty good. I especially liked the Ronald McDonald shoeshine thing. If you look at one of his pieces and only fixate on the simplicity of it, you won't get the bigger meaning. A lot of his graffiti work is meant to be discovered. It's not like being in a gallery and being able to put a microscope on something. It's finite, fragile, and temporary. I think that's part of what makes it impactful and resonate with people.

 

Yes, it's a simple aesthetic, but part of what makes it interesting is where you're finding it.

 

 

 

war is bad we need to say it all the time until it goes away.

 

2000+ years and counting...

 

 

More like 10,000+ years.

 

if you like Banksy you have shit taste in everything

 

Such an intelligent, cogently constructed opinion.

[xox]

i really can't understand how obviously intelligent people can sometimes be so undiscerning.

i mean, we all understand how great guernica was, is and always will be, but put guernica on some wall in the middle of nowhere and let's see how many of passing people will really understand it...

 

[Bechuga]

While I can take or leave Banksy's actions + works (some are funny), I think it's even funnier that what is simple stencil graffiti, i.e. vandalisim, is being traded for incredibly high sums between collectors and poseurs. It's got to the point where local councils PROTECT his work, mostly so they can hopefully sell it on their selves later on.

 

So yeah, his work I'm not bothered about, either negatively or positively. I just find it amusing people PAY for it. They're paying top dollar for a piece of mortar ripped off a moldy wall in Walthamstowe. That in itself is a bigger statement than the art he makes. Not that it's one he's making himself, nor ever intended to.

[MisterE]

i really can't understand how obviously intelligent people can sometimes be so undiscerning.

i mean, we all understand how great guernica was, is and always will be, but put guernica on some wall in the middle of nowhere and let's see how many of passing people will really understand it...

 

 

or maybe lots of people simply wouldnt be able to recognize stuff like that a lightbulb is supposed to represent a bomb because the two things have similar sounding words in the countries involved in the subject matter- or even if you realize that and replace the light bulb with a bomb in your head, then what? unraveling the symbolism doesnt lead to any great epiphany. art isn't going to end wars. artists aren't necessarily any smarter or better than say, a guy who toiled away his entire life as a damn good plumber. the only real difference is that one vocation involves making work that can either be mass produced or put on a stage for the public to admire, and the other doesn't. the idea that these people have smarter ideas than everyone else, and that we should all strive to understand or even be more like them, is just fucking stupid. and it comes about because there are lots of dumb people out there who don't ever question what they are told. picasso probably wasn't the only person in spain who thought that bombing was fucked up, and his contorted, impossible to decipher painting of some people and a cow doesn't somehow lead to some new enlightened plane of existence when you solve it's riddle. maybe this is why people don't like banksy. its fucking pretentious as all hell to actually put out art with the notion behind it that you have all these grand ideas about how the world should be, and that those ideas should have more intellectual weight because they're packaged with a pretty image.

[Guest skibby]

[xox]

 

i really can't understand how obviously intelligent people can sometimes be so undiscerning.

i mean, we all understand how great guernica was, is and always will be, but put guernica on some wall in the middle of nowhere and let's see how many of passing people will really understand it...

 

 

or maybe lots of people simply wouldnt be able to recognize stuff like that a lightbulb is supposed to represent a bomb because the two things have similar sounding words in the countries involved in the subject matter- or even if you realize that and replace the light bulb with a bomb in your head, then what? unraveling the symbolism doesnt lead to any great epiphany. art isn't going to end wars. artists aren't necessarily any smarter or better than say, a guy who toiled away his entire life as a damn good plumber. the only real difference is that one vocation involves making work that can either be mass produced or put on a stage for the public to admire, and the other doesn't. the idea that these people have smarter ideas than everyone else, and that we should all strive to understand or even be more like them, is just fucking stupid. and it comes about because there are lots of dumb people out there who don't ever question what they are told. picasso probably wasn't the only person in spain who thought that bombing was fucked up, and his contorted, impossible to decipher painting of some people and a cow doesn't somehow lead to some new enlightened plane of existence when you solve it's riddle. maybe this is why people don't like banksy. its fucking pretentious as all hell to actually put out art with the notion behind it that you have all these grand ideas about how the world should be, and that those ideas should have more intellectual weight because they're packaged with a pretty image.

 

 

my country was not involved in the matter and i just learned about the bulb/bomb connection

 

lemme say it again: it's about sending a message to as many people as possible. well, that's how i see his work, anyway...

 

second, remember that not everybody's intelligent and knowledgeable as much as you are

 

also, what's really wrong, stupid or idonknowwhat about this? too direct? not symbolic enough?

