When you think about Street Art you picture innovation and originality. I actually love MBW’s work as a whole however little to any of his projects to me are street art. When you look at more conventional street artists like Banksy and Invader you can clearly identify their M.O. However when you look at MBW’s work at a whole you can clearly see the repetition and the pop art influences.
One street artist that I have personally looked into is Invader: a French mural painter who has been to and conquered all corners of the world. His style of art is most original I have ever seen. Using small colored square tiles to form a mosaic Invader pastes up characters from and inspired from the game Space Invaders. This type of originality gives him his own style of art, which makes him a street artist. When you look at MBW’s most famous works: his spray paint cans of Campbell’s chicken noodle soup, Elvis holding an assault rifle, and Warhol like pictures of Madonna you can almost directly trace his art to someone else. While some people could make the argument that MBW is simply taking inspiration from great artists one could also make the case that MBW is just stealing from the artistic greats.
One of the major reasons I like street art is for the sense of anonymity that comes with it. The idea that some unknown prodigy is out there decorating the world with his visions and ideals because of passion instead of profit is what makes street art so much more interesting than other forms of art. Because of the anonymity that Banksy operates under it makes his work much more distinguished and relevant. Almost like some mysterious benefactor who riddles the world with great pieces of art for his own enjoyment and ideals instead of for money.
MBW’s rapid rise to fame was due to none other than mass media and global networking. Through powerful networking tools like magazines and the Internet MBW’s premier show was a hit. Without networking it would be nearly impossible for the thousands of spectators to have known about the show and Mr. Brainwash himself.
I feel like the documentary was similar to reality TV in the way it was formatted. The way the documentary went from a clip of action to an interview of the person back to the clip and continued was very much like reality TV. However because of the topic of the documentary and the way it was shot made it much less of a hit TV show and more like an actual documentary. There were several parts of the movie that were very shakily filmed and seemed true to getting information out instead of simply entertaining the masses.
While I’d like to believe that MBW is just a gut-less thief of ideas I cannot completely write him off as an artist. Some of his work is very aesthetically appealing to the eyes and while his work can be seen as plagiarism they do send some form a message out to the buyer. So overall I have to call MBW an artist however I don’t believe that he is actually creating meaningful work. Almost like Thomas Kinkade who paints amazingly beautiful landscaping works but has no further meaning. His paintings are great to indulge into but because of looks instead of meaning much like MBW’s work.
I feel like the message of surveillance and Big Brother watching us is a pivotal message of the street art movement. http://www.foundshit.com/tag/big-brother/ if you look at this website it shows one of Banksy’s more well known tags; One Nation Under CCTV, a reminder that there is always someone watching you.
I think that Terry had a very skewed view on life. I never particularly found that it was necessary to film my life so that I don’t miss anything. In fact I feel like if you spend too much time filming things and not enjoying them you’ll really miss out on life itself. Before filming he was just another storeowner in LA but after filming he really had something going for him. He was the first person to have first hand video footage of street art. This if he knew how to produce him right would make him famous. However ironically because of his obsession of video taping things he missed out on his most prized possessions: his family. I feel like he set out with the good intention of never missing a moment but ended up with his family wanting him back.
To me the lawlessness of street art makes it so interesting. The idea that people are going out of their way to express their ideals and ideas even though it could cause them harm speaks to me. Street art being illegal only empowers the strong messages that are behind them.
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