I really like it when an artist takes on a public space and changes it. It’s not graffiti (they’re not marking space like a dog) but rather changing the space and they was we feel about it.
I remember walking down King street and coming across a “Designated homeless sleeping area” which consisted of a spray painted dotted line in a rectangle around a heating grate. It made you think, not long or too deeply but left you with something, a brainworm if you will. I wish I had taken a picture of it.
I find the work of Banksy is like that. This piece here on the left is on the dividing wall that separates Palestine and Israel. The image, two kids playing on the beach with sand pails and shovels seems pretty innocuous; but the image of paradise, peeking through crack in the wall makes a subtle statement. Brainworm!
This image of hunters, painted in what looks like Africa, hunt a buffalo created from chipped paint. Perhaps a comment on what was lost? …not unlike the wall in Palestine. Brainworm.
Anyway what got me thinking about this is another website I stumbled across. Site Interventions. This is a little bit of dry wit with some playful materials which combine into a pretty neat brainworm. Check it out.
