It took me a minute to figure out what is happening in this video, but if you look closely, you will see this is indeed the work of Banksy. Hint: what is the dolphin jumping over?
Here’s more from Banksy’s recent work in the Gulf of Mexico:
Streetwise
16
May 10
Streetwise
“There is a kind of attentiveness that can be cultivated and deeply relished, and a whole secret life of the street that it brings to light. It gives to the human-made world almost the same kind of delight that the lover of the natural world (and I am also one of those) might take in lizard eggs, bird colonies, feathers, droppings, rocks, and lichens. It does not oppose the wild and the made worlds but conjoins them, finds their overlap and resonance, sees the wild in the made, pays to the rust stains on an old corrugated iron wall the same receptivity it gives to dewdrops delicately strung in a spider’s web. It includes but goes beyond spotting and classifying.”
From Susan Murphy’s “The secret life of the street,” Winter 2006
31
Aug 08
Alabama: forget Neil Young, here comes Banksy
Give it to Banksy, he is the master of ironic juxtaposition. Trouble is, it’s one thing to be provacative and challenging as an outsider, it’s another to live with the output, i.e. the community is going to deal with the consequences of this kind of provocation. Could an image like this stir up enough hatred and anger to cause real physical violence? Hard to say because we’re not there to see what happens. Everything has a context, even street art.
Via Wooster.
4
Jul 08
Nike recycles the real
Nike now allows you to photograph a street scene with your cellphone, which then can be uploaded to create a customized show based on the colors of your image, completing a curious cycle from street to the factory (god knows where and under what conditions) and then sent back you for more street action. This is hard to classify because it’s a hybrid of corporate DIY injected with street culture. Given that Nike is really an image company more than a maker of shoes (the company produces advertising, the shoes are made elsewhere), this seems to be another effort gain street cred by remediating the street (as is the case of incorporating new, extreme sports into its campaigns). Now, it would be fun to see shoes made with the colors of sweatshop walls!
9
May 08
Is it guerrilla gardening or guerilla marketing?
File this one under WTF. Adidas finds a safe rebellion to latch onto to give it some street cred by creating a little action movie about rebel gardeners with GPS, night vision and an assortment of other TV crime show devices. Notice the quasi-’70s-era bongo suspense music. Thing is, gardens take nurturing, building and developing their niches, in other words, an ecological context. Additionally, what about starting a *community* garden? In this case I at least hope once they plant these beautiful set pieces that someone will water them!
Sadly, as much as I think guerrilla gardening is a cool action worth promoting, the ad is so trite and contrived I think most that would potentially be inspired by the idea will see through Adidas’ ploy as yet another tactic to equate fashion with revolution. Rather than pass itself off as a device for urban rebellion, just sell the damn product for what it is: a shoe! And stop pretending your dumb-ass sneakers are a tool for social transformation.
Still in case you are enthused, here’s a link to a nonpartison group, Guerilla Gardening, which may inspire you to do your own action (with or without corporate sponsorship).
And not to disappoint, there are a number of DIY books on how to start your own urban (gardening) revolution:
“On Guerrilla Gardening: A Handbook for Gardening Without Boundaries” (Richard Reynolds)
“Guerrilla Gardening: A Manualfesto” (David Tracey)
“Guerrilla Gardening: How to Create Gorgeous Gardens for Free” (Barbara Pallenberg)
17
Apr 08
Inspiring portrait
I beautiful little documentary about a great artist who creates urban portraits in chalk.
6
Feb 08
Fastfood caveman
Banksy strikes again. One criticism though – with a diet like that I doubt his body would be so fit!
(Via +KN | Kitsune Noir » Banksy’s New Fast Food Caveman)
Technorati Tags: Banksy
6
Jan 08
The year is (street art) pictures
The votes are in. Streetsy has posted the most popular photos of street art in 2007. The winner is……
“muck on ludlow”
But I like this one the best:
“unknown, nolita”
Technorati Tags: streetsy
3
Dec 07
Street life in Rome
Some photos documenting my obsession with street art. This set is from the streets of Rome.
14
Oct 07
Bombing Modernism
OK NSA filters, here’s the innocuous headline translation: marking-up modernist architecture. Strange how artistic expression could be interpreted as terrorism. Imagine how in the post-9/11 world a band like Einstürzende Neubauten (“Collapsing New Buildings”) would be misconstrued. It wouldn’t surprising me if certain government elements in their enthusiasm to define everything under the murky rubric of terrorism would classify the destruction of private property as an act of terror. Maybe they have and it was slipped in at the dead of night in the most recent intelligence oversight bill. One can never be sure.
Anyhow, this little side rant was inspired by the great article that I stumbled upon by Amos Klausner snipped below. It has nothing to do with terrorism, but with the curious way that graffiti dialogues with modernism. After the riots in Paris last year there was some grumbling that one of the primary causes of youth discontent was the design of the suburban projects. The architecture had a way of imposing an alienating social structure that made it easy for gangs to control the communities that inhabited the buildings.
I’m in love with the idea that the street remains one of the last pubic free-for-all zones where media and social control can be contested by an anonymous swarm.
Core77 – Bombing Modernism: Graffiti and its relationship to the (built) environment:
It’s easy to see how a generation of restless teenagers growing up in high-rise and low-rise ghettos doubted and eventually rejected modernism and its oppressive reality. For them, modernism represented systemic irrationality, negativity, half truths, poor education, and limited access to economic empowerment. However, when a self-aware subculture rose out of the urban core to embrace plurality, fragmentation, and indeterminacy, something clicked. In retaliation they shaped an honest reflection of their lives from a fundamentally post-modern lens that pitted them against larger forces that had denied them individual value and cultural identity. Adventurous teens did this with no capital and no organizational power. They fought back with one of the few things they could control, words.
9
Sep 07
Streetwise
“You want information? Take a look at this city, Maya. The graffiti on the walls, the crazy shit the bums and crackheads and wild kids come out with. This is the underground data exchange; the infranet. The city is the hardware and the people are the software.”
Coyote in Grant Morrison’s The Invisibles
“The street has its own uses for technology.”
William Gibson, Neuromancer
Via The Daily Galaxy
