Occupy street art

Banksy conquered New York in a month.

The world's leading street artist, Briton Banksy held a spontaneous exhibition in New York. Every October day, at least one work appeared in the city - these were not only the usual graffiti, but also installations, actions and video art. Banksy's action attracted a lot of attention from the press and ordinary New Yorkers - who sometimes tried to destroy works of street art or, on the contrary, began to take money for viewing.

Banksy also posted his works on his website and on Instagram, accompanying some of them with a specially recorded pseudo-art history - and through and through ironic - audio commentary; Most of all, the “guide” got confused in the name of the visiting Briton, calling him either Bensky or even Bambi. On October 31, the artist said goodbye to New York - unexpectedly in a serious way. Lenta.ru presents a photo chronicle of the October conquest of New York - day by day.

(Total 40 photos)

Source: lenta.ru

October 11. "Graffiti is a crime."

22 of October. “This is my New York accent. (...usually I write like this)."

3. October 3rd. "You complete me."

4. 4 October. "Occupy! Musical". This work, like many others, is part of a series: Banksy remade a number of New York graffiti in his own way.

5. 4 October. "Dirty Laundry: The Musical".

6. 4 October. Sandbox mafia. Musical".

7. 5 October. A rare exercise in the installation genre for Banksy: he converted a truck into a mobile garden - with a waterfall, a rainbow, butterflies. The audio guide commenting on the work is not happy: the artist "Bambi" repeats himself.

8. 6 October. In addition, Banksy also took up video art: in the work “Rebel Rocket Launcher”, the Mujahideen shoot down the Disney flying elephant Dumbo.

9. 7 October. “This object is a symbol of the struggle of a broken heart for survival,” the parody audio guide commented lusciously.

10. 8 October. “According to my hypothesis, any phrase will seem profound if you sign it with the name of a dead philosopher. Plato".

11. October 9

12. October 9

13. 10 October. For photos of this graffiti, local residents were going to take $ 20 from tourists - the artist posted a video about this on his website without comment.

14. October 11, a frame from the video. "Feeding the Lambs". Banksy rented a slaughter van and had it drive around the meatpacking plant for two weeks—only the animals inside were toys.

15. 11 October. "Feeding the Lambs".

16. 12 October. "Concrete confessional".

17. 13 October. On October 13, Banksy held the loudest action for the whole month: he set up a tray in the park from which he sold the originals of his works without disclosing their authorship. The canvases cost $60 each; now that their author is known, each is valued at no less than $30,000.

18. 13 October. Frame from video

19. 14 October. "Everything we do in life echoes in eternity." “Some criticize me for using, shall we say, primitive sources (this quote is from the movie Gladiator). But you know what? This hostility will only make me stronger, not weaker, as Kelly Rowland said on The X Factor."

20. 15 October

21. 16 October. During the week at lunchtime, fiberglass Ronald McDonald appeared at various McDonald's, whose shoes were polished to a shine by a living person.

22. 17 October. This edition of the New York Post tabloid, with the editorial "Catch Banksy!" the artist accompanied it with a scathing caption: "I don't read what I believe in the papers."

23. October 17

24. 18 October. “Do you like to walk through art galleries, but you lack gravel in them? Here's an exhibition space for you: just two paintings, a bench mat, a free buffet."

25. 18 October. “People ask why I put on exhibitions on the street, but have you looked at art galleries recently? They're full!"

26. 18 October. Word to the tongue-in-cheek audio commentator: “This is more than just another exhibition… Oh no, wait, this is it. In the corner is a cooler full of cheap wine. Keep up the gallery tradition of ignoring artwork and focusing on drinks." “This piece is inspired by the Occupy Wall Street movement. It is weakening, and we involuntarily wonder what will happen if all the main ideas collapse. But if the idea that all ideas will collapse collapses on its own ... Oh, well, this is strong wine, that's enough for me.

27. 19 October. Frame from video. Banksy turned an ordinary anthill in Staten Island into an object of candid art.

28. 20 October

29. 21 October. "In the ghetto forever."

30. 22 October. “A copy of the great Sphinx of Giza in the ratio of 1 to 36, made from broken cinder blocks. We do not recommend drinking a copy of the Arabian spring waters. Banksy plays with words: Arab spring water refers both to spring water and to the events of the so-called Arab Spring.

31. 23 October. "Today's art has been canceled due to police action."

32. 24 October. “For those of you who are wondering if this image was taken with the permission of the owner of the building. No, it was not".

33. 25 October. Banksy rides death in amusement cars. The audio guide comments: "This is a dance of death: the artist has reproduced the reaper of souls with as much care as he had talent for."

“Think about the fragility of being, about the thin slice of life given to each of us in order to leave a mark on the annals of mankind. Why are we all here? What are we doing here? Do you know that, according to statistics, one of you standing here right now will die today? Oh no, wait, one of your cell phones is going to die today. Well, it's still pretty tragic";

“They say that the task of art is to remind a person of his mortality. To do this, Banksy creates an installation of such duration that we regret that we are not dead yet. Let me quote the words of the great Wikipedia poet who once said…”

34. 26 October. Banksy proposed his own version of the slogan on the bumper: "The more f****stay you yourself, the more f****kov around"

35. 27 October. Banksy was going to "cover" on October 27 with an author's column in the New York Times, but it was rejected by the editors. In the text, Banksy criticizes the new skyscraper built on the site of the World Trade Center - the Freedom Tower. “Replace it with a better exhibit!”

36. 27 October. "Image locked."

37. October 28

38. 29 October. “The Banality of the Banality of Evil”, oil on canvas. Banksy's work was named after the book by the thinker Hannah Arendt, written on the materials of the trial of the Gestapo Adolf Eichmann. To the landscape of the unknown artist, the graffiti artist painted on a Nazi sitting on a bench. On November 1, the work was sold at an online auction for $615,000; the money will go to a charity helping the homeless and those with AIDS.

39. October 30

40. 31 October. A word to the audio commentator: “Oh… This is the last day of the show. And I'm happy to say that we're ending it on a happy note. This is an homage to the most frequent type of graffiti in the city, which gave graffiti to our era.”

“What did the artist achieve this month in New York? It is a shame that the exhibition did not attract the attention of reviewers. He told me: “If just one child was inspired to take a can of paint and draw something, then it would be a disappointment even statistically, considering how much work I put in.”

“Banksy argues that art should live among us, in public space – to provoke debate, to express concern, to create and remove masks. What if a temporary whim is not street art, but, on the contrary, the entire previous history of art, when paintings hung in churches and institutions? The world we live in is already governed - visually at least - by road signs and billboards. Maybe this is no accident. Maybe we want to live in a world made of art, and not just decorated with it?

"Thank you for visiting the exhibition."