Is Cy Twombly a better graffiti artist than Banksy?
Is Cy Twombly a better graffiti artist than Banksy? Yes he is, according to a harsh post by Guardian art critic Jonathan Jones, who wields Twombly as a bludgeon, beating back the Banksy-loving British art hordes.
I’ve published more articles about this unimportant graffiti and street artist than I care to count. I’ve generally been pretty harsh and yet the honest truth is that I don’t have an opinion about Banksy. I can’t believe that grown people find his work worth more than passing attention; he just doesn’t come onto my radar. What I really want to say to his admirers is - haven’t you people ever heard of Cy Twombly? He’s the only graffiti artist I care about.
A Twombly retrospective opens soon at Tate Modern; Jones hopes it won’t be a flop. He worries that Banksy’s popular appeal has desensitized the public to art that is
stupid, vulgar, trite and obvious…[while Twombly's] recent paintings…lusciously contemplate the beauty of Arabic script in what might be called a gesture of subversive orientalism, constitute perhaps the most intelligent response by an artist to the world’s current crisis.
Related: A conversation between Tate director Nicholas Serota and Cy Twombly.
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