Friday, December 31, 2010

Bow & Arrow Balloon 2010

What does it take to become Banksy Banksy? Google

Exit Through the Gift Shop , incorrectly translated the wall Make , creation of street artist Banksy film is not only the movie you'd better go see instead of lazing in front of your PC, it is also a masterful lesson in art and, perhaps, sociology.

summarize briefly the film (here, those who have not seen stop reading and go see the beast because all I could say will in any case less than the cinematic experience itself, is as necessary as this summary for my purposes).


MAKE THE WALL! - Trailer VOSTFR
sent faiteslemur . - Short film, documentary and trailer.

Thierry Guetta is a French expatriate in New York obviously a bit deluded: clothes salesman Used cars unaffordable for the leisure class in Los Angeles, he spends his time filming everything all the time - a short sequence traces this obsession to the untimely death of his mother, explaining that smells good reviews from critics psychologizing Art piecemeal. Uncovering cousin to Space Invaders, a street artist best known for its mosaics that brighten our cities (see photo below, taken by me because Bubble Bobble rocked my childhood), he begins to film the street artists at work These nocturnal graffiti tagger and navigating between contemporary art and degradation of public property. He is particularly obsessed by the most famous of them, Banksy, best known for his paintings on the "wall of shame" between Israel and Palestine, its rats, its generic Simpsons (which is enough to earn him my total and unconditional sympathy) and some other stuff.


He finally meet him and follow him in his productions, including the installation of an inflatable doll in the shape of Guantanmo prisoner in Disneyland that serves as its baptism of fire after he refused to spill the beans served at the park's security, Banksy recognizes him as a friend. Having accumulated an impressive amount of tape, it attempts to mount a documentary Art on the Street. When Banksy viewed the thing, he sees how it's a shit. He therefore asked to leave the band to rework something drinkable, and Thierry Guetta returns to LA in advising him to mount a small exhibition - inspired by his models, he began to do some street art. The latter takes the word, and throws all his money and his talent for sales in a crazy dream to become overnight an artist that counts. And, under the name of Mr. Brainwash, it's going to happen.

My resume certainly does not do justice to the density and depth of the film, which speaks in the final analysis, art, and its commodification loss of meaning. Street Art is first presented by the voiceover as the largest protest movement since punk. What is in a sense: the works of Banksy, as slogan "One Nation Under CCTV" or even the recent pre-generic city, are indeed a critically important power. On the Simpsons (video below), not only the artist has understood the spirit of the series, but he manages to deliver a message more subtle in appearance: the commodification of the series kills her wonderful spirit (the unicorn chained ...). At a time when some complained that the venerable cartoon loses its strength is a formidable exercise of criticism and self-criticism that the show has dared to do (yes, I am a fan, it surprises you that much?).



But this emphasis critical problem. When Banksy is becoming a recognized artist, he is in power. Briefly see an image leaves a tag on the front window of a gallery where his works are on display: "Banksy sold" I've had time to read the subtitles. By becoming an institution, a reference, a name in the art world, Banksy loses marginality that gave meaning to his work.

My assumption is that he then realized that the critical capacity of his work is weakened, or worse, has never been as strong as he thought. Indeed, what does it take to become Banksy Banksy? That is to say what should be an individual to become an "institution", a name whose only reference is attached to a value? Here he is good - as usual - to read a little of Howard Becker:

Imagine you're Curator of sculpture in a museum and you have invited a prominent sculptor to exhibit a recent work. Sometimes driving a tractor-trailer transports a gigantic construction combining several elements of large industrial machines arranged in a volume all to do interesting and attractive. You're excited. You ask the sculptor to drive the truck to the loading platform of the museum. And then you realize both that the door is too small. It measures four feet high, and the work is much greater [...]. Finally, the sculptor, very upset, goes with his work ( The worlds of art , p. 51-52)

To enter a museum, and thus be recognized and have a chance become an institution, a work must pass the door. In more general terms, it must comply with existing agreements in the art world considered, it must be consistent with other institutions, or at least, with a number of them: if we can enlarge the door, it is still necessary that the museum floor supports the weight of the sculpture, the ceiling height is sufficient, that the public can move around, etc..

The lesson is terrible for artists to be revolutionary and rebellious, like Banksy, we must not undermine all the institutions of art. We must pass the door. In other words, to become an institution such as Banksy, should provide a little bit concerned, in order to enjoy the prestige and charismatic revolutionary who own artists, but not too much, or at least not all. It must produce works that fold to enough rules to make them presentable and appreciable by existing public. In the same way as the punks playing music on stage for three minutes. In the same way that Robert Parker awards high marks to most wines have a reputation and which subverts traditional hierarchy to a minority of raw ... Banksy's works have passed the door, they are also protesting that he would have wanted? The

second part of the film is about that. We doubt the real existence of Mr. Brainwash and Thierry Guetta: various commentators have suggested that it was a creation of Banksy . The fact is that his works have a serious deja vu, taking tics of Street Art unoriginal, and we never see the artist perform himself (he says all the technical realization that Becker call the "personal backing"). And he seems more interested in advertising (through use of the name of Banksy himself) and communication to reflect on his work. In fact, it was a hoax or a real Banksy lit, the film's criticism is quite clearly against it. Managing to become an artist based on nothing (except the capital accumulated from artists and journalists), emptying it of its meaning Street Art, the advent of Mr. Brainwash appears as a biting criticism of the commodification of art, the transformation of urban form fleurtant with the boundaries of art and the law to a mass reproduction of poster (Mr. Brainwash wondered how to make posters of unique identifiers as Banksy n has never placed any copyright on his works). Exit througt The Gift Shop "or how all art end in memory merchant.

It seems to me that this scene, whether or not a hoax, is primarily a way for Banksy to reduce the conflict that he himself can speak with the commodification of his art. And the film reveals, even in its construction in two parts and go back and constant between the commentary of the "real" artists and Odyssey slapstick of Mr. Brainwash, the habitus of contemporary artists (and perhaps even artists in general). Habitus made here in the sense of Norbert Elias, as a tension between the impulses and self. The artists seem the prism of this film, worked by a desire for radical - Drives - and the need to adhere to certain conventions - the self stress. And this first voltage it adds a second between the desire for success and ethics of refusal of commodification. Two voltages themselves in tension that make the complexity of the position. Thus, hiding his face, Banksy refuses although the commodification of his art, but bends at the same time former artistic conventions ... and makes it more audible with institutions that are taking the risk of commodification.

For artists, the situation is intractable. There they are forced to deal with these tensions, contradictions and all their attendant misunderstanding and misinterpretation of their actions and their works. The Street Artists works are ephemeral ... but they are happy in the film, someone films them and gives them a permanent ... but this is always the risk of commodification they despise ... but gives them the recognition they aspire ... There is no solution. And that's pretty good. This probably can give impetus to art worlds.

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