We’d like to thank Fever for giving us the opportunity to experience and review their museum quality exhibition ‘The Art of Banksy: Without Limits’ currently showing at The District Docklands until 3 August.
This stunning street art exhibition is an exploration of over 180 works produced by the anonymous artist including certified art, prints on different materials, photos, sculptures, installations, digital installations, murals, animations, mapping shows and more.
‘The Art of Banksy’ has been widely successful with more than 1,750,000 people coming to see it. After much anticipation, following the exhibition’s incredible popularity in Europe, the United States, South America and Asia, it’s finally here in Melbourne!
This is similar to Banksy’s own explosive career as a street or graffiti artist, acclaimed globally for his criticism of capitalism, conformity, war and especially authority and the police which he voices through his many forms of absurdist and evocative art.
The exhibition opens in a fake 2D cartoon style security area, which points to the superficial nature of security and law enforcement, much like his painting ‘Catch Me Before I Paint Again’, suggesting that they spend far too much time worrying about harmless things like art and not enough on real issues. The area is fitted with security officers sporting replicas of a ‘stab proof’ union jack adorned vest designed by Banksy and worn by Stormzy, holding cardboard metal detectors and walkie-talkies.
This, in conjunction with the centerpiece of the exhibition, a ‘Dismaland Bemusement Park’ castle silhouette, showcases Banksy’s prominent self-funded collaboration in creating the infamous 2015 Disneyland parody ‘Dismaland’.
Some of the 58 participants in this project included Damien Hirst, Jenny Holzer and Jimmy Cauty, while Banksy also produced 10 works of his own for the project. The castle silhouette in the exhibition incorporates many mediums used by Banksy including animations of popular cartoon characters such as Spongebob and Mickey Mouse projected onto its face as well as a short film in the form of a ‘Dismaland’ advertisement which follows a family as they take a trip to the bemusement park.
Ironically, Banksy has been quoted many times for having said ‘Commercial success is a mark of failure for a graffiti artist’, and yet he’s become one of the world’s most famous living artists. It’s thanks to his commercial success that he was able to personally fund something as huge as ‘Dismaland’ in the first place.
While he condemns capitalism he draws a huge profit from celebrities and rich art collectors such as Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt, Bono, and Chris Martin, and it’s this commercial success which has awarded him plenty of critics within both the contemporary art world and the British street art scene with people like Jerry Saltz calling him ‘Mr Meh’ and Jonathan Jones describing his work as ‘not real art.’
These critics express that they feel Banksy’s art is shallow and offers no subtleties. Put best by Izzy Turner of HASTA Magazine, ‘Critics hate him, artists hate him, yet his popularity and hype endures.’
Love him or loathe him, Banksy is undoubtedly skilled in what he does, keep an open mind when visiting the exhibition, there’s plenty of discussion and enjoyment to be had on both sides. And we hope you have as much fun as we did spotting all of the little rats!
The Art of Banksy: Without Limits is at District Docklands until 3 August. Tickets are available here.
