PARIS: British graffiti artist Banksy, known for his politically charged sketches on walls from London to New York to Gaza City, has descended on Paris, painting a series of murals that are sparking debate among residents and tourists.
The satirical images, tackling issues such as migration and poverty, began popping up late last month. The secretive artist has since posted photographs of them on his Instagram account and added comments, confirming his authorship.
One mural, on a street in northern Paris where migrants often sleep rough, shows a black girl spray-painting pink wallpaper over a swastika. The painting has since been defaced to make it look like she is drawing the swastika herself.
Others depict rats, a common Banksy motif, including one flying through the air on the back of a champagne cork, and a pair walking under a parasol near the Eiffel Tower.
One of the most provocative, painted near the Sorbonne, on the trendy Left Bank, shows a stern man with a hand-saw hidden behind his back offering a bone to a pleading dog that has had part of its front leg sawn off.
Vincent, the director of an art foundation in Paris, stopped to take a picture as he headed for lunch.
“This painting is of an unspeakable cruelty which is representative of the times in which we live, times of wantons,” said the 49-year-old.
“The man’s stare is empty and cold, while the dog is weak and full of humanity. I think it is a clear representation of the European context and the migration crisis.”
This year marks the 50th anniversary of the May 1968 uprisings, when French students and unionists mounted violent protests across Paris and its surrounding area, bringing much of the country to a standstill for weeks.
Referencing the anniversary, Banksy painted a picture of a rat holding a stencil pen and wearing a bandana over its face on the side of a building near the Pompidou Center. Another showed a rat dressed as Mini Mouse perched on the numbers 1968.
While two of the nine murals have been defaced, most of the others have been covered by plexiglass to protect them.
Banksy concluded his series with a mural on an emergency escape door to the Bataclan, the music venue where 89 people were shot dead by Islamist militants in November 2015.
The image depicts a woman in mourning, wearing what looks like a hijab, the head scarf worn by Muslim women, although the picture also has echoes of Mother Theresa.
“This one is my favorite,” said an American tourist. “I can feel that her sadness is deep and palpable.”
Banksy’s subversive art draws tourists and locals in Paris
Banksy’s subversive art draws tourists and locals in Paris
English museum shines light on Mary Shelley and her Gothic classic ‘Frankenstein’
- Museum in English city of Bath celebrates work of Mary Shelley
BATH: On a window of a Bath townhouse, one of the southwestern English city’s most famous residents looks out at passersby. Inside is Mary Shelley’s House of Frankenstein, a museum dedicated to the writer and her Gothic novel, published in 1818, which has inspired numerous screen adaptations, with the latest being Mexican filmmaker Guillermo del Toro’s Oscar contender.
“‘Frankenstein’ is regarded as one of the most important books in English literature ... It’s the world’s first science fiction novel,” said Chris Harris, co-founder and director of the immersive attraction.
“It’s a very modern story ... he’s trying to fit in, but he’s abandoned ... and rejected and has prejudice thrown toward him. And you think, well, from prejudice comes violence, which is happening nowadays.”
‘FEAR ABOUT CHANGE’
Born Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin, Shelley came up with the idea for “Frankenstein; or, the Modern Prometheus” at 18 years old. She and her future husband, poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, were staying by Lake Geneva in 1816 with Lord Byron when the latter challenged their group to write a ghost story. She found inspiration there.
Back in England, she moved to Bath, where she penned key chapters before finishing the book — about the scientist Victor Frankenstein, who brings to life a creature assembled from body parts — in the town of Marlow.
“It plays on people’s fears about change,” Harris said. “Now Frankenstein is a metaphor for anything we’re scared of.”
The first “Frankenstein” adaptation was a musical, he said.
“The Creature in her book is sensitive, he talks ... but in the play, he was rendered into a monster. He didn’t talk, he was mute. He just went around killing people,” Harris said.
“So, right from the off, he’s been sort of invented in a slightly different way. And that’s happened all the way through the evolution of film and theater ... So it’s interesting to see del Toro’s film; they’re exploring a different side of him.”
OSCAR AND BAFTA NOMINATIONS
That film, with nine Oscar nominations including best picture, shows actor Jacob Elordi’s Creature as gentle and hungry for knowledge but facing resentment. Elordi received Best Supporting Actor nods at the Oscars and Sunday’s BAFTA Film Awards, Britain’s top movie honors, where “Frankenstein” has eight nominations.
While del Toro’s movie differs from the book in several ways, including omitting the Creature’s murders, Harris said physically it was “a similar recreation” of Shelley’s description.
The museum has its own animatronic, standing in Victor Frankenstein’s recreated laboratory. Elsewhere, visitors learn about Shelley’s life, tragedies she faced and her interest in science.
Nearby, by Bath Abbey, is a 2018 plaque marking where Shelley lived in 1816-1817 and worked on the book. Bath is also associated with another female novelist, Jane Austen, who is celebrated annually with a festival. Harris, who opened his museum in 2021, says Shelley deserves more recognition.
“We just want people to understand that this is an extraordinary young woman who came up with one of the most enduring books ever written, that will never go out of fashion.”
