Banksy

Banksy’s self-shredding artwork was headline news in October.

Opinions were immediately formed: Sothebys were in on it; the buyer was in on it; no-one knew about it; it was a statement about the investment-orientated Western art market; it was a publicity stunt for an attention-seeking pseudo-artist; it was all a joke.

And perhaps this last is the one that resonated with most people watching the news. To make an artwork that self-destructs when the auctioneer’s gavel descends has got to make you laugh. But then to discover that the buyer is happy to keep the piece and to realise that its value may have increased by the shredding might make the laughter turn into questions, or shaking of the head at least.

I’d agree with the BBC’s Will Gompertz that the event was a ‘dark satire [on] how art has become an investment commodity to be auctioned off to ultra-wealthy trophy-hunters’, but I would disagree that it is ‘brilliant’ art.

Who is he?

We don’t know that much about Banksy because for 30 or so years he has carefully guarded his anonymity, though, of course, theories circulate as to his identity. What we do know is that he is from Bristol and began doing graffiti in the city in the 1990s, moving to his distinctive use of stencils as a way of making his art quickly, so as to avoid being caught in the act, and also following a traditional mode of political dissent. And his art is undeniably art of protest.

Subverting expectations

His most famous image, of a girl letting go of a heart-shaped balloon, which self-destructed at Sotheby’s, might be seen as whimsical and even sentimental, but more commonly his works condemn materialism and violence. Take, for example, the picture of people worshipping before a Sale Ends Today sign, or the masked rioter throwing a bouquet of flowers, Paddington Bear with the message ‘migration is not a crime’ or two helmeted policemen kissing; all make a statement by subverting expectations through common cultural images.

Banksy’s medium of illegal painting on side-street walls reinforces his satirical message. Similarly embodied messages are found in his other projects, such as ‘Dismaland’, a 2015 theme-park-style art exhibition – a so-called Bemusement Park curated by Banksy – and the Walled-Off Hotel (get it?), which is a hotel, museum and gallery in one, built adjacent to the Bethlehem wall separating the Palestinian territories from Israel.

But these are old, impersonal messages. The soldiers in his murals are symbols, not individuals. The copy of Michaelangelo’s David in a suicide vest is shocking, but one-dimensional. Such protests display a visceral anger, but limited understanding of any real situation. The questions that arise from this, then, are whether his art is any more than a satirical cartoon or a protest placard? Does it make the viewer actually think or feel deeply?

‘Preachy’ art?

It is easy to deplore war or materialism, much harder to make someone consider their own personal connection to those evils, or to examine the complexity of them. A quick and clever image doesn’t make us wonder, rather it diminishes our engagement in a difficult issue by reducing it to a simple moral that the liberal West can agree with and then feel smug about. Ironically, Banksy is making the kind of art that we sometimes find in Christian circles – simplistic and preachy.

But, it is true that Banksy is, as Gompertz says, ‘making art that penetrates the public consciousness; art that is in the world, not detached from it; art that raises questions that need an airing.’ He might not be doing it well, but he is doing it.

Pointing to the answer

And this is a reminder to us of the public hunger for engagement with problems of injustice, greed and violence. If Banksy can ask such questions and raise protest, then surely Christians can too, through art and other means. Then, humbly and gently, we can point to the answer that is the incarnation and cross of Christ, the ultimate embodied message which is never easy, though it may be simple, and which connects the small and personal with the vastness of God’s glory.