Saturday 30 July 2022

Banksy Antonelli and Marziani Book Review

Banksy, the best known living artist, is an enigma with a perverse attitude to celebrity status and personal information. In an age where non-entities share every plate of food, change of eyeshadow and ill-advised swimwear hot, this is this is a major anomaly.

Banksy cover


Anonymity and secrecy fuels curiosity so there have been many books about Banksy, though none actually by him since “Wall and Piece” in 2005. The economically titled “Banksy”, Stefano Antonelli & Gianluca Marziani, Rizzoli International Publications, 2022, unauthorised, collects together a significant amount of material addressing Banksy the street artist, the art world darling, the enfant terrible and Banksy the “polite vandal”.

Banksy Antonelli Marziani p 16 17


Liberally illustrated with large photos, Banksy’s indoor gallery art and his outdoor street art get pretty much equal billing.

Having two authors lends two distinct dimensions to the book. A significant portion of the book is basically chronological, with photographs illustrating Banksy activity from very early freehand collaborations in Bristol right up to screengrabs of the two videos released by Banksy during lockdown.

Banksy Antonelli Marziani p 154 155


The years 2014 and 2016 are omitted so curiously no references to Banksy’s only known signed confession (Mobile Lovers) and his use of a QR code in 2016 to link the Gassed Cosette street image opposite London’s French Embassy to his underlying humanitarian political point.

The second and perhaps more interesting aspect is the philosophical, art history and political analysis which are covered with far superior writing quality. Perhaps I am too easily impressed when I have to google the words. The book makes a strong case for Banksy as a serious and art-world credible artist, something art critics are often inclined to deny.

Banksy Antonelli Marziani p28 29


The one thing no one wants revealed is thankfully not addressed in any great depth. The authors simply acknowledge the oft-repeated un-confirmed guess from the Telegraph years ago, seemingly on the basis that prior repetition by enough other people provides validation. The car park attendant in Weston Super Mare must be gutted.

Banksy Antonelli Marziani P189


Some cultural nuances are strangely overlooked such as in the dissection of the title of Banksy’s last book, there are cross references to Tolstoy’s “war and peace” and a tricky allusion to a wall as a source of social media output (me neither) but Banksy’s key joke that to a graffiti writer, a “piece” is a complex multi-colour graffito is not mentioned at all.

There is an excellent Banksy mind-map placing Banksy in context between street art and graffiti with a stream of influences and effects. Many similar graphics exist such as Cedar Lewisohn’s hand scribbled 2008 street art mind map, they are endlessly fascinating and never easy to agree 100% with, this is the first I have seen regarding Banksy and the authors have done a great job with it.

Banksy Antonelli Marziani p 14 15


The book would have benefited from more careful fact checking with errors in dates slipping through and even one artwork not by Banksy but is not attributed to anyone else either.

There is always room for another Banksy book in the market. The passage of time provides perspective on Banksy’s earlier career and as long as he remains active there is scope for updating on his latest twists and subversions of the act of creating and disseminating art. Its range of photographs earns it its position on the bookshelf of the Banksy curious and the in-depth analysis will provide food for thought for the die-hard fan base.

© Banksy, by Stefano Antonelli and Gianluca Marziani, Rizzoli Electa, 2022
Hardcover / 10.25” x 11.25” / 240 pages / 194 colour illustrations
£29.95 / ISBN: 978-0-8478-7276-3
Rizzoli Electa / Release date: June 2022

Tuesday 19 July 2022

Jean Peut-Etre and Boxitrixi batter Brick Lane

Jean Peut-Etre & Boxitrixi
Jean Peut-Etre and Boxitrixi (also feat My Dog Sighs)


A wonderful new batch of paste ups from a pair of overseas artists really gave a huge make over to some of Shoreditch’s paste up halls of fame.

Jean Peut-Etre & Boxitrixi
Jean Peut-Etre and Boxitrixi


Jean Peut-Etre & Boxitrixi
We can see.... Jean Peut-Etre and Boxitrixi


Jean Peut-Etre is from France, quelle surprise, and collages letterpress and screenprinted paste ups on found vintage paper.

Jean Peut-Etre
Jean Peut-Etre (also feat Subdude, Face The Strange, Ghead, City Kitty)


Jean Peut-Etre
Jean Peut-Etre


Jean Peut-Etre
Jean Peut-Etre


Jean Peut-Etre
Jean Peut-Etre


Boxitrixi is from Argentina and is currently a welcome resident in the UK with a glorious line in wood block printed naïve tribal characters. Boxitrixi’s paste-ups were applied with an urgent roughness leaving ripples, wrinkles and textures in the paper. The art acquired an instantly aged appearance entirely in keeping with the roughness of the printed images.

Jean Peut-Etre & Boxitrixi
Boxitrixi


Boxitrixi
Boxitrixi


Boxitrixi
Boxitrixi


Boxitrixi
Boxitrixi


Boxitrixi
Boxitrixi


The way the pair attacked the walls leaves you admiring both the individual prints and also the combined collaged sum of the parts.

