Welcome (Gross Domestic Product) 2019 Mixed media 42x64 cm The work consists of a mat stitched with the word “welcome” using the material which life vests are made with. The straps supporting the buckles are sewn along the rear edging, so it can be used as a life vest. This limited-edition multiple work was done in collaboration with Love Welcomes, a digital company that, with a contemporary aesthetic, markets objects made by refugees in refugee camps, or by craftspeople in war zones.
fatal collecting/wealth dualism, Banksy demolishes this custom with new positions and roles in a world to be deeply rethought. The content of Welcome barely needs explaining: the phenomenon of migrations along the Mediterranean route, addressing those who abandon their homes and their domestic memory. Not limiting himself to conceptual actions, Banksy purchased a former French warship which he refitted to carry out rescue activities at sea along the critical Mediterranean routes. The ship is called Louise Michel, in memory of a historic French activist; its flank is painted with Banksy’s most popular girl holding a heart-shaped safety float, and no longer a balloon.
The work was marketed in 2019 in the usual surprising way: in October, Banksy had a performance titled Gross Domestic Product, renting an unused shop in London’s Croydon neighborhood to display a series of items, including the mat, in the window; he then launched a website called Gross Domestic Products, where the items in question could be purchased. Or more accurately, users could enter a lottery from which the people who could then purchase the items would be drawn. Some of the lucky lottery winners who had the opportunity to purchase the work put them up for sale to make a profit (and this is what happens, because Banksy sells his works to the public far below market prices). This work is from an anonymous, randomly drawn purchaser—not a collector but a typical Banksy fan. By breaking the
Brad Downey Diver / TV Girl / Toxic Mary 2003-2020 Hyperspectral photography, plaster, concrete, paint, light-box, transparency, glass 151x231x25 cm In 2003, Künstlerhaus Bethanien, a major German public cultural institution, organized a collective show selecting the best representatives of an art movement then gaining notice, which was to become established a few years later with the name of “street art”. Banksy and Brad Downey were among the invited artists. Downey, an American artist living and working in Berlin, was a seminal standard-bearer of this idea: the entire
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nascent street art scene looked at his work, which ironically and irreverently organized and manipulated the visual elements that make up the city, using the languages of installation and performance. Banksy also saw Brad Downey’s work. Although until this time his activity had been mostly linked to the stencil, after meeting Brad Downey Banksy was to begin using the languages of performance and installation with which the American artist was besieging half of Europe. For the show at the Bethanien, Banksy was given a small exhibition room, where he produced some of his classic stencils and three large Flying Coppers topped with the words: “Every picture tells a lie”. Several rooms away, Brad Downey was presenting certain installations. Eight years later,
Downey was invited back to the Bethanien to present a new project; the room where he was to do so was the same one where Banksy had worked, only this time it was painted red. Downey suspected that Banksy’s works were beneath that layer of paint, and the Bethanien’s maintenance office confirmed it. At that point, he decided to change projects. The one he was to present would be a reappropriation of Banksy’s works, presented as Downey’s. What you see here are portions of the Bethanien’s wall that Downey cut out in correspondence with the works done by Banksy in 2003. Banksy’s works underlying the layer of red paint may be seen through the images obtained using the technique of hyperspectral photography.
