Brain Food #482
The art of looking at the unpleasant
Thoughts of the day
Louise Michel is yet another rescue ship that helps transport refugees trying to reach Europe, in search of a new shot at life.
Unlike other rescue ships, this specific vessel has been sponsored and painted by Banksy.
As explained on the project’s site:
“It might seem incredible there is need for a homemade emergency vehicle in one of Europe’s busiest waterways, but there is. The migrant crisis means that European states are instructing their Coastguard not to answer distress calls from ‘non-Europeans’ leaving desperate people to drift helplessly at sea. To make matters worse authorities prevent other boats from providing assistance, arresting crews and impounding boats that do.”
Although six people die at sea every day trying to cross the Mediterranean (and this was in 2018), ironically, people paid more attention to the matter because of Banksy’s involvement.
So be it. The value of art has never been only about aesthetic pleasure. Art is valuable because it also makes one pay attention to the trivial and, in some cases, the unpleasant.
And art can make something good out of the ugliest of situations. In the famous words of Carrie Fisher, “Take your broken heart, make it into art.”
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