Supposing ... Subversive genius Banksy is actually rubbish

The Guardian, Friday 22 September 2006

Supposing ... Subversive genius Banksy is actually rubbish

By Charlie Brooker

Here's a mystery for you. Renegade urban graffiti artist Banksy is clearly a guffhead of massive proportions, yet he's often feted as a genius straddling the bleeding edge of now. Why? Because his work looks dazzlingly clever to idiots. And apparently that'll do.

Banksy first became famous for his stencilled subversions of pop-culture images; one showed John Travolta and Samuel L Jackson in a famous pose from Pulp Fiction, with their guns replaced by bananas. What did it mean? Something to do with the glamourisation of violence, yeah? Never mind. It looked cool. Most importantly, it was accompanied by the name "BANKSY" in huge letters, so everyone knew who'd done it. This, of course, is the real message behind all of Banksy's work, despite any appearances to the contrary.

Take his political stuff. One featured that Vietnamese girl who had her clothes napalmed off. Ho-hum, a familiar image, you think. I'll just be on my way to my 9 to 5 desk job, mindless drone that I am. Then, with an astonished lurch, you notice sly, subversive genius Banksy has stencilled Mickey Mouse and Ronald McDonald either side of her.

Wham! The message hits you like a lead bus: America ... um ... war ... er ... Disney ... and stuff. Wow. In an instant, your worldview changes forever. Your eyes are opened. Staggering away, mind blown, you flick v-signs at a Burger King on the way home. Nice one Banksy! You've shown us the truth, yeah?

As if that wasn't irritating enough, Banksy's vague, pseudo-subversive preaching is often accompanied by a downright embarrassing hardnut swagger. His website is full of advice to other would-be graffiti bores, like: "be aware that going on a mission drunk out of your head will result in some truly spectacular artwork and at least one night in the cells". Woah, man - the cells!

He goes on to explain that "real villains" think graffiti is pointless - not because he wants you to agree with them, but because he wants you to know he's mates with a few tough-guy criminal types. Coz Banksy's an anarchalist what don't respect no law, innit?

One of his most imbecilic daubings depicts a monkey wearing a sandwich board with "lying to the police is never wrong" written on it. So presumably Ian Huntley was right then, Banksy? You absolute thundering backside.

Recently, our hero's made headlines by sneaking a dummy dressed in Guantánamo rags into Disneyland (once again fearlessly exposing Mickey Mouse's disgusting war criminal past), and defacing several hundred copies of Paris Hilton's new album (I haven't heard her CD, but I'm willing to bet it's far superior to Blur's godawful Think Tank, a useless bumdrizzle of an album, whose artwork was done by Banksy - presumably he spray-painted it on a brick and hurled it through EMI's window, yeah?).

Right now you can see some of Banksy's life-altering acts of genius for yourself at his LA exhibition Barely Legal (yeah? Yeah!), including a live elephant painted to blend in with some gaudy wallpaper. This apparently represents "the big issues some people choose to ignore" - ie pretty much anything from global poverty to Aids. But not, presumably, the fat-arsed, berk-pleasing rubbishness of Banksy. We're all keeping schtum about that one.

 

Speeches Task

Girls:

Antigone

Yea, for these laws were not ordained of Zeus,
And she who sits enthroned with gods below,
Justice, enacted not these human laws.
Nor did I deem that thou, a mortal man,
Could'st by a breath annul and override
The immutable unwritten laws of Heaven.
They were not born today nor yesterday;
They die not; and none knoweth whence they sprang.
I was not like, who feared no mortal's frown,
To disobey these laws and so provoke
The wrath of Heaven. I knew that I must die,
E'en hadst thou not proclaimed it; and if death
Is thereby hastened, I shall count it gain.
For death is gain to him whose life, like mine,
Is full of misery. Thus my lot appears
Not sad, but blissful; for had I endured
To leave my mother's son unburied there,
I should have grieved with reason, but not now.
And if in this thou judgest me a fool,
Methinks the judge of folly's not acquit.

