Photo gallery: 'The Mystery of Banksy – A Genius Mind' is now open in Tallinn

  • 2024-07-05

The blockbuster exhibition about the street art superstar for the very first time in Estonia: „The Mystery of Banksy – A Genius Mind” is now open in Tallinn.

He’s world famous but still a mystery – Banksy, the Bristol-born and to this day anonymous graffiti artist and painter, known for challenging the boundaries of the art market, who has been causing a sensation with his work for many years. Ever since its premiere in Munich in March 2021 more than 2,2 million visitors saw the exhibition about the exceptional artist in several European metropolises and made it one of the most frequented and successful shows about the street art superstar worldwide. “The Mystery of Banksy – A Genius Mind” will now be on display in Estonia for the very first time! From July 5, 2024 the doors of the Telliskivi M-hoone in Tallinn are open for visitors!

To bring to life an exhibition like this is quite a challenge. The successful German musical producer and exhibition organizer Oliver Forster (COFO Exhibitions) faced it. “We want to make art an experience, viewable for everyone and brought together in one place. Banksy is primarily a street artist who is known for his graffiti that he has distributed all over the world. In addition, he started early with selling signed works of art and prints in a limited edition. Most of them are privately owned and are therefore not accessible to the public. To be able to marvel at a genuine Banksy is therefore an absolute rarity. With 'The Mystery of Banksy – A Genius Mind' we try to bring together the best and most impressive motifs in just one place and in a relaxed atmosphere outside a museum, but still tangible with high quality standards”, says producer Oliver Forster.

The exhibition documents the entire creative period to this day with more than 150 motifs of the street art artist: graffiti, photographs, sculptures, video installations and prints on various materials such as canvas, fabric, aluminum, forex and plexiglass which were reproduced and collected especially for this exhibition. 

In an elaborate and unique setting, the exhibition provides a comprehensive overview and insight into the entire work of the exceptional artist. According to Banksy's motto "Copyright is for losers ©TM", this hommage is not officially authorized. 

This extraordinary art experience is curated by Virginia Jean. The young curator and gallery owner, born in England and living in Berlin, is a versatile designer and indisputable creative. After working in the classic art market for many years she created numerous projects and exhibitions in the field of street art. Banksy has always been a great influence and inspiration in her life because of her origin and passion for creativity and free art as a means of communication. She is an expert in his works and specialist in the street art industry. “With his creations, Banksy addresses significant truths and problems in our world to which we prefer to close our eyes. A Banksy work touches everyone and is aimed at everyone, whether they like it or not. This is exactly why it is so important to me personally to exhibit Banksy's works, to make them accessible to the world and to celebrate them. Banksy writes history with his art – the story that is a reality for us in this very moment. The exhibition is a must-see for everyone who likes to grapple with art, politics, general world events and, above all, themselves and has a sense of bitter sweet irony”, says the creative director of the exhibition.

Who is Banksy?

When it comes to street art, you can't get past him: Banksy, probably the most famous and most mysterious graffiti artist in the world. The British man, aged between 45 and 50, has successfully kept his identity a secret. His works, on the other hand, not only conquer the streets all over the world but also the auction houses, and with great success: he is currently considered one of the most expensive contemporary artists! Banksy, who touches people with his ironic, political but always poetic works, is an underground fighter, king of street art and even a hotel operator.  When the city of Bristol had its citizens vote in 2009 whether Banksy works should be removed from the cityscape, 97 percent decided against it. A clear vote for his art. Banksy is a star far beyond the boundaries of the art market. Back in 2010, Time Magazine put him on their list of the 100 most influential people in the world for the first time, alongside personalities such as Barack Obama, Steve Jobs and Lady Gaga.  

To this day, no one knows who Banksy is or what his real name is, but everyone knows his art that appears on city walls overnight and comments provocatively on world events. In the meantime, the phantom of the art world has long since made art history. Millions, and amongst them also in the classical sense less art-savvy people, know and admire his works. In particular, it is his recent work such as the painting "Game Changer" as a dedication to the hospital staff in Southampton or his guerrilla action with the world-famous rats in the London Underground that made him increasingly popular. 

In November 2022, several new objects confirmed by Banksy attract attention and proof the artist’s solidarity with the people of the war-ravaged Ukraine. The works of art on ruins are sprayed memorials: two children make a seesaw out of a tank trap, an abandoned chair becomes a viewpoint for a woman with gas mask and fire extinguisher, a child in a judo suit hurls his actually superior opponent on the floor, to exemplarily name three of the new motifs.

Many of his works have also found their way into everyday commercial life. The question of whether street art can be commercialised is written on another paper or in for discussion. Can his art be exhibited or can street art in general be shown in a museum or in galleries? After all, Banksy is also synonymous with rejecting commerce. The answer to this question is given by Banksy himself, as recently shown in the exhibition presented in Glasgow’s Gallery of Modern Art from June to the end of August 2023, which – for the first time in 14 years – was authorised by the artist himself.