Jean Peut-Etre & Boxitrixi
Jean Peut-etre and Boxitrixi


Boxitrixi & Jean Peut-Etre
Jean Peut-etre and Boxitrixi


Boxitrixi & Jean Peut-Etre
Jean Peut-etre and Boxitrixi


Links:

Jean Peut-Etre Instagram 

Boxitrixi Instagram

all photos: Dave Stuart

Sunday 10 July 2022

Pride Street Art In Shoreditch

 

Last weekend marked London’s main 2022 Pride celebration and a lot of new street art appeared in Shoreditch in celebration of and support for the LGBTQ community.

On the Shoreditch Street Art Tour on Sunday I was asked by one guest why the London Pride was in July rather than June as they were used to. Post tour digging revealed that “Pride in London”, the official title at present, is timed for the closest Saturday to the anniversary of the Stonewall riots in NYC which followed police raids on the Stonewall gay bar on 28th June.

Beirdo
Beirdo


The pride rainbow flag features in a lot of the Pride art pieces in its 6 colour traditional colour form, as opposed to the usual 7 colour representation of a rainbow. The first rainbow flag was designed by the artist Gilbert Blake in 1978 at the request of Harvey Milk (see the film Milk, excellent). It had 8 colours, the traditional 7 colours of the rainbow plus hot pink above the red. Each of the 8 colours was assigned a specific meaning. In 1979, aiming to increase flag production, the pink strip was dropped as hot pink material was not readily available. The turquoise stripe was also dropped so that the flag could be split and displayed in symmetrical paired halves each having three stripes. Thus the common Pride 6 colour rainbow evolved.

Subdude used an 8 stripe Pride flag to highlight statutory homophobia on the African continent.

Subdude
Subdude


Street artist Beirdo prefers 6 colours, or perhaps was just out of hot pink and turquoise A4

. Beirdo
Beirdo - Pride London 2022


Apparan sends her greetings and wishes you Happy Pride, with 7 rainbow stripes.

Apparan
Apparan - Pride London 2022


Drash La Krass has a list. No homophobia, no biphobia, no transphobia, no sexism!

Drash La Krass
Drash La Krass - Pride London 2022


Ghead_Tra is a new name this year to the Shoreditch street art scene and his art hates hatred and Conservatives. The God Loves Gays tricolour specifically aims at the vile spewing Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kansas USA.

Ghead_tra Ghead_art - Pride London 2022


If this next text based piece isn’t Ghead then Ghead ought to get together with the Unknown Artist as the message seamlessly blends that two big issues Ghead.

Artist not known
Unknown artist - Pride London 2022


Sidenote: on another matter the same so-called place of worship also holds extreme views on abortion and Ghead_tra parodies another specimen of Westboro extremism in opposition to that message.

Abortion Is My Bloody Choice - Ghead_tra
"Abortion is my bloody choice", Ghead_tra, July 2022


Ahead of this week’s Tory party implosion Social Sniper homed in on an issue which highlighted the breakdown of trust by members of the LGBTQ community in politicians. This may need to be read slowly. Conversion therapy is a process aimed at “curing” or changing expressions of gender behaviour, identity or expression. To describe it as controversial would be to miss the most unacceptable aspects of the practice by a million miles. Boris Johnson decided not to proceed with legislation to ban the practice which provoked howls of horror, at which point he flipped and decided there would be a ban except it wouldn’t apply to trans conversion therapy.

Social Sniper
Social Sniper - Pride London 2022


For the curious, the background to Social Sniper’s art is another form of colour spectrum specifically representing the trans community and their supporters. Trans Pride is taking place this weekend, the weekend after Pride weekend.

Wandering down a parallel track again, one senior tory we didn’t know about before appeared on TV regretting that he had had to support the flip flops on conversion therapy policy. When politicians publicly admit to supporting policies they fundamentally disagree with, how can voters expect to elect a representative possessing even the tiniest fragment of integrity.

Mike Freer MP, Equalities Minister (quit)
Mike Freer MP, close to Boris, Equalities Ministser (resigned)


I am hugely indebted to my Shoreditch Street Art Tours co-guide Subdude for his insights and information regarding the content and installation of the art discussed.


All photos: Dave Stuart except where stated

Saturday 14 May 2022

Daytripping – Cardiff Street Art and Graffiti

Any excuse to blow the London vapours from the lungs will do so my travels recently took me to Cardiff thanks to a cheap rail ticket promotion. Cardiff is the capital of Wales and, as a specimen of street art informs me, the 6th most “at risk” city in the world from rising water levels.

Cardiff At Risk - artist unknown Cardiff At Risk - artist unknown


I have previous with Cardiff, having been born there, schooled there and fled from there. It was a shithole until I left, now look at it! In the mid 00s when I joined Flickr with its global community of artists, writers and photographers I realised early on that Cardiff has some seriously good spraycan artists, so an art visit was well overdue. This is not a guide to Cardiff’s street art and graffiti scene, I am certain there is more and there are different artists and other locations; think of it as me sharing a snapshot of some of the stuff I happened to find and enjoy on one particular day.

