Alongside works by the world’s most famous street artist, the show will also feature more than 100 works by other street and political artists, including a range of high-profile names and some from closer to home.
It will take over the entire Minories building, including two original Banksy wall murals in our garden, which are being lifted over our gallery wall by crane! In my role as creative director at the Minories, I am curating “Out of Line”, and as a Colchester resident of 10 years I’m excited to be able to bring this high-profile show to our city.
There are multiple exhibitions running in London at the moment which use Banksy’s name, but actually feature very little original work, instead favouring reproductions and blown-up photographs to create a ‘Banksy experience’.
This isn’t what we are doing. Most of the artworks are being lent to us by Brandler Galleries, who are based in Brentwood and own a huge collection of artworks by Banksy and other street artists.
But our exhibition will be different. Rather than presenting a who’s who of the high and mighty of street art using John’s collection, I have approached the exhibition thematically, grouping the majority of the works into thematic sections, and augmenting John’s collection with relevant artworks by other artists to create a rich and thought-provoking experience for visitors.
Some of the themes we are featuring are:
Street Art History
Tracing the beginnings of street art through works of pioneers including Shepard Fairey, Invader, Ben Eine, and French artist Blek Le Rat, who was the first to use the stencil technique so ubiquitous with street art now.
Symbols of State
Street artists work with the symbols we recognise - A flag, a crown, a corporate logo, a politician's face: these images carry meaning without the need for words. By placing them in unexpected contexts or altering them slightly, artists can immediately shift or subvert what they stand for.
Authenticity
This is a hugely interesting area for street art. We’ve included some fakes and some interesting stories in this section to really get us thinking about who decides what is real or not? And what effect does this have?
No War
Featuring lots of iconic early Banksy works including ‘Happy Choppers’, which shows a military helicopter with a cute bow, alongside anti-war images by Peter Kennard and ‘CND’ by King Robbo, made to support the campaign for Nuclear disarmament.
Alongside these sections we will also be featuring stories of dissent which are tied to Colchester, namely the Boudican Revolt of (AD60), The Peasants Revolt (1381) The Siege of Colchester (1681) and the story of LGBTQ+ resistance in our city.
These stories shape our collective understanding of where we live, and historically Colchester has seen significantly more dissent than most other places in the UK.
