Forensic police photographers huddled outside The Royal Courts of Justice in London on Wednesday. A crime had been committed. As photographers snapped photos of the scene, a masked man arrived to scrape off a political mural that was already going viral around the world. Banksy, the anonymous street artist whose career has been defined by the elusive application of political imagery in public spaces, had struck again.
The image, which depicts a wigged and gowned judge beating an unarmed, bloodied protester with a gavel, had been painted on the Queen’s Building overnight and left for officials to sort out in the morning. The choice of the site and the timing, only days after nearly 1,000 Brits were arrested for protesting a ban on the group Palestine Action, were unmistakable.
“The Royal Courts of Justice is a listed building and HMCTS are obliged to maintain its original character,” read a statement by HM Courts and Tribunals in response to Banksy’s painting. But if the aim of the Courts was to scrub the stencil mural from its walls and in doing so move on from the political stunt then their aim well and truly failed. In fact, in attempting to erase the artwork, officials accidentally created an even more haunting and lasting “ghost” image whose shadow serves as a glaring metaphor for government censorship and crackdowns the world over.
The reviews were unanimous. “When you try to remove a piece of art and accidentally make it better,” wrote journalist Barry Malone. “They can try to erase protest, but they won’t succeed,” echoed an anonymous poster on X. Irish rap trio Kneecap, whose pro-Palestinian protests led the BBC to censor the group’s performance at this year’s Glastonbury Festival, argued that the mural’s shadow befit the times. “You can’t wash away genocide,” the group posted on X. “Your complicity will always remain.”
Even the right, who have struggled over the years to embrace Banksy, both politically and artistically, found common cause with the rogue artist. X owner Elon Musk tweeted “accurate” when asked to respond to the politically-charged artwork. The mural appeared only weeks after the Lady Chief Justice, the most senior judge in England and Wales, said she has been subject to “increasing and increasingly unacceptable sensationalist and inaccurate abuse.” By painting the judiciary as the villain, Banksy struck a chord that united politicos on both sides of the aisle.
The Bristol-based painter, whose real name is believed to be Robin Gunningham, is no stranger to controversy. His giant murals, which recall the public practice of American artist Keith Haring, have captivated the public for more than two decades. In August of 2015, Banksy traveled to the West Bank and Gaza Strip for a series of guerilla artworks that protested Operation Protective Edge, an Israeli military operation that destroyed 18,000 homes in Gaza the previous year.
In Bomb Damage, Banksy depicted a weeping woman covered by fragments of an explosion. In Watchtower, Banksy painted children swinging on a fairground ride which is made out of a surveillance tower. In a video mocking a travel advertisement that was published after the murals were unveiled, Banksy highlighted the devastation in Gaza as a result of fighting between Israel and Hamas in 2014.
In the time since, Banksy has made waves for headline-grabbing works that criticize violence, surveillance, war, capitalism, and consumerism. But the mural’s erasure this week and the haunting image that remains occurring only days before conservative activist Charlie Kirk was gunned down on a college campus in Utah brought a new gravity to the piece, however unintentional. Though fans of the artist might argue against the association, the piece’s transcendent figure, an everlasting image of rebellion, is something Kirk and his ilk have always embodied. As with the ghost mural, Kirk’s rebellion will linger on and likely inspire millions more to take up the call of freedom in the face of tyranny.
For England, Banksy’s artwork is another thorn in the side of government officials who have desperately attempted to curb growing dissent on a number of issues but most notably the situation in Gaza. On the same day that the mural appeared, UK officials concluded that Israel is not committing a genocide in Gaza despite evidence that the death toll in the West Bank has risen above 60,000 people according to local health officials.
“Art should comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable” is a quote attributed to Banksy. The message in Tuesday’s work is unmissable. During a time in which the British government is attempting to suppress public anger over the nation’s continued relationship with Israel and unyielding mass immigration, Banksy’s mural on the Royal Courts Of Justice is a stark reminder of all people’s fight for speech in a time of austere government censorship.
Read the full article here
