It's a monument style sculpture. The kind raised with public money. I think that carries part of the meaning with it versus graffiti or some other medium. It's also depicting the blinded walking off the edge, making the comment based on both the figure and the form of the statue.
The ambiguity is part of the charm. Something that reveals more about the beholders than the artist makes for stimulating conversation and discovery.
Even the new positioning of the art on a plinth in some open space is enigmatic. If it were a critique of the powers that be, why would officialdom collaborate in propping it up?
In the UK there's been a recent spate of nationalist flag flying. Given the artist and location, "blinded by nationalism" is the most likely intended meaning.
Is it though? This can mean anything. Is waving a Palestinian flag the same as waving an Israeli flag? Where do we draw the line between harmful and productive nationalism? Who exactly is blinded by nationalism?
It is vague enough to appear deep to those trying to find something deep but not concrete enough to appear as anything that will stick in people's minds for more than a week. Unfortunately a lot of modern art is like this.
> Is waving a Palestinian flag the same as waving an Israeli flag?
Waving a flag is not a problem in itself. You can be proud of being part of whatever group you like and not hurt anyone. The problem is when the flag becomes the prism through which you see the world. Or, as the statue puts it, when you’re blinded by it.
> Is it though? This can mean anything. Is waving a Palestinian flag the same as waving an Israeli flag? Where do we draw the line between harmful and productive nationalism? Who exactly is blinded by nationalism?
Clearly it depends on your actual object-level position on the Israel/Palestine conflict. Or in general, what specific nationalisms you mean when you talk about being "blinded by nationalism".
And that's the main reason why I think this is a mediocre piece of art. Very few people actually are genuinely anti-nationalist for all possible human groups that have some sense of themselves as a nation. All anti-nationalist rhetoric is implicitly aimed at a specific nationalism that someone has a problem with - and also everyone knows this. So everyone wants to use the blank slate of bansky's featureless flag as a canvas upon which to paint a nationalism they don't like in order to discredit it. And I personally think that's boring. Maybe engendering that reaction was itself part of Bansky's artistic vision, but I still don't think that makes for good art.
Are you from the UK and know what the piece is a reference to? It’s topical and unpretentious and comes at a time where the country is splintering. Feels a like a bit of a distant midwit take to take shots at the appeal it has.
Splintering? You have two zombie parties that are really the same in different colours. Of course people are going to vote for other parties that seem more left/right wing. Predictable consequence.
He wasn't objecting to that. He was saying the "point" is about as sophisticated as "we should just, like, all agree not to fight wars man".
Personally I don't mind it. I think it would be difficult to convey well thought out points in art (the world is too complicated) and it's fine that they're just fun visual wordplays.
You wouldn't criticise a newspaper political cartoon for taking liberties with reality; these are basically the same.
Most galvanizing statements have been pithy and comprehensible to 13 year olds. The general population is not doing a deep dive in to something like Thoreau’s “Resistance to Civil Government,” contemplating the proper role of government, and then getting fired up to act. We need CliffsNotes, slogans, and visible art like this.
Actually it’s a great example of something different, where the person who was original and eventually becomes ubiquitous and groundbreaking and widely imitated to the point where it's hard to understand just how original they actually are.
There are many examples of the same thing: Andy Warhol and the soup cans and screen-printed portraits with different color backgrounds or Led Zeppelin and English folk hard rock songs that have hobbits in them are two of them.
Eventually, it's hard to even process their work in the context of how predictable and trite it seems to be a few decades later.
Maybe, but in 100 years, people looking back on the current era will easily understand the work. It symbolically communicates something about the spirit of the age.
I disagree. There's plenty of adults going around plastering England's St George Cross flag on lampposts to project their love of the flag (along with the not so subtle messaging that immigrants and anyone non-white aren't welcome). If adults are going to behave like adolescents, then the art needs to go to their level.
(I'm a fan of Banksy because he isn't afraid to speak out against the blatant murder carried out because of flags and nationalism)
He's also king of the "I'll criticize the west but I'll turn a blind-eye to non-democratic countries' wrongdoings". A trait shared with virtually all intellectuals and artists in the west.
There are fights worth fighting: for example there are 300 million women alive who have undergone forced genital mutilation. 300 million ain't cheap change. There are also hundreds of millions of people who applauded the killing of 1200 young civilians who were enjoying life at a music festival "because it's resistance".
Applauding the killing of young unarmed civilians, genitally mutilating women and turning a blind-eye to a regime slaughtering 30 000+ of its own unarmed civilians is where I personally draw the line and consider there are maybe more important things to complain about than, say, "the patriarchal western society built by heterosexual white men" or some other woke non-sense like that.
