Banksy: Vandalism or Art?

 by Indie Stone

Although street ‘art’ like graffiti is depicted as being ‘vandalism’ or a ‘crime’, this doesn’t really apply to the well-known street artist, Banksy. The reason I say this is because his pieces of work aren’t the sort of thing that a gang of teenagers all dressed in black illegally writing obscenities on the side of public buildings in the dead of night do. No, Banksy is different - he uses spray paint in a way that has never been seen before, a way in which he can pass over a very simple message in such a clever and inventive form. Some of this wall art is nothing more than a funny joke, like making fun of famous people or things that are disliked in society, or they could be much more serious and have a more profound meaning behind them. He can get away with all of these things as his true identity is unknown. All that we know is that he works and lives in Bristol and goes by the name of Banksy.

One of his earlier, most well-known symbols in his art is that of portraying rats - rats are disliked everywhere: they are dirty, smelly, carry diseases and have sharp, razor like teeth that can bite through anything. These are like the poor and homeless people in the world; they are disliked, dirty, useless, meaningless and partly excluded from the rest of the world. The thing is, Banksy does this in a clever old way.  See, anyone could just rock up to the side of a town hall and paint some rats there and write, “We will fight back!” or “End homelessness!” or something similar to that, but Banksy would approach using a different perspective - he would think this out. His is a form of protest art. Using no words, no swearing or anything of that sort, Banksy thinks outside the box and uses art to make us think and through his pictures, opens up conversations about deforestation, climate change, the middle east, anti-war and anti capitalism.  All in a few flicks of his spray can.