＜prologue＞
I started a blog called “The Baby Boomer Generation’s Miscellaneous Blog”（Dankai-sedai no garakutatyou:団塊世代の我楽多（がらくた）帳） in July 2018, about a year before I fully retired. More than six years have passed since then, and the number of articles has increased considerably.
So, in order to make them accessible to people who don’t understand Japanese, I decided to translate my past articles into English and publish them.
It may sound a bit exaggerated, but I would like to make this my life’s work.
It should be noted that haiku and waka （Japanese short fixed form poems） are quite difficult to translate into English, so some parts are written in Japanese.
If you are interested in haiku or waka and would like to know more, please read introductory or specialized books on haiku or waka written in English.
I also write many articles about the Japanese language. I would be happy if these inspire more people to want to learn Japanese.
my blog’s URL:団塊世代の我楽多（がらくた）帳 | 団塊世代が雑学や面白い話を発信しています
my X’s URL:団塊世代の我楽多帳（@historia49）さん / X
In October 2018, a painting “A Girl and a Balloon” by a “masked artist” named “Banksy” sold at Sotheby’s auction for 1.04 million pounds, but immediately after the sale, only the bottom half of the painting was cut off by a “shredder device installed in the frame”, a very shocking and unusual This was a very shocking and unusual incident.
To the artist’s surprise, the shredder was installed by the artist himself, and it was a “deliberate prank.
Even more surprisingly, the name of the work was changed by Sotheby’s to “Love is in the Dustbin,” and the winning bidder accepted the work in its half-cut state at the winning bid price.
Some have even speculated that the value of the work has risen above the bidding price because of this event.
１．Who is Banksy?
There is graffiti on New York City subways, and “graffiti art” or “street art” in Japan, which is graffiti on walls and trains, using the city as a canvas, painted or spray-painted.
Most of these are unflattering and unfamiliar in meaning, but Banksy’s graffiti is somewhat “artistic” and “satirical” in feel.
（1）Masked Artist
Banksy (birth date undisclosed) is a masked artist based in London, England. He has left socially satirical graffiti and street art in about 170 locations around the world, including Japan.
In this sense, the “painting” auctioned by Sotheby’s last October is a special case.
（2）Who is Banksy really?
The true identity of the person remains a mystery to this day, and media interviews are thoroughly limited to phone calls and e-mails.
However, there are several people who are considered to be the “real” person, although this is not beyond the realm of speculation.
They include “Breck Le Rat,” a graffiti artist from France, “Robert Cannigham,” an artist from Bristol, England, and “Robert Del Jana” (aka “3D”), a central figure in the popular British music unit “Massive Attack.
Of these, “Robert Del Jana” seems to be “the most suspicious,” as some journalists have reported a correlation between the “time and city” of “Massive Attack’s” live performances and the “time and city” of “Banksy’s” graffiti appearances.
（3）Is Banksy a painting terrorist?
Some people call them “painting terrorists” because they display their works inside the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the British Museum without permission, or use stencils to leave politically charged graffiti such as “peace,” “anti-capitalism,” and “anti-authority” on walls around town.
２．What is Banksy’s message?
（1）Criticism of society and the world
The following examples of works illustrate this trend.
・Climbed the penguin enclosure at the London Zoo and painted “We’re bored of fish.
・On the Palestinian side of the West Bank separation wall, he left nine paintings, including one of a child making a hole in the wall and a beach visible through the hole in the wall.
（2）Criticism of regarding paintings as property
The above “shredding incident” of the painting “The Girl and the Balloon” seems to imply this.
（3）The idea that paintings are public property
This is also related to the “shredding incident,” but I feel that there is a backlash against paintings being “held in dead storage as property” by individuals.
However, I also wonder, “Why not just donate one’s work to an art gallery or museum for free?” I feel that he wants to exhibit his works freely in public spaces so that they can be seen by a wide range of people.
３．Artists who burned or destroyed their own work
Although they may not have considered painting to be “instant art” in the same way as “sand painting” or “latte art,” there are those who burned their own paintings and calligraphies or bought them back and destroyed them themselves.
（1）Botticelli (1445-1510)
Botticelli is very famous for his painting “The Birth of Venus,” but I have heard that he once destroyed his own painting.
I have also heard that even famous potters often break their own pottery if they don’t like the way it is fired.
I suppose it is the “pride and enthusiasm of a good artist trying to create a good work of art” that makes them do it.
（2）Mitsuo Aida (1924-1991)
I have heard that when he saw a calligraphy he had written as a young man hanging in someone else’s house, he was so embarrassed that he bought it back from the owner and destroyed it himself.
This was probably because he was embarrassed by how false his “works” were, in which he wrote “enlightened words”.
I have heard him say himself that he is not an enlightened person as he writes in his paintings and calligraphies, but a person full of desires, troubles, and insecurities. For a long time, he was not well received as a poet and calligrapher. He wrote poems such as “Ningendamono” and “Okage-san” that were easily accepted by the masses, “acknowledging human weakness” and “accepting things as they are,” including himself, which became a big hit in his later years.
Daisaburo Okumoto, a French literary scholar and director of the Fabre Museum of Insects, said, “Frankly speaking, I dislike the character Mitsuo Aida’s writing, which seems to be deliberately written poorly to take advantage of others, as well as his complaints, which seem to cover up the inferiority complex deep inside the person who put them on paper. I am wary of people who intentionally write poorly when they can write well.