The Art of Banksy opens time portals and out flows the light and the dark. Pop Art and asymmetric guerrilla warfare on the streets.
The world’s largest Banksy exhibition takes up a month-long residency in Auckland. The largest collection of original and authenticated Banksy pieces from around the globe will be here on our shores.
We’re talking over 150 artworks, from iconic prints and canvases to one-of-a-kind pieces we’ve only ever seen online.
Curator Michel Boersma reckons this version of the exhibit is bigger and better than ever before.
The last nine years we have been working with collectors in expanding the collection, which we are able to display.
I am particularly proud that trusted associates of Banksy, for example Ben Eine, have been willing to contribute to the exhibit with their privately held works, gifts and hand-drawn sketches and video.
Many people know the identity of Banksy, and that’s just counting past girlfriends, but the western world is willing to participate in the cult of Banksy and preserve his anonymity, as an integral part of his art statement.
Is he an Art Terrorist?
Originally a graffiti artist in his teens, on the streets of Bristol in the early Nineties. Banksy could be pro-footballer’s name, or his alter-ego of football hooligan.
Using spray paint as his medium, he was always constrained by the police response time.
As I lay there listening to the cops on the tracks, I realised I had to cut my painting time in half or give up altogether. I was staring straight up at the stencilled plate at the bottom of a fuel tank when I realised, I could just copy that style…
He got caught a few times. Eventually, I Fought the Law and I Won.
The phrase has a long history in pop Art. An ex-Cricket Sonny Curtis wrote it. A Texan Bobby Fuller had the hit in a racing style, the best Buddy Holly song he never got to record. The Clash raged on stage with it. Lou Reed also deified it with his Dirt song off Street Hassle (1978), whilst pissing all over it and worse.
I fought the law, and the law won/ You’re just dirt/ The only word for you is dirt/ That’s the only word that hurt.
One of Reed’s great mentors was Andy Warhol. One of the kings of Pop Art and synonymous with the Sixties cultural revolution.
Banksy’s Kate Moss and Tesco’s Tomato Soup are direct steals from Drella’s Marilyn Monroe and Campbell’s Soup Can.
The most inspired steal is the image of John Travolta and Samuel Jackson paired, from Pulp Fiction. Black and white which changes Jackson’s race to white as well. They are pointing yellow bananas instead of revolvers. Velvet Underground phallic.
All Art is theft. Talent borrows, genius steals.
I am eternally grateful/ To all my past influences. (How I Wrote Elastic Man, the Fall).
Undoubtably strong influence from the original BBC Monty Python’s Flying Circus television series, absurdist British humour which was launched in 1969.
It was a lot more that that with its totally non-linear approach to sketch comedy, and ground-breaking work on graphics through the talents of American Terry Gillam (Brazil).
For many Boomers (me included) it was our generation’s Beatle moment. We became that sub-species of humans who were Python tragics. Forever quoting lines and sketches (Norwegian Blue’s always kip on their side).
Check out one of the smaller exhibits. What looks like a fragment of ancient tile and a crude sketch of a shopping trolley. The (even smaller) writing below refers to an artist called Banksymus Maximus.
A startling image of hunters on the African savannah. In the foreground are three youths who look tribal. Holding a spear and a tomahawk, and minimal flax dress. Stalking a family trio of shopping trolleys which includes a small juvenile. The spear thrower is poised.
This is the portal to one of Python’s most idiosyncratic sketches, the Lost Batsmen of the Kalahari. When the English cricket team come down to play a Test match against the Lost Batsmen. Instead of a round leather ball they throw spears.
I love the smell of napalm in the morning. It smells of…victory. (Colonel Kilgore, Apocalypse Now)
One of the three most horrific images from the Vietnam war is the picture of napalmed girl Pham Thi Kim Phuc. Clothes stripped off and suffering in anguish.
Banksy has her partnered with Ronald MacDonald and Mickey Mouse, life size but with plastic head and clown face.
The grotesque nature is heightened to a level of sadism. Part of the motivation of the Moors murders was a form of art statement through extreme cruelty.
I thought I saw an image of Myra Hindley somewhere. O wherever he has gone, I have gone. It could have been Lady Di on a 10-pound note.
Another similar iconic photo, this time of the three tanks in Tiananmen Square being halted by a lone student, fails to fire. The student holding a Golf Sale sign.
Dismaland was an exhibition Banksy funded in the seaside resort of Weston-super-Mare in Somerset.
Disneyland was part of my childhood, and in New Zealand the Sunday afternoon TV show was a hallowed watch, especially the cartoons of Goofy and Donald Duck.
The exhibition lasted 36 days, and close to 40 artists contributed. There is a video film and images from the installation.
Helicopters, artillery, sewer rats, police and thieves in the street, fighting the nation with their guns and ammunition.
Two elderly ladies in armchairs knitting. One is making a pullover with the slogan Thug For Life. The other has a blanket comforter with Punks Not Dead.
More than a nod to visual artist Jamie Reid. His most famous image is the cover off God Save the Queen 45, with the single large safety pin through the lips of a young Queen Elizabeth II.
Banksy has Queen Victoria sitting on another woman’s face, and a chimp with a tiara and a diamond necklace
Recent work with stencils painted on bombed buildings in Ukraine, have a certain beauty and charm amidst the devastation.
Banksy is a committed Socialist. That is why his simple slogans are his most effective street weapon.
Last word from him. The canvasses, the prints, all the “proper” Art I have made doesn’t matter. Only the streetwork will last.
Rev. Orange Peel
The Art of Banksy is on display until 3 August 2025. Tickets from Ticketmaster