The hype surrounding this event put me off, we got features in the weekly, spreads across the Times and the animal rights activists helped boost ratings even more. I still wanted to check this out though - if only to see the red flocked wallpaper colorway elephant. Got there at just the right time, and shot round the whole thing in under half an hour due to an appointment. I left just in time to see a line developing a little way down the street, and the whole place was already crowded.

Did I like it? Well, I went back twice (and its a drive), just to see a slow moving line of maybe a 1000 people the first time, and about 600 the second...that was with an hour of opening time left. So I didn't get to see it again, but I wish I had. I really liked what he had to say, and it felt new, fresh and truthful.

It was a sharp contrast to the night before when I went to Shephard Faireys anodyne opening. I stayed just 10 minutes; having had my fill of more of exactly what we've come to expect from Shephard.

I left with a new respect for Banksy, and genuine excitement for this show. If someone asked me to describe this show in one line, I'd have to say: The MESSAGE is the MEDIUM.

Didn't get to take a huge number of photos in my short visit, but here's a few to give you an idea (sadly missing some great stuff). ANyway, here ya go:



























Imagine a RED elephant behind this picket fence:






Turtle God in aquisition afterglow.






PS. I never got to see the elephant anyway; he was out for lunch...or something.

thanks Carl...

i rarely think this cuz theres no point in thinking it, but.. i wish i could be there

Yeah, it felt kind of like a happening, wish I could have hung out much longer.

This is a very interesting point. One that I think in some ways is answered by saturation. In my opinion a lot of what Banksy had up was a bit Banksy by numbers. And I say this with the utmost respect for his work. As a Londoner I've been treated to his work for a fair while, so it's only when you get a really good piece that you pay attention. Don't get me wrong he's a genuis. But his work in a gallery sometimes lacks the creative beauty of when it interacts with the environment in my opinion. But as he says it pays for his street work so more power too him.

As I haven't ever seen any of Shep's gallery shows and very little of his work on the streets in the flesh in a way I find him more intriguing. I think it's the familarity breeds... well familarity argument. You want what you don't have.

That's enough of my musings.

that's the feeling I was getting looking at those pics. Sort of like legalized gangsterism. Just doesn't have the raw edge and impact his graf does.
I hope he keeps doing his street stuff and doesn't get fat and lazy like the rest of the graf artist doing installation shows.

I read an interesting comment from Mr Fairy saing how he'll always bomb as that'll reach people a gallery or his commercial work wouldn't. I think that's true in general though in terms of the message being more effective where you don't expect it. Hence the rise of guerilla marketing I guess.

banksy = [expletive deleted]

I genuinely loved the show, but apart form the odd wall here and there (London and Brighton) I haven't seen that much - so as Banky said the newness for me is in the unfamiliarity.

SO, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts behind your comments Isaac - u usually have a fresh (dare I say insider) perspective on things.

PS. Didn't realize that [expletive deleted] didn't get replaced...unless u have special mod powers......

this is perhaps one of the dumbest things i have ever read on this message board.

the show was good, though it did recycle a lot of his older imagery so it would probably be much more enjoyable to people that weren't familiar with his stuff. if you fall into this category, buy/borrow "wall and piece".

the best new piece was the one with girl/red cross/tv crew. very powerful. *really* wish they'd made a print of that one. there were some good humorous pieces also, the grannies being my favorite. all in all i think his stuff has a lot more vitality on the street, but it's good to see that he's using the gallery-type shows to make pieces that wouldn't work so well on the walls. some of his graffiti does work pretty well in a gallery setting though ... one of my favorites of the recycled pieces was the "the key to great art is all in the composition" canvas.

i think most of shepard's new work is great. his style is certainly well-established, but his compositions are mostly excellent nonetheless. the only problem i have is that he sometimes goes a little over-the-top with his polemic. it's easy for me to forgive though.

in contrasting the two, each has his strengths/weaknesses. banksy has a true talent for humor, but he tends to use it purely for criticism without any construction. shepard's stuff always has a lot of mistrust of authority and anger in it, but there's often a positive stance, even if just implied. in the end i think banksy's work is more accessible to people in general, but i find shepard's work more relevant.

