After carelessly roaming the Internet the other day out of boredom I came across “Banksy’s” website. Although I have passively seen his controversial artwork in papers and on the news in the past, I have never actually looked in detail. The layout and design of his website reflects the style of art he produces and there seems to be very little, if any, text.
The reason why I think there’s no text is to maintain the image that has been created around him, therefore if there’s not text it doesn’t give much information away about the artist and almost mirrors his image of being quite secret. But also I think that he has purposely chosen to do this because his art speaks for it self. Rarely do his pieces have to have their meaning explained, they all pretty much speak for themselves. It almost is a physical definition of the phrase “A picture says a thousand words”.
Although the world and the UK in particular moan about things being different and people speaking out, secretly society thrives off a bit of controversy. Most of, if not all his pieces are controversial and personally that’s why I find him so alluring.
In my opinion, controversy is one of the key motives for change. At first many aspects of society such as divorce, sexuality and people of different race’s integrating with other countries have once been taboo subjects, but people speaking out and making an impact have been seen as controversial but in retrospect it has also led to change. In modern society, neither of those three “issues” are shocking to people as they have been accepted as normality now by many people.
Banksy’s works are often not portrayed in conventional ways, but are produced on sides of buildings, street signs and billboards. This method reflects the point I just made about society, as he is not putting his work on a canvas, which will only be viewed by people that want to see his work. Any one who is in that area will view it passively. I believe this is a genius idea, because if your trying to put a point across whether it be political or fact based, then this is the way to do it. People who would choose to see his work already have pre conceived beliefs and ideas on what he produces, however it’s the people that haven’t seen his work before that it will create the most impact on.
After looking at his pieces online, the thing I found surprising was that I understood the message that he was trying to put across. Now im not the best art analysist in the world, or even very good at it at all. However his points are easy to understand and the message is clear in many of them. He creates impact with his works without them being mentally challenging. The question is though, is that because his art is simple and just plain outrageous? Or is it that although the meaning is fairly simple, it is innovative and extremely clever? Personally I believe it is the latter.
The real question is though, who is Banksy? After looking at the website I did a bit of extra research to see if Banksy’s identity had ever been revealed. I discovered an article on the “Daily Mail” website (surprise, surprise) and found a text from July 2008, which claimed that Banksy’s had been unmasked and was a man called “Robin Banks” and alongside it is a picture of the suspected artist. The article try’s to avoid the statement that this man is defiantly the famous artist but most defiantly implies it. In my opinion is just a very clever game of “Where’s wally”, where they have tried to find the person who technically ticks all the boxes.
Personally I really hope that this isn’t the artist, and that Banksy’s identity is never confirmed, as his secretive image compliments the art very well. (Let alone that the police and government are after him for numerous crimes against vandalism). But also I feel that the picture used in the article isn’t what I imagined him to look like. Which is also a let down as the imagination will always create a more exciting version of someone than reality.
. David Bird Media . 