Now to be honest Banksy did art criticizing war overall, not just war started by the west. So a generous reading could consider that he also criticizes things like the 800 000 deaths during the Hutu vs Tutsi war.
But still overall: lots of balls from western artists when it's about criticizing the west, but tiny tiny nuts when it's about, say, attacking the ideology that is responsible for 300 people enjoying music at the Bataclan and then getting slaughtered.
But these people can live with their own conscience: I speak up and I've got mine.
> But these people can live with their own conscience: I speak up and I've got mine.
Not sure there's much conscience in Banksy making anti-national chauvinist memes whilst not identifying as any sort of nationalist, but there's even less in dismissing all criticisms of one's own society's treatment of, say, women because some other societies treat them worse.
For all that I don't think posturing graffiti artists are the saviours of humanity, it's difficult not to notice that the groups that actually are tackling FGM are practising Muslims and super-liberal NGOs (in that order) and that the people who raise it to deflect from criticisms of their own society are not represented at all in those efforts. Or are actively campaigning to get women's escape routes from those countries shut down.
Can't really lecture others on losing their sense of perspective about the magnitude of injustices either when a week ago you were expressing outrage at checks post history creatives depicting certain characters in LOTR as non-white!?!
That's a lot of imaginary flaws in imaginary people, with imaginary numbers as scaffolding.
The moral posture you're criticising is not actually a thing, I personally don't know of any Western intellectual who criticises the West but is fine with FGM for example. But it seems that the fault you find in them is that when they criticise the West, for example, they don't also add a list of grievances against all the other countries (but surely they'd have to speak for 10 hours every time they open their mouths?).
It's also funny how you take the 30,000 Iranian civilians killed at face value, but don't talk about the wrongs of the British empire. And you didn't even mention North Korea once. You see the issue with your reqs?
So how do you fix a situation, where one party relentlessly attacks all the time? Israel, does what ukraine does- a strip of death around the country- getting wider as the technology to attack it matures.
Are you making art to fill that perceived gap, or just lodging your objection to people doing their own thing? No artist owes you a curriculum of your design.
Oh yes the classic problem of 'the west' always bettering themselves. If they would actually start focusing on the rest of the world, maybe the world would be a wonderful place. Right?
Or maybe, we should look at the problems in our society and try to make it better, instead of just shouting into the void about things we, as nations, can't and wouldn't be and perhaps, shouldn't able to change?
There's a lot wrong with the world, but it seems not unreasonable for people to more strongly critique things 1) they feel they have some responsibility for or 2) that directly impact them or 3) where their criticisms are more likely to result in positive change.
What do you want the artists to do about it? Part of art's power is shining a light on something we don't notice day to day. Most westeners are against mutilation, what would the art say?
Art will always be about speaking truth to power, and that power will usually be the one closest felt. There's not much value in a swede speaking truth to Nigerian warlords.
You're being downvoted but honestly the "everyone is twelve now" meme explains our collective societal dysfunction perfectly.
There's no point to complexity or subtlety in art anymore, or even any kind of symbolism at all. Anything that needs to be interpreted, that doesn't have a single objective meaning which gets spelled out for you. Flag man is silly. Everyone is twelve now.
100%. One can't advocate for the dismantling of the Dept. of Education, the tearing down of "educational elites", and the wholesale banning of books, while at the same time crying foul when people say they have the intellectual capacity of a 12-year-old.
"Blinded by nationalism" I don't know, seems like a clear concise message that has relevance in today's world.
Why nationalism? A flag can represent more than a nation. Can be blinded by any "flag" / ideology.
It's a monument style sculpture. The kind raised with public money. I think that carries part of the meaning with it versus graffiti or some other medium. It's also depicting the blinded walking off the edge, making the comment based on both the figure and the form of the statue.
Since last summer a lot of flags appeared all over the UK.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Raise_the_Colours https://manchestermill.co.uk/the-men-who-raised-the-flags/
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The ambiguity is part of the charm. Something that reveals more about the beholders than the artist makes for stimulating conversation and discovery.
Even the new positioning of the art on a plinth in some open space is enigmatic. If it were a critique of the powers that be, why would officialdom collaborate in propping it up?
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Interpretations, in my art?
Seriously, this is part of the fun of art. Neither of you are wrong for reading different messages into it.
Exactly.
Communists are blinded by the flag with the hammer and sickle.
Teachers and doctors are blinded by trans ideology and its flag.
Examples abound, but wanna transgressor blanksy knows who butters his bread.
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Flags overwhelmingly represent nations, groups considering themselves nations, that were nations or have some kind of individual governmental status.