I still don't know if banksy is a genious or one big gimmick. His work takes about 2 seconds for you to get the point... so it's not very deep... but at the same time he is a graphitti artist, so i guess you should get an immediate reaction... er i dunno

I say this because Banksy has a magazine and website art education. When I look at any of those pieces I see a copy or attempt copy at another artist work from the last 10 years.
large animals, taxadermy: damian hearst, maurizio cattelan
Trucks with graffiti in a gallery: Barry Mcgee
elaborate stencils: WK, Swoon, faile
Modern cliche's in a rennasiance painting style: 1 in every art school
culture jamming: a million 90's artists
juztapozed sculpture in white: tom sachs and going back to 80's bullshit

the only thing he forgot to rip off(maybe he is saving for his next show) is a group of naked women standing around(vanessa beecroft) and some candid snapshots of his friends doing drugs(terry richardson, ryan mcginley, etc...).

I only see someone trying to make a name for themselves and not really interested in working on a solid group of work made from a genuine place. He is all over the place with his messages and mediums. This guy is playing the PR game on all of you. He has high price PR company working his art to every angle and media source possible. this is why you have heard about it, not because this work is so stand out.

This dude is like a mixtape, alot of good ideas, that he didn't think of, all mixed up into a fucking mess.

I say that equals [expletive deleted] because [expletive deleted] are the same shit, a broke ass bearbrick with two bit artist trying to make their version of something else. KR spends a huge amount of press to make sure that every fucking person at all interested in "alternative culture' knows about their shit.

If you like banksy stuff then please dive a little deeper into the current artworld, there is some much amazing shit out there, here is just a short list of stuff:
http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/ray_charles.html
http://www.space1026.com/
http://robertsandtilton.com/
http://www.rvcaanp.com/
http://www.jacktiltongallery.com/
http://www.hamptonplace.com/innerworkings/
http://www.kavigupta.com/
http://members.aol.com/MadArtCtr3/kersels/kersels.htm
http://images.google.com/images?q=maurizio+cattelan&hl=en&lr=&client=safari&rls=en-us&sa=X&oi=images&ct=title

Cool!

I was hoping we'd get a considered response, and we did. I'm looking forward to checking out those links form home.

I understand where Ramos is coming from and the sky rocketing prices of his prints and og's make these criticisms more relevant. He is more of a PR machine than a Picasso but some of the stunts are just so amazing I think you have to give him some credit. I do prefer the street art to the fine art. I don't think you can diminish the power of most of these images:






The west bank pieces had more of an immediate effect on me persoanlly than any other graffiti I have ever seen. I have always wondered what the people living there thought about them.






His street art is very direct and very easy to "get". You don't have to be a hipster or an art lover to understand most of it immediately. Basically he is doing gallery graffiti for the masses and I think that is okay if not necessary. The PR works and is picked up by the media becasue the message is so simple. CNN can't run a 3 min story about Barry McGee becasue it takes longer to put his work in context.


I think it should also be mentioned that he still does street art all the time whereas many graffiti artist that have had success in the gallery world no longer do anything on the street.

you guys amaze me sometimes, with your knowledge about graffiti art, art in general, art commerce, etc. etc.

i guess we all have things we know more about than the majority of people, and art isn't mine.

i suppose i'm easily impressed (well, not THAT easy) by some of these exhibits seeing as its really not my realm...

and i live in a village of about 10,000 people. LOL

so far, good read..

I agree and disagree with most of the opinions here at the same time, which is a good thing. While I do like Banksy, having seen his stuff for at least going on 5 years now (there was a piece 1/2 bllock from my house for 2 years, as well as a good bit of stuff around SF), I think he is doing a decent job. I like the humor, and making something "easy to get" is usually a painfully difficult task after the first four or five pieces. (the destroy capitalism line for tees is amazing). I like the fact he is trying to stretch what he does, but it seems forced, and not well executed. Basically, just about everything outside the 2-d work really gets thin, but at least he is trying -that is more than most people do. (the vans though are bit hard though, you gotta admit that.)

As for Shepard, I really think he has gone someplace special. His elaborate installations are beautiful, and a great experiment in his format and message that is appropriate for the venue. Why he continues to be relevant, is he has meaning, continues to evolve, and has no problem being himself. So many people are "tired" of him because it is not insider anymore, but not changing for others is a great thing. Aside from that, he still outbombs most new kids, (although the baby has slowed him a bit), and he is putting himself out there. Laziness and self-love kill artists, and luckily he has not fallen prey to either.

It will be interesting to see what happens next, as content always outlives style.

