Last blog question for semester one- Banksy's work

Banksy's work, graffiti or murals?



Banksy is one of the most celebrated street artists of our times. He made himself popular with his well known ‘guerrilla’ art in public places like on street walls around London, Bristol. His graffiti on the West Bank barrier separating Palestinians and Israelis made him even more popular. His art has sold for record prices and he has a huge fan following including Brad Pitt and Christina Aguilera. But to this day, the exact identity of this artist remains unknown.
Banksy is popular for his various tricks which have landed him into controversy. His tricks include hanging a picture of Mona Lisa with a smiley face in Louvre in Paris and assembling a set of portable toilets to resemble the Stonehenge nicknamed the “bog henge”.
Banksy’s art is overtly political and often controversial. Unlike most artists, his creations invite criticism not only because of their subject matter but because of their medium - they involve daubing paint over public or private property.



He was born and raised in Bristol. It has often been rumored that his real name is Robin Banks and that his parents think he is a painter and decorator - but no-one close to Banksy has ever verified these stories. He is thought to have been born in 1974. Banksy’s agent is Lazarides who owns a gallery in London that sells original works by Banksy. Banksy’s website is managed by him as well.

Some believe that his stenciled graffiti provides a voice for those living in urban environments that could not otherwise express themselves, and that his work is also something which improves the aesthetic quality of urban surroundings, many others disagree, asserting that his work is simple vandalism or that his beliefs are not shared by the majority of the inhabitants of the environments that he graffiti. This political purpose behind his vandalism is reminiscent of the Ad Jammers or subvertising movement, who deface corporate advertising to change the intended message and hijack the advert.



In 2005 he placed subverted versions of well-known paintings in galleries including the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Tate Britain in London - they went undetected for several days.

The British Museum added a Banksy to their permanent collection when they discovered his imitation cave painting depicting a caveman with a shopping trolley.

In 2006, 97% voted to save a controversial mural in a Bristol City Council internet poll. It depicts a husband and wife looking out of a window while the wife's lover hangs from the ledge, painted on the wall of a sexual health clinic.

Copies of Paris Hilton's debut CD were replaced with his cover art and remixes by Danger Mouse with titles such as "Why am I famous?", "What have I done?" and "What am I for?" Some were purchased before stores could remove them and fetched up to £750 on eBay.

Several Banksy pieces have been painted over accidentally by council workers - most recently, a scene from the film Pulp Fiction in which the characters hold bananas instead of guns was erased by cleaners from Transport for London.


http://weburbanist.com/2008/09/07/banksy-art-and-graffiti-the-ultimate-guide/
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-559547/Graffiti-artist-Banksy-pulls-audacious-stunt-date--despite-watched-CCTV.html
http://www.toptenz.net/top-10-images-by-street-artist

Industrialisation and Art- week 7

1. Industrial Revolution and Industrialism

The most far-reaching, influential transformation of human culture since the advent of agriculture eight or ten thousand years ago, was the industrial revolution of eighteenth century Europe. This revolution would change consumption, family structure, social structure. This revolution involved more than technology. However, the industrial revolution was more than technology—impressive as this technology was. What drove the industrial revolution were profound social changes, as Europe moved from a primarily agricultural and rural economy to a capitalist and urban economy. In 1750, the European economy was overwhelmingly an agricultural economy. The land was owned by wealthy aristocratic landowners ; they leased the land to tenant farmers who paid for the land in real goods that they grew or produced. Most non-agricultural goods were produced by individual families that specialized in one set of skills: wagon-wheel manufacture, for instance.
The European economy, though, had become a global economy. In our efforts to try to explain why the Industrial Revolution took place, the globalization of the European economy is a compelling explanation. European goods in part drove the conversion to an industrial, manufacturing economy World trade was about making Europeans wealthy, not about enriching the colonies or non-Western countries.

2. Research Monet's painting 'Impression Sunrise'(1873) to analyze the work in relation to Industrialization.



'Impression Sunrise' is a painting by Claude Monet.
Dated 1872, but probably created in 1873 its subject is the harbor of Le Havre in France, using very loose brush strokes that suggest rather than delineate it. Monet explained the title later: It was displayed in 1874 during the first independent art show of the Impressionists (who were not yet known by that name).
Monet painted the sun as having almost exactly the same luminance
as that of the sky, a condition which suggests high humidity and atmospheric attenuation of light. The sun is nearly the same luminance as the grayish clouds .The orange color against the gray and the vibrant force of the sun against its motionless surroundings. Notice how the sun nearly disappears if you remove the color .This detail relies on the use of complementary colors and variety of color temperature, rather than changes in color intensity or contrast of values, to differentiate the sun from the surrounding sky.

3. Olafur Eliasson's 'Weather Project'(2006) is a contemporary work that relates to Monet's famous landscape.



Olafur Eliasson and Monet are using similar colors . Eliasson mimicked the sun and created a late afternoon scene, like Monet. He used orange, yellow, grey and black, to create the feeling of warmth.