Banksy again

Meant to blog this a few days ago but not got round to it. Banksy has an art show in a warehouse in LA, amongst the other pieces which includes a great graffiti piece of 2 older women knitting jumpers with slogans and a piece which continues Banksy's assault on Paris Hilton's 'musical' career, is an amazing piece which is an elephant situated in a lounge environment! The elephant is painted the same pattern as the flock wallpaper (aside from the ethics of painting an elephant...) I thought this piece was brilliant. Gayle informed me that on Radio 4 that morning the presenters were discussing why on earth Banksy would put a pink elephant in a lounge and they didn't seem to get it (or maybe this was fained ignorance?) - but strangely it is a metaphor Gayle and her colleagues use all the time at work - in the context that racism is the elephant in the corner that no one ever talks about and pretends is not there.
Apparently a spokesperson for Banksy said the elephant represents poverty - the elephant in the corner some people choose to ignore. There are pictures of the show at the BBC news website

Another Banksy piece that hit the news last week was he had managed to get a life size replica of a Guantanamo bay detainee in the enclosure of Big Thunder ride at Disneyland