Is graffiti artist Banksy being hypocritical with his "One Nation Under CCTV" art ?
Former street graffiti artist "Banksy", whose often witty stencil graffiti artworks, now fetch hundreds of thousands of pounds in art galleries, is being credited with a new wall painting in London, which appeared over the weekend.
The location is an "end of terrace" blank wall, on Newman Street, at the junction with Eastcastle Street. overlooking the rear entrance to the Rathbone Place Post Office sorting centre
See this map
The Daily Mail spins the story from the angle that this is supposed to be a secure parking area for Post Office vans, with a big fence and at least one CCTV camera (circled), supposedly guarded around the clock.
However what strikes us is the ambiguity of the slogan and the image, which seems to tolerate the idea of fascist / communist style mass surveillance and sloganeering. The figures of the private security guard and the dog (see next image) at the bottom left, are not trying to prevent the figure on the ladder from painting the slogan, they are looking on passively or with approval, whilst taking their own photo of the painter.
What is really annoying about Banksy and this particular piece of grafitti art is that he recently donated an artwork, which raised £195,000 at auction, to support the re-election of the notorious Ken Livingstone as Mayor of London, Hopefully the name of this anonymous purchaser / donor will be revealed in the election expenses returns.
Livingstone is a manipulative Labour politician, and an admirer of the Cuban and Chinese police state dictatorships, and of other terrorist supporting extremists, whose Transport for London and Policing policies have vastly increased the amount of CCTV and other surveillance, which is being inflicted, unaccountably and in secret, on innocent travellers and residents in London.
Ken Livingstone deliberately refused to appear at, or send a deputy, or provide any written answers to the Questions about the Database / Surveillance State issues put to the other main Mayoral candidates at the recent cross political party NO2ID Campaign organised Database State Mayoral Election Hustings on the 8th of April - he ended up appearing as a "Cardboard Cut Out Ken".
In that context, the location and timing of this "Banksy" looks to be supportive of the Labour Party surveillance and control cliques, rather than being in any way on the side of the angels, or of the majority of the unnecessarily snooped on public.
A couple more images:
The other Daily Mail / Evening Standard published image from inside the Post Office yard:
Another image, uploaded to Flickr by Hershell Hershey, showing the Britsh Telecom tower in the background.
Comments
You may disagree with Banksy supporting Ken, as many do. But to extend from this to the suggestion that his work is now void of any irony or satire and should be taken literally as supporting the 'surveillance state' is, frankly, preposterous.
Posted by: Blanksy | April 18, 2008 11:11 AM
@ Blanksy - The blog article does not claim that this artwork is "void of any irony or satire" - the extra irony is that the presumed creator of this work, Banksy, is one of the largest financial supporters of Ken Livingstone's campaign to be re-elected, and that Livingstone is one of the prime movers behind the Labour Government's Surveillance State, personally responsible for tens of thousands of CCTV cameras snooping on Londoners.
It is equally preposterous for you to suggest that the timing and location of this "political" artwork, in London rather than, say, Manchester or Bristol, during the London Mayoral Election campaign, is somehow irrelevant.
The CCTV camera in the photos appears to be a fixed one, with an infra-red spotlight, aimed at where the postal mail vans are parked, and not capable of Pan / Tilt / Zoom to cover where the wall mural was being painted.
Posted by: wtwu | April 18, 2008 3:38 PM
I imagine surveillance is an important issue to Banksy but other issues are more important and it is on those that he trusts Livingstone more than the others.
Unfortunately (but naturally) surveillance / civil liberties aren't among the top five issues at general election time - it is usually on the grounds of the economy and law and order, education, immigration and health that elections are fought and won. No doubt London elections are fairly similar.
Posted by: ukliberty | April 21, 2008 11:51 AM