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How do you know it's "blinded by nationalism"? There are plenty of non-national flags which are just as blinding
In the UK there's been a recent spate of nationalist flag flying. Given the artist and location, "blinded by nationalism" is the most likely intended meaning.
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Well, at least he didnt blindly support islamosupremacism..
Is it though? This can mean anything. Is waving a Palestinian flag the same as waving an Israeli flag? Where do we draw the line between harmful and productive nationalism? Who exactly is blinded by nationalism?
It is vague enough to appear deep to those trying to find something deep but not concrete enough to appear as anything that will stick in people's minds for more than a week. Unfortunately a lot of modern art is like this.
> Is waving a Palestinian flag the same as waving an Israeli flag?
Waving a flag is not a problem in itself. You can be proud of being part of whatever group you like and not hurt anyone. The problem is when the flag becomes the prism through which you see the world. Or, as the statue puts it, when you’re blinded by it.
> Is it though? This can mean anything. Is waving a Palestinian flag the same as waving an Israeli flag? Where do we draw the line between harmful and productive nationalism? Who exactly is blinded by nationalism?
Clearly it depends on your actual object-level position on the Israel/Palestine conflict. Or in general, what specific nationalisms you mean when you talk about being "blinded by nationalism".
And that's the main reason why I think this is a mediocre piece of art. Very few people actually are genuinely anti-nationalist for all possible human groups that have some sense of themselves as a nation. All anti-nationalist rhetoric is implicitly aimed at a specific nationalism that someone has a problem with - and also everyone knows this. So everyone wants to use the blank slate of bansky's featureless flag as a canvas upon which to paint a nationalism they don't like in order to discredit it. And I personally think that's boring. Maybe engendering that reaction was itself part of Bansky's artistic vision, but I still don't think that makes for good art.
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Both Israel and Palestine are blinded by ideology. It is a very common failure mode for people.
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waving any flag and thinking its us or them is equally blinding. the world is not vacuum and to coexist we need to put flags behind and work together.
Are you from the UK and know what the piece is a reference to? It’s topical and unpretentious and comes at a time where the country is splintering. Feels a like a bit of a distant midwit take to take shots at the appeal it has.
Explain like I'm 13 and don't live in the UK.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48001630
Splintering? You have two zombie parties that are really the same in different colours. Of course people are going to vote for other parties that seem more left/right wing. Predictable consequence.
Splintering because some are going one way and others are going the opposite direction. Heading to opposite extremes.
The irony is that the statue is being guarded by the London police.
That’s not irony. It’s a pro-establishment piece. If it was a piece about migrants raping British women Banksy would be in jail right now.
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Heaven forbid someone tries to communicate a point with art.
He wasn't objecting to that. He was saying the "point" is about as sophisticated as "we should just, like, all agree not to fight wars man".
Personally I don't mind it. I think it would be difficult to convey well thought out points in art (the world is too complicated) and it's fine that they're just fun visual wordplays.
You wouldn't criticise a newspaper political cartoon for taking liberties with reality; these are basically the same.
Most galvanizing statements have been pithy and comprehensible to 13 year olds. The general population is not doing a deep dive in to something like Thoreau’s “Resistance to Civil Government,” contemplating the proper role of government, and then getting fired up to act. We need CliffsNotes, slogans, and visible art like this.
I think it deserves credit for being both simple and original.
So, you are 14 and you understand the world? Doesn't seem like it
They are 14 and in the ‘it’s cool to hate’ phase.
What truly deep art would you recommend for us laymans who enjoy Banksy's works?
It doesn't need to be super layered to be impactful?
Plus the execution is also part of the art.
Actually it’s a great example of something different, where the person who was original and eventually becomes ubiquitous and groundbreaking and widely imitated to the point where it's hard to understand just how original they actually are.
There are many examples of the same thing: Andy Warhol and the soup cans and screen-printed portraits with different color backgrounds or Led Zeppelin and English folk hard rock songs that have hobbits in them are two of them.
Eventually, it's hard to even process their work in the context of how predictable and trite it seems to be a few decades later.
You are the patron saint of "I'm doing jack shit except criticizing anyone that moves".
Maybe, but in 100 years, people looking back on the current era will easily understand the work. It symbolically communicates something about the spirit of the age.
Really riles up PE types and "patriots" though.
Either that or Trump supporters are easily triggered.
I disagree. There's plenty of adults going around plastering England's St George Cross flag on lampposts to project their love of the flag (along with the not so subtle messaging that immigrants and anyone non-white aren't welcome). If adults are going to behave like adolescents, then the art needs to go to their level.
(I'm a fan of Banksy because he isn't afraid to speak out against the blatant murder carried out because of flags and nationalism)
Account created last year, is Banksy your patron saint?
