HMV (His Master's Voice)
Mickey Snake
2003 Silkscreen print 35x49 cm
2015 Fiberglass, polyester resin, acrylic 72x82x262 cm
His Master's Voice is one of the earliest images made by Banksy, appearing in Bristol as a stencil in various sizes and colors, and later made as a silkscreen print. HMV is a modified allusion to the logo of the British record label founded in 1920 following the advent of wind-up gramophones. The original logo showed a dog looking curiously at a gramophone, listening to its owner’s voice. Banksy transformed the scene so that the dog, exhausted from listening, aims a bazooka at the gramophone. The humorous element to the work is open to various interpretations: on the one hand, it shows us how to confront obsolete ways to thinking, while on the other, it underlines the possible outcome of tensions over the aging western population; it could also suggest how to behave towards anyone who declares themselves to be the owner of something.
The snake swallowing Mickey Mouse, Mickey Snake, is one of the sculptures-installations presented by Banksy at Dismaland, the apocalyptic temporary theme park opened by the artist in 2015 in Weston-Super-Mare, south of England. The relationship between Banksy and Disney is ancient and controversial, the entertainment multinational has often been the artist’s target for its intent to involve childhood in the representation of a world of fable and unreal rhetoric.
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