My Dog Sighs & others My Dog Sighs & others


I headed into the area south of the train station, dark streets where we used to drink and play pool in the old Bristol Hotel, drawn in that direction not by an awareness of any art locations, just simple curiosity at a new exit from the train station which I don’t think existed when I was a kid. N3KOcardiff trans rights stickers Cardiff N3KOcardiff trans rights stickers


South of the station there was barely a single building I recognised but one thing they never change are the railway bridges so it was nice to find to rough and raw pieces on those familiar surfaces.

Past Jams Cardiff Past, Jams


Rmer1, as in “Armour”, stood out in my online remote appreciation of Cardiff’s street art scene, my 150% certainty was that if I did find any Rmer artwork it would be one of his photorealistic portrait pieces. I was dead pleased when one of the first tags I found was Rmer1.

Hoxe1 Rmer1 Cardiff Hoxe1 Rmer1


That tag was found on Womanby Street, a drag that screams “diehard 18 year old drinkers from the valleys” and most of the art seemed bar related. There was some good stuff and when you have talent like Dr Zadok combining with Karm and Rmer the result such as this portrait of 2015 Welsh Music Prize 2015 winner Gwenno Saunders is inevitably impressive.

Zadok Karm Rmer Cardiff Zadok, Karm, Rmer1


After a delicious humus and felafal sourdough in the indoor market a hired bike took me west the short distance to Sevenoaks Park in Grangetown where I found this enormous RIP tribute to deceased graffiti writer NERVE. The fragmented blockbuster letter outlines served as a frame within which writers paid their respects in a coordinated colour scheme.

Nerve RIP wall Grangetown Cardiff Nerve RIP wall


I couldn’t believe my luck in coming across this crisp, clean, colour coordinated graff seemingly painted quite recently given its pristine freshness. It was quite a surprise when a bit of research revealed it dates back to June 2021, there is absolutely zero chance, almost, of anything lasting that long unscathed up here in London.

Nerve RIP wall Grangetown Cardiff Nerve RIP wall


Nerve RIP wall Grangetown Cardiff Nerve RIP wall


One writer who's style caught my eye in that Nerve tribute and a couple of other spots was Elvs. ELVS Grangetown Cardiff ELVS


TIP: When exploring art in a new town, never take the same road twice. A different route back to the centre led to the chance find of a long extent of graffed up hoardings on the embankment of the River Taff leading to an entrance to the Rugby stadium. Rugby fans have to have something to piss against I suppose.

Millenium Stadium Taff Embankment  Cardiff Millenium Stadium Taff Embankment


Newer Cardiff Newer


AMOK Cardiff AMOK


Cesto Cardiff Cesto


Sepr Cardiff Sepr


Apart from strange spiky posts covered in furious tags, the pieces on the boards were virtually unblemished with little to no dogging or lining out. Close inspection of one piece did show evidence of some local beef, lining out had been repaired and the same taking out style deployed against the same writer was observed in several spots across the city.

A longer ride took me through Cardiff’s impressive civic centre towards the Roath area where spectacular murals and cobbled alleyway pieces can be found.

Lowther Keys Dan Green Cardiff Lowther Keys Dan Green


Helen Bur, Colour Doomed collab Cardiff 2014 Helen Bur, Colour Doomed collab


City Road ish, Cardiff City Road ish


Familiar artists abound though the art piece that excited me most was a My Dog Sighs painting in support of Ukraine in which the photorealistic eyeball reflection expresses the explosive horror or a Russian missile attack. My Dog Sigh’s painting went viral on social media in the early weeks of the current conflict.

My Dog Sighs Ukraine Cardiff My Dog Sighs support for Ukraine


My Dog Sighs Cardiff
My Dog Sighs


With spring light holding up well a random loop up the side of Roath Park then back west hemmed in by the Western Avenue revealed individual isolated art works are to be found by the vigilant eye.

Alex Pawson Alex Pawson


This mural by SPK dating from 2015, survives on a wall which has all the hallmarks of a building extension jerry built on top of an existing garden wall, Boris was a pariah among the righteous even before becoming PM (but you knew that).

SPK Anti fox hunt Boris Johnson SPK Anti fox hunt Boris Johnson


It’s the legs of the badger down the badger sett painted where once would have been a garden gate is a use of wall topography that amuses and impresses.

Boris Johnson fox hunt supporter - SPK Boris Johnson fox hunt supporter - SPK


They say one of the first signs of gentrification is street art moving in; I remember this cut-through to the train station opening some 35 or so years ago, seems Cardiff’s street art lags the gentrification :-))

Helen Bur / Wasp Elder Collab Helen Bur / Wasp Elder Collab


This trip to Cardiff was part art, part graffiti and part nostalgia. Despite no prior research into locations a random exploration of Cardiff yielded a satisfying quantity of art and for that randomness was actually all the more interesting. We shall return.

All photos: Dave Stuart