This works really well these days, when the average person is 13.
He's also king of the "I'll criticize the west but I'll turn a blind-eye to non-democratic countries' wrongdoings". A trait shared with virtually all intellectuals and artists in the west.
There are fights worth fighting: for example there are 300 million women alive who have undergone forced genital mutilation. 300 million ain't cheap change. There are also hundreds of millions of people who applauded the killing of 1200 young civilians who were enjoying life at a music festival "because it's resistance".
Applauding the killing of young unarmed civilians, genitally mutilating women and turning a blind-eye to a regime slaughtering 30 000+ of its own unarmed civilians is where I personally draw the line and consider there are maybe more important things to complain about than, say, "the patriarchal western society built by heterosexual white men" or some other woke non-sense like that.
Now to be honest Banksy did art criticizing war overall, not just war started by the west. So a generous reading could consider that he also criticizes things like the 800 000 deaths during the Hutu vs Tutsi war.
But still overall: lots of balls from western artists when it's about criticizing the west, but tiny tiny nuts when it's about, say, attacking the ideology that is responsible for 300 people enjoying music at the Bataclan and then getting slaughtered.
But these people can live with their own conscience: I speak up and I've got mine.
> But these people can live with their own conscience: I speak up and I've got mine.
Not sure there's much conscience in Banksy making anti-national chauvinist memes whilst not identifying as any sort of nationalist, but there's even less in dismissing all criticisms of one's own society's treatment of, say, women because some other societies treat them worse.
For all that I don't think posturing graffiti artists are the saviours of humanity, it's difficult not to notice that the groups that actually are tackling FGM are practising Muslims and super-liberal NGOs (in that order) and that the people who raise it to deflect from criticisms of their own society are not represented at all in those efforts. Or are actively campaigning to get women's escape routes from those countries shut down.
Can't really lecture others on losing their sense of perspective about the magnitude of injustices either when a week ago you were expressing outrage at checks post history creatives depicting certain characters in LOTR as non-white!?!
That's a lot of imaginary flaws in imaginary people, with imaginary numbers as scaffolding.
The moral posture you're criticising is not actually a thing, I personally don't know of any Western intellectual who criticises the West but is fine with FGM for example. But it seems that the fault you find in them is that when they criticise the West, for example, they don't also add a list of grievances against all the other countries (but surely they'd have to speak for 10 hours every time they open their mouths?).
It's also funny how you take the 30,000 Iranian civilians killed at face value, but don't talk about the wrongs of the British empire. And you didn't even mention North Korea once. You see the issue with your reqs?
The Iran problem is a good example: it was wrong of them to massacre civilians, but you cannot fix this by .. bombing more civilians.
So how do you fix a situation, where one party relentlessly attacks all the time? Israel, does what ukraine does- a strip of death around the country- getting wider as the technology to attack it matures.
Are you making art to fill that perceived gap, or just lodging your objection to people doing their own thing? No artist owes you a curriculum of your design.
Oh yes the classic problem of 'the west' always bettering themselves. If they would actually start focusing on the rest of the world, maybe the world would be a wonderful place. Right?
Or maybe, we should look at the problems in our society and try to make it better, instead of just shouting into the void about things we, as nations, can't and wouldn't be and perhaps, shouldn't able to change?
There's a lot wrong with the world, but it seems not unreasonable for people to more strongly critique things 1) they feel they have some responsibility for or 2) that directly impact them or 3) where their criticisms are more likely to result in positive change.
What do you want the artists to do about it? Part of art's power is shining a light on something we don't notice day to day. Most westeners are against mutilation, what would the art say?
Art will always be about speaking truth to power, and that power will usually be the one closest felt. There's not much value in a swede speaking truth to Nigerian warlords.
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This criticism would carry more weight if the people this statue criticises had the intellectual and emotional maturity beyond that of a teenager.
Unfortunately, they often don't meet that bar, so the message has to be in a form they can understand.
You're being downvoted but honestly the "everyone is twelve now" meme explains our collective societal dysfunction perfectly.
There's no point to complexity or subtlety in art anymore, or even any kind of symbolism at all. Anything that needs to be interpreted, that doesn't have a single objective meaning which gets spelled out for you. Flag man is silly. Everyone is twelve now.
Lana Wachowski has said that the Red Pill movement taught her that no matter how unsubtle you are, it's still too subtle for some people.
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100%. One can't advocate for the dismantling of the Dept. of Education, the tearing down of "educational elites", and the wholesale banning of books, while at the same time crying foul when people say they have the intellectual capacity of a 12-year-old.
"They'd be pretty angry if they could read"
> Banksy is the patron saint of the “I’m 13 and this is deep” mentality.
You are wrong.