Creative destruction
Sotheby’s employees display a famous Banksy prank. Minutes after it sold at auction for nearly $1.3 million, Girl with balloon began to shred itself in a device built into the frame. Renamed Love is in the bin, the “new” Banksy painting sold for $20 million just a few years later.
Photo by Jack Taylor/Getty Images
Have you ever worried about starving hedge fund managers? No, because they’re never starving. They may be counting their cash in a jail cell, but generally speaking, they’re well fed. When you think of artists, however, the loyal adjective that always precedes their arrival is “starving.” That wouldn’t be my first choice, what with that priceless BFA on my resume, but starving and artist are like conjoined twins.
The sad reality is that not every aspiring artist will become prosperous enough to move out of their parents’ garage in this lifetime. Colleges omit that detail when you proudly declare art as your major. It’s going to be right up there with astrophysics, job offer wise, right?
When frustrated artists learn the truth, they might take their talent out on the nearest cinderblock wall (think: free canvas) in the dead of night, which will eventually make them felons. Or legends, like Banksy.
The mysterious Banksy, the internationally famous British graffiti artist whose identity has yet to be confirmed, has been turning fine art traditions on their head for decades. He’s part political satirist, part philosopher and part Batman—rescuing drab, mute walls from obscurity overnight. In the world of guerrilla art, he’s Taylor Swift, but invisible.
Now if I changed my name and moved to Tibet to avoid a parking ticket, the FBI would have me in shackles by noon. But in almost 30 years, Banksy’s identity has yet to be confirmed.
Armed with stencils and spray paint, his artwork has graced structures around the world—from London to Venice, and even Jerusalem. He won’t design your company logo, paint your dog’s portrait or license his images to anyone, but seems OK with the millions of dollars his originals and prints bring in.
“You don’t have to go to college, drag ’round a portfolio, mail off transparencies to snooty galleries or sleep with someone powerful, all you need now is a few ideas and a broadband connection,” he told his last in-person interviewer more than 10 years ago.
Banksy has smuggled his own pieces into places like the Louvre Museum in Paris (move over, Mona). He’s even been known to leave his own commentary alongside his images. Consider this artist statement, left at the Tate Britain gallery with his painting of a countryside home cordoned off by police tape:
“This new acquisition is a beautiful example of the neo post-idiotic style. Little is known about Banksy, whose work is inspired by cannabis resin and daytime television.”
At a Sotheby’s auction where his Girl with balloon painting had just been purchased for about $1.3 million, the painting began to shred itself with a device Banksy had built into the frame, much to the horror of gallerygoers. Sotheby’s declared that “Banksy didn’t destroy an artwork in the auction, he created one,” and managed to sell it again a few years later, this time for $20 million.
If you’ve got a problem with that (or any Banksy prank-sy), you’ll be referred to the “pest control office” of the artist’s website, banksyexplained.com, for “shrugs and pointless denials.”
So if switching majors from art to astrophysics isn’t practical, take this advice for success from his book, Wall and Piece: “Speak softly, but carry a big can of spray paint.”
Jan A. Igoe has to hand it to Banksy. Art galleries can be pretentious, so hanging your own paintings and critiques can save you time and sanity.