understood and comprehended?

In the video we finished in class this Friday, “Exit Through The Gift shop” by the notorious street artist Bansky and amateur videographer Thierry Guetta reflects this discovered art.  In the documentary based on the creation and documentation of short-lived street art, Thierry and Bansky take a present motif of society and display it like fine museum art. What I found most interesting was the popular turnout to Bansky’s first big professional exhibit in America with the painted elephant. Many activists said that his display was barely legal and cruel in the elephants case but his exhibit directly correlates to the quote in “The Cave Painters” where the author, Gregory Curtis says “the visitors in the caves could not even begin to understand what they were, the paintings might as well have been invisible” (Curtis 48). There is obviously an elephant in the room as Banksy displays and people are refusing to see it because the televisions still shouting and the couch is too comfortable. The elephant is this case is symbolic for all issues people are involved in but refusing to face in their sugar coated reality.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2006/sep/18/arts.artsnews

The paintings in the Niaux cave of France were noted upon but never studied because many dismissed the works as frauds. If the teachers of science and religion had known that these paintings dated back before 1660, would the patterns of colonization in this age of exploration have been different? Would people tried to preserve such an ancient and cultural difference instead of melting it down and turning it into bullets or objects of their own wealth. The concept of art is ever-changing. Nearly 300 years ago, people would not have considered cave graffiti as “art” in comparison to 30 years ago, when street graffiti was not considered street “art.” Perceptions are adapting along with cultural influences as to what is considered art and savory to the individual and the collective people as a whole. In today’s American culture, a more open approach to discuss these concepts has adapted (in certain areas where power constructs do not cripple the people), there are growing interpretations of what is and is not art to one eye and the collective. Curtis goes on to say that the cave paintings “were not misunderstood, exactly; better to say they were not comprehended” (Curtis 47) by the people of this time until they were given an older date. Reflecting upon both Bansky’s work and those of the cave art, both modern and ancient influences of social and economic being are explored. Without the ancient depictions of bison, people would not be here today able to discuss the movement that allows people life and the ability to explore beyond their necessity. Bansky consistently shows this through his stencils of a collective desire of peace and his depiction of the world influx. Better to say that people today are understanding his art but maybe not comprehending it as to what it truly gives voice to.