The urban artworks attributed to Banksy are famous for carrying many questions about the society in which we live.
They display messages with a high content of social criticism, either implicitly or explicitly, and are present in several cities around the world, mainly in England.
We selected 6 protest works by this contemporary artist that bring important reflections. Check out!
1. Love is in the Air (Soldier throwing flowers)
This is a mural made in 2005 in London. At the time, the British city was experiencing a wave of protests.
In the work, we see a protester with his face covered. He makes a move as if to throw an explosive cocktail, however what he carries is a bunch of flowers.
The image exhibits a paradox by combining a "violent" act with the delicacy of flowers.
The work was chosen to illustrate the cover of the artist's book Wall and Piece (2005), translated as "War and Spray".
2. Napalm (Can't Beat That Feeling)
In this impressive work, Banksy makes a montage relating the Vietnam War with American capitalist culture.
That's because the artist combined the images of Mickey Mouse and Ronald McDonald, symbols of American way of life, with the figure of a Vietnamese girl who was photographed fleeing the horrors of war.
The photo was taken on June 8, 1972 by photographer Nick Ut, and it received a lot of recognition, earning it the Pulitzer Prize for Spot News Photography and the World Press Photo ranking of Year.
In Banksy's work, the American characters are placed hand in hand with the figure of the girl in despair - after having her body burned by the napalm chemical bomb.
Thus, the artist leads us to reflect on the US responsibility for the suffering of so many people. More than 2 million Vietnamese died in this war.
3. Shop Until You Drop
The composition was painted in a building in London, in 2011.
In it, Banksy illustrates a woman in free fall with a shopping cart. The purchased items start to disperse in the air, as well as the girl's shoes.
The criticism of consumerism, and consequently of capitalism, is clear.
It makes us reflect on how the system we live in is unsustainable and how much we are on the verge of a collapse, but even so, consumption is stimulated and people feel compulsion to buy products and more products.
4. Guantanamo Bay Prisoner
Guantanamo Prison is a US military institution from the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base.
It is located on the island of Cuba and is known for its ill-treatment of prisoners, who are subjected to torture and forced labor. The denunciation was made by the International Red Cross.
On this mural, Banksy represented one of these detainees.
On another occasion, in 2006, the artist managed to make an acid critique with the same theme, when he took an inflatable doll dressed as a Guantanamo prisoner inside Disneyland.
He inflated the doll inside the park, and it remained there for more than an hour before someone noticed and removed it.
5. Stop and Search
In this work, produced in 2007 in Bethlehem, Palestine, the artist exposes a soldier being searched by a girl.
Here, he proposes a role reversal in a situation that normally occurs with civilians, which is that of being searched by the armed forces. The girl wears a pink outfit and represents innocence.
The Palestinian region is marked by intense conflict between Jews and Arabs, where the Arab people are exposed to extreme violence by the State of Israel.
6. girl with ballon
girl with ballon was held in 2002 in London, England.
In the work, the figure of a girl is shown who reaches out to catch her balloon, which is carried by the wind. The balloon is heart-shaped and painted in red, while the rest of the artwork is black.
There is also the phrase "There is always hope", which translated into Portuguese means "There is always hope". Here, Banksy leaves a message of belief in better days, despite all the dismay in the system in which we live.
This work is perhaps the artist's most famous. It was reproduced on a canvas and sold in 2018 at auction in London for over 1 million pounds.
At the moment the sale hammer was hit, the work self-destructed through a device placed in the frame, surprising everyone present.
Thus, Banksy performed another artistic action that questions the art market.
What is Banksy's identity?
This artist keeps his identity a secret, but even so, he managed to get his paintings to gain worldwide recognition.
They are usually works made using the stencil technique, which consists of making casts on rigid paper and painting with spray paint.
The English tabloid Daily Mail reported that the artist's real name is Robin Banks, and that he was born in 1973, but this information has not been proven.
There is also a suspicion that the name behind the pseudonym Banksy is that of musician Robert Del Naja, lead singer of the band Massive Attack.
About street art, the artist-activist commented:
People who run the cities don't understand graffiti because they think nothing has a right to exist if it doesn't generate profit, which makes their opinion despicable.