 

Boys:

Shylock

He hath disgrac'd me and hind'red me half a million; laugh'd at my losses, mock'd at my gains, scorned my nation, thwarted my bargains, cooled my friends, heated mine enemies. And what's his reason? I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes?  Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions, fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh?  If you poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in that. If a Jew wrong a Christian, what is his humility?  Revenge. If a Christian wrong a Jew, what should his sufferance be by Christian example? Why, revenge. The villainy you teach me I will execute; and it shall go hard but I will better the instruction.

Draft- Assignment 2

The Wasteland

The shuddering corpse opened with a shrill screech that pierced through my bleeding eardrums, rattling through my empty skull. The glowing embers that were laid in the scene left at me feet singeing the lifeless bodies strewn across the wasteland.

The pain-ridden sky had been covered in sleepy clouds. The city had burnt in hell; timid ribbons of light had floated down to the desolate barren wasteland. Why had these monstrous creatures set their intellects to destroy our coping society?

No one was able to understand why our race had been chosen. No rhyme, no reason. The human race had been nearly annihilated, left to decay by the superior Martians.

During the attack we, as the inferior race, attempted to gun down these magnificent life forms; hundreds of men died. Using.308 rifles and our primitive tanks they stood no chance against the superb machinery of the Martians.

The flames raged as if they had risen from the burning fields of hell, the spiteful anger watched all the people burst into flames; the night had turned a ruddy violet from the Martian’s destruction, it hid every child’s worst nightmare, enveloping the sky sulked above the smouldering field.

Every human now had to stand up for their right for life, most quivered in the other’s shadows while the alleged ‘brave’ ones went to fight: they never returned. Those that hovered in the back stood the greatest chance of survival, the humans had come to realise that they had to fight from the back-line, never searching for hassle from the aliens, merely trying to build society again.

Peoples skin turning red and blotchy as abyss’ ruptured through there skin, there screams pierced every brain in the miles vicinity, we stood no chance as the Martian’s murdering machines. I had looked up to the sky one night, dirt surrounded my face as the clouds were filled with ash, blood and death. Clattering sounds of murdering machines and daunting planes filled the atmosphere with purpose. I had sat there in uproar of the commotion. I crouched there, filling up inside with enmity and disgust of the travesty the Martian’s were causing. The planes were humans trying to save us from the destruction; there was no hope. All the planes thundered to the ground, in a matter of moments of being in sight. People’s blood turned into crimson paints as it cascaded through the cracks of the shattered planes. The bodies that had managed to tumble to the ground through the cracked windows of cars, planes and whatever other machines had surrounded me were pitched like rag-dolls. Single beads of sweat ran down my back as I had stood in awe and petrifying fear, silently gasping to myself at the destruction I had stood witness to those treacherous months. Peoples lives streamed out of chasms left in the guts, their entrails splattered like paint across what was left of the hell on Earth. The gruesome, grotesque world, horrified me day and night, the image still burns through my eyelids, I remember every second like I am still living it.

Every single piece of the life had ever known had been stripped from me, every person I had once known had been killed, they were all too familiar with the process of death. There had been nothing I could have done to save them as the heat rays of these ‘demons’ had conquered their bodies. They had taken over. Every body convulsed as they collapsed to the floor, no matter the age was no respecter, and colour was no bar. You were just another innocent figure in their path to destroy. In their journey of tyranny.

Every night streams of sweat flows down my furrowed brow as I cursed the hour the Martian’s had laid a mechanical foot on this Earth. I spent days in hovels and ditches hiding from the superlative Martians. The obliteration the Martians caused stood looking down on me for days on end. One night I had had to hide under a lifeless form, it drooped above my head, the stench was unbearable, I would spend minutes holding my breath, breathing was not an option when the Martians were near, they heard your every move and breath. I would shudder in apprehension, dread and anxiety took over my mind, every electrical impulse that was sent through my body was another second I dared to live with these atrocious beings existing nearby. Even if they’re one million light years away they would still be too close for my preference. As evenings passed while they were still inhabiting this Earth, fright and horror occupied every last humans mind, day and night, dusk to dawn and dawn to dusk. No human was unaware of the atrocity that was happening! It felt as though Armageddon was nigh.