 

 

 

[kokoon]

yes, too in-your-face, obvious, banal, even shallow.

[mcbpete]

The Nathan Barley of street art

[xox]

yes, too in-your-face, obvious, banal, even shallow.

 

yes, i know. but so what? what's wrong with that IF you want to send a message?

 

i'm not getting this! i know i'm not a retard.... (would i now if i was?)

 

gimme an example of the same topic as on the above pics but that has been made better, or can you propose an alternative way?

[MisterE]

why is one persons message more important than the hundreds of millions of other people out there in the world simply because they put it in a nice image, and what kind of person goes around thinking that about themselves and others? what kind of world must we live in where you have to be good at drawing for your 'message' to matter or be so important as to force/push it upon everyone else so that they may become enlightened?

 

also i may think some of these things look nice and i may even look at some paintings for a good bit of time but im just saying personally that i think the idea of having big 'important' 'messages' in art is ridiculous and it has been blown up into this kind of mythology, like when kids used to play all their rock and roll records backwards to find the hidden messages. so what if there even is a message. if you need someone else to give you such a basic idea as war is bad then you having been made to think that is entirely useless because you'd be so stupid that you will never be involved in any change. truth is these messages are usually there because they make the artist look like 'one of us' to certain groups who judge art or give it bonus points based on its political message. it's PR.

[chronical]

Eh, looks fake to me. I wouldn't mind if he got caught though, don't really like the direction he's been heading into the past year(s).

Reminds me of my facebook feed's pseudo-aware conspiracy theorists babbling about the government, isis and whatnot. goddamnit

[xox]

why is one persons message more important than the hundreds of millions of other people out there in the world simply because they put it in a nice image, and what kind of person goes around thinking that about themselves and others?

 

who said that his message is more important? we can all say it. shouldn't we say it?

 

what kind of world must we live in where you have to be good at drawing for your 'message' to matter or be so important as to force/push it upon everyone else so that they may become enlightened?

 

first of all, we live in a shitty world. didn't you know this?

second, how to influence people positively is a good question. imo, art is pretty good way to do this (like beethoven, picasso, kubrick and others did)

 

 

also i may think some of these things look nice and i may even look at some paintings for a good bit of time but im just saying personally that i think the idea of having big 'important' 'messages' in art is ridiculous and it has been blown up into this kind of mythology, like when kids used to play all their rock and roll records backwards to find the hidden messages. so what if there even is a message. if you need someone else to give you such a basic idea as war is bad then you having been made to think that is entirely useless because you'd be so stupid that you will never be involved in any change. truth is these messages are usually there because they make the artist look like 'one of us' to certain groups who judge art or give it bonus points based on its political message. it's PR.

 

of course it's PR. and it good. picasso needed PR, as was beethoven, as was kubrick.

[MisterE]

by PR i mean it's like a way of saying 'im hip with u, the hip crowd. this is what you believe in, and its what i believe in, so its ok for you to go post that pic u took of my graf on your blog, dont worry, i'll never say or do something you strongly disagree with'

 

it's like a wink and an elbow nudge

 

it's not to get people who don't think something already, to consider it. its to make sure that the people who already agree with you know you're one of them. and that your product is safe for them to consume.

 

none of which has anything to do with challenging anyones ideas about anything. in fact its the opposite of that.

[awepittance]

i prefer the provocative symbolism of Shepard Fairey tbh

[Joyrex]

i prefer the provocative symbolism of Shepard Fairey tbh

 

You mean the provocative plagiarism, amirite?

[Alcofribas]

i prefer the provocative symbolism of Shepard Fairey tbh

 

yeah he probably designed bHo's fake birth certificate imo

[MisterE]

but its also a great example of how the artist's message turned out to be wrong

whats really changed

 

the symbolism easily gets burned in peoples brains, lights up all these receptors and gives them a tingly feeling about the message but none of that has anything to do with the actual facts or reality of the message. its propaganda

[xox]

lets take just one example: the US spend twice as much of money for army per year that could completely eradicate world's extreme poverty. and on top of that they're selling that same weapon to kill even more people (when they're not killing ppl by them self) so they could make even more weapons next year. that's not banal? what americans are doing about that? nothing! i mean, look at this world! eu, russia, isreal, china...no one's innocent. and now this islamic fundamentalists!

 

what i'm trying to say is that banksy is just a product of his time, a reaction to the world's denial. extreme banality is just a reaction to the chronic denial of (mostly) the western world.