Spectacular promotions and auctions

With his murals, Banksy writes art history in his very own way: he continually sprays unsettling images and texts on facades, subways, public squares, surfaces and objects - logistically sophisticated with a lot of preparatory work, spying and guarding the process. Meanwhile, millions in sales are achieved with his salable works. The 2018 auction of one of his best-known works, "Girl with Balloon", was spectacular and sensational: Shortly after it was sold at the Sotheby's auction in London, the picture self-destructed on the spot, with the lower part being cut into strips by a shredder hidden in the frame. Before that, the original had been auctioned for the equivalent of 1.2 million euros. Up to this point, the record price for a Banksy work was the equivalent of around 1.7 million euros, which was achieved at an auction in New York in 2008.

In 2019, the 2009 oil painting "Devolved Parliament", the British Parliament populated by monkeys, landed again at Sotheby's in London and achieved a record price of 9.9 million pounds (11.1 million euros). Banksy himself then wrote on Instagram: "Too bad it's not mine anymore." Banksy sold the picture in 2011.

A triptych on the refugee crisis entitled "Mediterranean Sea View 2017" brought in the equivalent of 2.4 million euros in 2020, twice as much as expected. The artist donated the money to a Palestinian hospital.

'Show Me the Monet', Banksy's tongue-in-cheek reinterpretation of a Monet masterpiece, fetched £7.6million (€8.4million) in 2020. The idyll that prevails in Monet's work about "The Japanese Bridge" becomes an illegal rubbish dump in Banksy's work, with discarded rubbish bobbing amidst the water lilies. Banksy had already painted the oil painting in 2005 and shown it in a gallery exhibition.

The artist set a new record in March 2021: his picture "Game Changer", which he secretly hung in the hallway of a hospital in Southampton in May 2020 and dedicated to the hospital staff with the words "Thank you for everything you do", went under the hammer at Christie's auction house and fetched an incredible price of almost 17 million pounds (almost 20 million euros). As explicitly requested by Banksy, the proceeds should benefit the entire British health service NHS. The picture shows a little boy who threw away his superhero characters Batman and Spiderman and is now playing with a new favorite character – a nurse with surgical mask and cape.

Banksy last broke his own record in October 2021. The re-auctioned "Love is in the Bin" brought 18.5 million pounds (equivalent to around 21.6 million euros) - i.e. the shredded "Girl with Balloon", which, as mentioned above, had been sold already in 2018. To this day, it is not known who bought the work of art for the new record sum. 

While the originals are not all publicly available at the moment, the no less impressive reproductions can be admired in "The Mystery of Banksy - A Genius Mind".

PRODUCER

COFO Entertainment, Passau (Germany)

With over 50 years of expertise and experience in live entertainment and several hundred shows as well as numerous exhibitions per year, COFO Entertainment is one of the leading promoters in Europe. In addition, managing director Oliver Forster is known for his successful musical biographies of legends such as Tina Turner, Elvis Presley, Falco, Michael Jackson, Frank Sinatra and the Beatles, which attract and inspire over a hundred thousand visitors every year.

Since 2013, the Passau-based company has also established itself as the market leader in the field of touring exhibitions such as "Terracotta Army and the 1st Emperor of China", "Tutankhamun – His Tomb and Treasures", "Da Vinci – The Genius", "Gunther von Hagens' Body Worlds" and "Titanic – Real Finds, True Destinies" all over Europe. During the pandemic the exhibition portfolio has been expanded even further. With the motto "Art as an experience", exhibitions like "The Great Masters of the Renaissance", "Andy Warhol – Pop Art Identities", "Van Gogh ­– The Immersive Experience", "Klimt – The Immersive Experience" and „Dalí Surreal – The immersive exhibition experience” create and offer a completely new form of art presentation for a broad and interested audience. 

Together with the street art show "The Mystery of Banksy – A Genius Mind", also produced by Oliver Forster, over 50 exhibitions have been implemented in Germany and abroad since 2021 and millions of visitors from all sections of the population were captivated. By now, COFO Entertainment is one of the so-called “big players” in the international exhibition business!

PRESALE

A time slot must be booked in order to optimally direct the number of visitors. With the time slot ticket, access to the exhibition is possible within the booked time slot, the length of your stay is unlimited.

If you want to stay flexible or want to give away tickets without a time limit as a gift, so-called flexi / gift tickets are the right alternative. They can be used to access the exhibition within the booked month at any time, but there are only a limited number available. 

 

Tickets can be bought at www.mystery-banksy.ee

Texts in Estonian and English. The exhibition is fully accessible.