Banksy, You are an Acceptable Level of Threat

Banksy is the closest thing we have to Che Guevara. Except, as far as we know, he’s never flunked medical school, shot anyone or attempted to foment revolution in the Congo. You will find, gathered lovingly together, in this book – the single best collection of photography of Banksy’s street work that has ever been assembled for print. If that isn’t enough there are some words too. Much to the chagrin of art schools everywhere, it is likely that Banksy will be the best remembered artist of post-millennial-depression Britain. His capacity to grab attention and deliver a message, often with a punch line or hidden layer of meaning would have landed him a great job in an advertising agency. Madison Avenue’s loss is our gain. If you’ve never heard of Banksy, this book is all you’ll ever need to read to be able to engage in pub table debates about the man and the legend. When Banksy started out painting the political landscape was bleak. Fortunately now, it’s ten times worse. So as Banksy’s cheerfully aggressive political work grows ever more relevant we take a stab at presenting his art in the context of the era he was responding to, looking at the issues his work was about. Make no mistake; this is not a dull history book or dimwitted collection of mediocre fan snaps. This book is designed to ignite, provoke and inspire you – and is a work of art in itself. So hopefully when Palestine is a free state and school kids of the future wonder why Banksy went to Bethlehem, it will all be clear. Banksy goes to Bolivia to start a guerrilla uprising and gets shot to death? Could happen. Jon Active reckons Banksy is both seriously smart and very flawed so its not without “doubts” that we do books about his work not least because of his celebrity status and abuse of animals in his installations. But we’d be lying if we haven’t been impressed and inspired by much of his work.