I like it here. An intelligent debate. I can't remember the last time I saw that on a board.

Good points all round. I have to agree with Brian on simplicity or 'easy to get' being a I FART A LOT. With his stencil work, I think Banksy has, most of the time, managed this. He's added a slap stick humour to what was going on that I don't think the others have. I like what WK, Swoon and Faile have done, and most likely what they do is technically more complex, but to me Banksy's taken a different route to them.

Sure some of his pieces conceptually are better thought out than others. Pogue's West Bank pics being great examples of the good. Personally I love the Barcelona zoo stunt with laugh now one day we'll be in charge scralled on the rocks. The 3D work and paintings just don't do much for me - as people have said they're a bit forced (or ripped off). The paintings etc worked better for me when he was placing them in the galleries - the withusoragainstus beetle being my favourite.

All in all, as as advertising monkey, if I could get a message across as quickly and effectively as he does I'd be on a lot more money. ha ha.

Anyways enough from me. Thanks for the links Ramos looking forward to diving in.

nice....ramos and flynn dropping bombs on the suckas.....some good and some bad points given...one thing for sure yo...Ted Nugent is wack

as a matter of fact...fuck Banksy yo.....Chaka for Life!!! now thats gangsta....a real one man assault on the city......

Brad and angelina bought 3 seperate pieces from the show and now about 3 different tabloid type tv shows are profiling "who's banksy?" type things

one of them was starving african children staring at a white family under an umbrella having a picknick for $226,000.
That's pimper than the tshirt line, selling a woman who rented the premiere resort and asked the government of an african country to deny photgraphers visas a portrait of her baby buying nation hopping for almost a quarter mill.

imagine how many starving children you could feed for $226,000?
mindblowing. Bansky has become a major cog in the machine he's been fighting. That bullshit about him using installment money to fund his street projects is a lie. How much does spraypaint cost again?

i was thinking along the lines of connecting a rural village with an electric grid, building a well of clean water where people have to trek for miles to possibly parasite infested streams, buying seeds and fertilizers for people who live on exhausted soil, or funding/starting a land mine disposal team.
she totally needed the bust with the bullet hole too. $400,000 (the bill for the 3 pieces) is I can't imagine how many times the average income of the rural population of subsaharan africa. philanthropo-tourism sucks.

So I'm just curious, would it be better for Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie to not care about anything and spend all their money on bullshit? They won the genetic lottery and can now make millions off of their good looks. Good for them. Thank god, as misguided as some of us think they are, that they (esp. Jolie) are trying to help raise money for AIDS programs and to end hunger, shedding light on a problem most people with their wealth and position would either like to sweep under the rug or don't even know exists, instead of adding nothing to this world. They probably have done even more with their money than we will ever know about.

I'm blown away by people who, in theory at least, believe in the same things they do, being the ones to attack these people the hardest. If you guys had the money they did, would you use your money to give to charity or spend your time travelling half way around the world to help people? The weaker of us, as idealistic as we are now (when we aren't mega-rich), would probably buy ever vinyl toy ever made, build a shrine to them made from custom gold leafed Detolfs, and instead of going to Africa, we'd spend our time here making even more money and having sex with young hot models (or, to quote Mr. Kozik "fantasy Johnsons" for those so inclined).

And they don't strike me as stupid either. Do you really think the irony of what they are buying is lost on them? I think you'd be mistaken.

Feels no different than the Banksy haters. If Banksy used his talent to do something non-political like design a toy, we'd be falling all over each other to hump his leg, but because he uses it to express ideas that most of us generally agree with, he gets a load of shit thrown at him. Makes no sense. You just can't win I guess.

And who knows what Banksy is doing with his money? Spray paint isn't a lot of money, but doing some of the stunts he has done aren't cheap. And if the market will pay that price, I'd rather he get the cash than some useless guy who had nothing to do with the art and doesn't care about the world. He makes art a lot of people like and will pay a lot for. I'm glad he has money, doesn't have to worry about his bills, and can spend more time making great art. I wish I could follow my passion and live comfortably on top of it.

just as long as he leaves the elephant alone next time

+1

I don't care about the money or people who are buying this stuff. the price tag is not annoying to me. more power to him for making his stuff have value through viral marketing.

it is the idea hijacking and no attempt to advance the language of art that I think sucks. I just think it is a waste of time for him and the viewers.