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Bodie Priddy

Instructor Sarah Haak

English 1510

14, September 2017

Visual Analysis: Banksys Flower Thrower

The picture I chose to do will be the flower thrower from the amazing artists Banksys.

An author known for his random, yet highly sophisticated political graphitic images that are

always a perspective of their political views and has gained quite following of people. The image

is known by many names but for this we are going to call it The Peace and Love Vandalizer.

The image is more than likely on a public place we can deduct this by the fact Banksys images

are usually in a public place or at least thats what we can draw from because it would be odd for

an artist trying to get their point across to put their art somewhere no one would see it.

In a world of chaos and total animosity towards our fellow human this work of art is an

anomaly all in itself. This work of art feels lovely in a hostile way, what I mean by this is it

depicts a gang member holding a beautiful bouquet of flowers that add such a beautiful contrast

all together. Some would even say paradoxical the vividly colored flowers clash against the

bland and grainy looks of the black on yellow against the wall. The young thugs image is

blotchy and very grainy giving it a tough look compared to the smooth tone of the wall behind

him. This in itself may have been what Banksy had wanted from the start. That no matter how far

we fall as humans there isnt a point of no return. This point of view is due to the fact that most

gang members are always categorized as mean, tough, and unloving people but that is societys

view on it. We find that the lovilizers eyes are almost non-existent, maybe that was also an

intentional feature to show how blind the publics eye is to the world around this gang members
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eyes. The most questionable feature is that normally you wouldnt ever catch a gang member

menacingly throwing a Bouquet of flowers as if was a Molotov meant to do any damage of any

sort. The mans jeans are all white and blotchy most likely due to a stencil like effect spray has if

you use a stencil when drawing artwork. The man has a bandana over the half of his face that

cover his lower mandible and most of his nose. We can infer this is so they may stay anonymous

or this is just meant to resemble the stereotypical view of the average gangster or punk.

Now we progress towards the core of what Banksy was trying to get us to understand.

Someone may be able to notice the fact that there is a grid like pattern on the overall art this

could be a reference to society and how we all have a place that should perfectly fit and operate

together like a giant institutional machine designed to have no flaws, be fair, and most

importantly be precise. The more likely reason may be that whoever had created this work of art

had used stencils and could have possibly did it in perfect squares that aligned all together. It has

a definite feeling of overall grainy almost overuse like the stereotypes people like to put others

in. The picture gives the visualization of calm in the chaos since the man holds the flowers

instead of a weapon or object of destruction. The side of which the man is holding the flowers is

lighter with a dark undertone possibly to represent that there is good in all evil. We see in the

picture he is looking off into the distance at some type of goal or destination for the flowers to go

possibly to a foe he wishes to make peace with or to a loved one who deserves this love.

Seeing how this image overall contrasts itself and makes it out to be almost paradoxical

its agreeable that there happen to be some binary opposition. You notice that the man is almost a

yin and yang symbolization in the aspect is the half with the flowers is of lighter color than the

side without the flowers, we can assume that this is the mans good side considering its the

side that have the harmless bouquet of flowers that he is preparing to throw. The side without
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anything is the mans dark side this is possibly his opposite side but without a doubt this is in

opposition to his lighter side with the friendly item in it this is the two images that the society

has. The background and foreground clash simply because the back is all white while the

foreground is dark due to the mans presence. They clash enough for you to notice its somewhat

blotchy beside the mans knee giving it noticeable qualities.

One thing that stands out in particular is the man is holding flowers almost menacingly as

if he intends to do damage with these flowers. Not to mention that his eyes are almost just

blotched out as if he is blind to the world around him giving some a question if does he even see

what he is throwing these flowers at and is it out of spite or is it intended to be given to someone

he really cares about. One of the things that you can get from this but isnt directly stated is that

every person that looks to be a thug is overall bad and seen as the one who causes violence. The

group of people that originated from violence between two group who have conflict with one

another. Minorities who get a bad rap because they dress alike and act out of the way of societys

perpetual standards of how everything should operate. One way someone could interpret this

image is that this poor man has lost a loved one to gang violence and he goes around throwing

flowers at the people who killed them so in a way they could remember what they did to him and

he wants them to know all will be forgiven if they give up the life of a thug and try to repair the

society in which they live in. One plausible interpretation is that this image is a way to express

not all gang members are bad people that go around spreading hate and destruction and this is a

culture shock to those who always look negatively at all gang members, we have to remember

that they are people too. Even If this individual is cracked, fading, half good, half evil, there is a

light in all darkness you just have to look for it. I say this because there is no way to be able to

say with uncertainty that someone is evil just because the way they dress they are often ridiculed
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and looked down upon. There is also the prejudice of gang members because of the gangs

Bloods and Crypts and this in turn gives gangs in general a negative face of which they operate

from but that is not always the case.

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Works Cited
War and Peace [], 2005
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Bodie Priddy

Instructor Sarah Haak

English 1510

14, September 2017

Reflective Statement

My overall feeling for this essay made think in a whole new perspective I liked it because

it was something new but I was fully aware I wasnt good at it at all. Although it was tough I

love new challenges and I will gladly accept things like this all the time. One part in particular

that I can point out was distinguishing analyzing from summary at times it felt like I was doing

the same thing until I took a step back and looked at my work and went back and corrected

myself. It was a nice change up though from the whole 5 paragraphs that Im used to all the time

this honestly made me step back and think about what I was typing and it was refreshing and

gave me a new love for writing again. That being said I wouldnt mind getting a little more time

on this analyzing thing and it sucks we have to be graded all the time just to prove progress but

thats just the world we live in now, I truly enjoyed the method at first I had personal though it

was a waste of time but now that we actually got to use it I had second thoughts and will not

mind using it in the future even when I leave this class. One thing I actually disliked entirely was

drawing so much from photo who doesnt even have a known author and it bothered me the

whole time knowing that the author isnt known and I wish they would come out and show

themselves because it is frustrating respecting someones work so much and not even know who
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deserves this respect. I can say from this that I respect writing again I used to think summarizing

things was too simple and I wanted a new challenge and Im certain this is how it should have

been presented to me because learning it was harder than using it in actual context. I can say It

was quite annoying looking for the deeper meaning as to why the graphitic image was all crusty

at times but that made it that much more challenging to me which made me think harder which

overall gave this a better feeling of an actual challenge. All I can say is I liked this, I would have

preferred that I would have had to write less words but this just overall prepared me a little better

than I thought it would.