Assignment 2-Draft

A Survivor’s Account: Living in fear

Death. Everyone I knew, my friends, my family, had gone through this process, but more painful than some. Those evil, cruel hearted demons who’ve brutally murdered hundreds of innocent people, taking mothers from children, husbands from wifes, families being torn apart or completely wiped out. Who do they think they are? Suddenly landing on our planet and thinking that they can just take over.

I cannot rid the image that has been burned onto my eyelids, the image of a child, no older than 5 or 6. Being boiled and burnt from the inside out, his bloodcurdling scream is still ringing in my ears, his limbs convulsing as he dropped to the ground as he appeared to be having a seizure. His horrifically pale skin was covered in purple blotches; blood began seeping through his once white, pristine shirt. His piercing green eyes were wide with fear, his mouth wide open as a silent scream escaped his pale lips. I stood paralyzed, in fear that the same would happen to me if I ventured out from the safety of the trees. His pale skin was beginning to turn blackened and burnt; parts of his skin and clothes had began to flake off and fly away with the slight breeze. His limbs laid still as I watched him draw his last breath. I stood there, as I watched his body turn to dust before these particles danced away with a gust of wind.

I began to run, sprinting, jumping over the tree roots who were trying to trip me up. I was no longer in the protection of the trees as I headed as far away as possible from the catastrophe on the common. I knew where I was headed to, the woods on the other side of Horsel where I spent the majority of my childhood making bow and arrows, climbing trees and making rope swings. I ran through the deserted streets, doors were swinging on their creaking rusty hinges, most likely due to the inhabitants in a rush to witness the happenings on Horsel common after curiosity got the better of them. The wind had begun to whisper its secrets to me as some dogs began barking for their owners. By the time I’d reached the edge of the woods the wind had started to howl at me, screaming it’s woes and problems to me. I ran further and further into the woods, recognizing the familiar trees I used climb and seeing the odd rope swing I used to play, those were the days where I had no troubles, no cares in the world, now look where I am now. Running for my life, away from my friends, my family and everything I had once known.

I sank to floor attempting to catch my breath, I gradually felt my breathing and heart rate slow. The gentle pitter patter of the rain hitting the leaves on the trees above calmed me, a shiver racked through my body as I realized how cold is was now. The rain was beginning to penetrate through the canopy, huge droplets began to splash on my skin and clothing. I reluctantly rose from the ground and began to look for shelter, a sudden thought came to me, there was a hollow tree on the side of the woods furthest from Horsel. I began walking in the direction which the tree was in, I knew this woods like the back of my hand. I collected some berries along the way, which were about the only edible thing here. The sky had begun to darken as I was walking along, I was worried that I wouldn’t reach the tree before darkness fell. I pulled my coat around me tighter as the wind howled harder and the rain fell heavier, I pushed my legs to go faster as I was determined to reach the tree before nightfall. These damned Martians deserve a place in hell for what they have done and what they have put people through, perhaps these things were sent by the devil, to punish mankind, but why Horsel? The people here are good and kind hearted, the complete opposite of these beasts whom have taken over and murdered the innocent people of Horsel.

I reached the tree just before it became impossible to see anything, I crawled in through the small hole at the base of the tree. I covered myself in the dead leaves and moss as attempt to keep slightly warmer. The events of today unfolded in my head even though I tried stop them. My future had vanished, I can’t be certain of anything anymore. I’m living my life in fear…

Pathetic Fallacy - Finn

The once resplendent Houses now glowed with the menacing, red haze of hatred. Hatred of the defilers that teared down great, gaping holes, ripping the life out of the building. But still it stood, before the weeping skies, a determined bastion of the old world.

Pathetic Fallacy - Eithne King

A rough blaze echoed the shape of the heaving walls and below the parched ground screamed  for the soothing splash of water. Twisting and twirling the smoke raced upwards in an eager torrent, colliding with tongues of hungry flames. Swirling clouds  forced themselves downwards, uniting earth and sky in a furious battle of conflicting elements.

Pathetic Fallacy

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