Welcome to our article. Today we will try to change your vision of art
with a representation of two Banksy artworks. Firstly what is art ? We
will answer to that question and we will do a quick presentation of
Banksy. Then we’ll show you our revisited pieces. To finish, we’ll
conclude on the importance of Banksy’s art and activism in our
society.

So first what is art ? Art today plays an important role in society. It
doesn’t suit an ideology or an exact image, it is expressed in
numerous forms going from graffiti, sculpture, painting, music, and many
others. Art tackles the form of anything that stimulates the brain to
create. It works on imagination, expression and skills to prompt our
intellect. Art tries to bring out the beauty of life and highlight
important issues of society it conveys emotions and senses to the
public. For the artist themselves, it is a way to share a message that
is meaningful to them. However, one artwork can be seen in a thousand
ways. So art can by used for example to interpret social or political
events, and it is a tool to pass the message and or to take part in something.

For example, Banksy, an anonymous England based street-artist debunked
in a satirical way the society in which we live in through his graffiti.
He became famous for his distinctive art often with a political and
social themes. His art has gathered international attention and
controversy about art, society, and politics. We chose one of Banksy
famous art pieces “_ Little Boy Pulls the curtain_” It depicts a
young boy pulling the curtain back to show a wall full of graffiti. It
originally tackles the issue of government control and lies. This
artwork depicts some other topical issues, namely the curiosity
especially of teenagers, to always discover the truth hidden by the
authorities. Therefore this artwork also criticised the surveillance and
control of institutions. So with this art piece Banksy stands for
political rights and social gratitude. Indeed he implicitly promotes the
truth against dissimulation. It also raises a social debate: Street Art
! Through this artwork, he wanted to show that street art and graffiti
are serious arts, and this provoking art invites people to reevaluate
the perception of our authorities and it’s a reminder to maybe
challenge them! And with all the colors and the contrast between the
grey wall and the graffiti, Banksy created a kind of urgency that
highlights the artist’s message. This artwork went viral because it
became a popular symbol of art, it encourages the society to change. But
as many of his artworks,the painting is rich of symbolism and messages
that invite us to review our vision of the world. We decided to take the
picture of a young boy drawing the curtain to see the graffiti. This
image made us think of something hidden. The graffiti is hidden from the
boy’s eyes until he draws the curtain. After this we reflected on what
was something that was hidden from our sight. Something that we had to
draw a curtain to see. Our mind immediately went to the different
inequalities in the world, inequalities that are hidden from us most of
the time. In geography class, we remembered studying the image of slums
in Brazil which strokes us.

This picture juxtaposed the rich part of Brazil with pools and luxurious
hotels, separated by a simple wall from the slums of Brazil. This
picture showed how the image of Brazil is maintained as luxurious city
when it actually has a large number of inhabitants. This poor society is
just hidden from our sight. Using the app Picsart, we photoshopped the
image of the rich part of Brazil on the left side to represent what we
see. We put the poor part, the slums on the right. This way, the little
boy who sees the rich side opens the curtain to show us the poor side of
Brazil. There is a French saying that states: “_The truth always comes
out of the children’s mouth_”. Thus, the little boy is the guardian
of truth, purity and sincerity who, without judgment, shows the world
what is hidden from our sight.

These two artworks share the idea of a curtain in the middle, which
draws the audience's attention. However, the original piece depicts a
colorful graffiti behind the curtain, contrary to our work which shows
two different landscapes on both sides of the curtain. On the left, we
can see the Brazil slums made of waste and recovered materials. The
right side portrays the Brazilian rich population who, unlike the slums,
lives in big buildings with pools and tennis courts. On the other side,
Banksy's work only portrayed one colorful side with only a white wall on
the left.

In the same way, we revisited another one of Banksy's artworks. With
this work, we also undertook to denounce inequalities, but this time in
the Commonwealth.

We decided to choose “_London Maid_”, a modern street art created in
2006. It depicts the maid cleaning the London Skyline, symbolising the
tendency of the society to hide important problems and inequalities
instead of solving them. It shows the desire to clean up negative
aspects. This piece blends humour and social criticism, which basically
hallmarks Banksy work. With its distinctive style and powerful message,
_London Maid_ captives attention and prompts a reflection on a
contemporary issue. That is why we wanted to revisit it, and still
criticize a contemporary issue. Nowadays, the UK still get power in
their colonies, in a more indirect way, as Nigeria, India or even
Canada. They’re all connected to each other with the organisation.
Commonwealth Countries that aren’t ex-colonies of the UK could be part
of it but it is mostly ex-colonies that are part of it. The UK gives us
an impression that it is only a organisation that helps small countries,
helps their growth, economics and have a status in the world. Some
people consider that the UK only decided to create this kind of
organisation because they are definitely the reason why those countries
aren’t powerful enough. In a nutshell, we revisited the _London Maid_
to prove that the Commonwealth was a way for the UK to clean up their
mess when they decided to invade countries, and make them the colonies.

In Banksy's artwork, the wall behind the maid is completely grey, and
not painted. However, we decided to put the flag on the entirety of the
wall so as to draw attention on the fact that it is the Commonwealth
that is hiding Britain's mistakes when it comes to the colonies.
Banksy's artwork also shares the message that nowadays, our society
would rather hide its negative aspects than to take care of them.
Contrary to the original work, we put pictures showing the negative
aspects of the Commonwealth.

All things considered, we could say that Banksy's activism raises
awareness to common issues in the society we live in. His realistic art
undertakes to change your vision and to have a critical eye. His
polemical work is timeless, and the issues are always relevant. In the
same way, our revisited pieces set out to denounce the inequalities that
are never going to end if we dont stand up.

- Louise Coureau, Jade Denis, Blanche Lauthe--Perrissoud, Damilola
Ochala, Meryem Bellakhdar & Elen Grigoryan