Jonathan Fleck

On Wednesday a group of us—Winnie, Allister, Coleen, Dale, Richard, Janine and I—took a day trip to Bristol to visit the Banksy Exhibition at the Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery. Here follows the first of what I’m sure will be a number of accounts from different perspectives on the exhibition.

(Group photo courtesy of Janine)

The journey was arduous, from meeting at the airport at 5:30am for a 6:30am flight, followed by nearly 5 hours of train, tube, train and taxi, finally arriving at the Museum shortly after 12:30pm. Before we even stepped out of the taxi, we were aghast at the size of the queue, snaking around barrier after barrier on a closed off road beside the exhibition. Printed signs along the queue indicated that we would have a 2h30m wait time for entry, which as we’d found out had been the case all day every day since opening on the 13th June!

Finally we entered the doors of the exhibition, and were greeted by such exhibits as a burnt-out ice-cream van with a huge upturned cone spilling ice-cream over the roof and down the windscreen, surrounded by an old, partially buried shopping trolley, oil barrel and road sign. In the same entrance foyer were a couple of statues, one mixing a classical-Greek style naked figure with a face-covering bandana and a suicide bombers vest, the other, a statue of an angel with wings, but also wearing a mini-skirt, and holding a tin of beer, cigarette and pair of high heels. Right away, the tone was set for an exhibition that speaks of modern decay and pokes fun at many of the institutions that impact on our daily lives, yet often are the source of great controversy. How ironic that Banksy’s work is itself so controversial. Often stencilled and painted on buildings, both public and private, most often done illegally and in the shadow of night, Banksy has attracted the ire of the police and governmental bodies. Yet the people of Bristol recently voted to keep one of his most tendentious pieces of public art — a naked lover hanging one-handed from an outside window-sill, whilst the woman’s husband searches angrily, looking out the window for the object of his wife’s affair.

Much of Banksy’s work is a humorous commentary on real-life situations that any one of us might find ourselves in, as much again is direct political statement. We see here juxtapositions of the queen and politicians with monkeys, immediately speaking of Banksy’s deep disrespect and dislike of these people. The exposition is not for everyone – much of the displayed work is offensive, some vile, but what is interesting is how this Bristolian graffiti criminal has risen to worldwide acclaim as an artist, able to attract massive crowds of fans to his first exhibition, as well as opening up yet another debate on the nature of art. In the first room, he has displayed numerous paintings, photos and murals, graphically demonstrating the aforementioned worldview.

Five riot policemen skipping through a meadow, holding hands and smelling flowers, another with a third world child with water pail in hand, wearing an oversized torn t-shirt that shouts “I hate Mondays!”, a painting on metal wire mesh of the familiar image from 50p coins—the original portrays Britannia accompanied by a Lion, and round shield, and holding a trident—the Banksy version replaces the head of the trident with a CCTV camera, a painting of a small malnourished child pulling a fat American couple in a traditional Japanese rickshaw, as they take pictures of said child on their camera-phone. Moving upstairs, the rest of the Museum appears at a casual glance untouched by Banksy, with glass cabinets displaying china, and stuffed/faux-stuffed animals, as well as other traditional museum exhibits. Yet on closer inspection, we see a lamb with muzzle over its mouth in amongst the other animals, and a traditional horse-drawn gypsy caravan, but with a very modern wheel clamp attached, and yellow eviction notices stuck to its door.

A further large chamber showed off a range of animatronics and other 3D exhibits, showing Banksy’s attitude to the practice of keeping animals in cages, and using them for food and fur. In one cage, there are some newly hatched chicks inside their enclosure, watched over by mother hen, but these ‘chicks’ have been rendered as chicken nuggets with legs, and instead of pecking grain off the ground, are pecking their ‘heads’ into a disposable ketchup container. A set of glass ‘reptile’ boxes show off hotdogs, salami, and other types of sausage, moving and wiggling around. As you exit the museum, you could easily miss the suicidal and drunk Ronald McDonald perched on the ledge high above the exit, contemplating jumping to his death.

So all in all, a really enjoyable exhibition and well worth the visit, despite all the travelling to get there and queuing to get in. It remains open until the 31st August.

A selection of photos are below – to see more, click here.

Video 1, Video 2, Video 3, Video 4, Video 5, Video 6, Video 7