I am super gungho about creative visions coming to life. And for the world's most famous street artist and 50 of his street/performance/installation art friends, I just can't even fathom how magnificent it must feel to see such a grand scale vision come alive.
I pored over pictures of the distorted little mermaid, the park workers with dutiful scowls wearing mouse ear hats, the crumbling royal castle, and this picture of a Cinderella figure succumbing to a Princess Diana style death:
(picture from The Daily Beast)
It's unarguably very fascinating. I'm in awe. I'm envious. I'm intrigued and inspired. But, today, I'm also more like: Why? The installation is created at the location of an old, out of use seaside amusement park in England, so modeling the project after an amusement park makes sense. And the artists use the space - as Banksy is known to do through his street art - to bring up issues of political unrest and bring attention to societal ills: war refugees, our fascination with celebrity, the trace horse meat found a few years back in UK tv dinners (depicted by a horse on a carousel hanging bloodied upside down over boxes of lasagne - if I'm remembering correctly)...
I read once about Banksy recreating Monet's water lily paintings to include trash and debris. I get that. I think it's a good idea. But why the heavy mockery of Disney in this particular project? The brochure blatantly says (so I've read), "See what it's like to be a real princess." If the artists are not addressing the actual "issues" Disney usually gets criticized for - patriarchy, white-washing - then why reference the company at all? Simply because Disney has created the largest type of amusement park in the world, so it must be included?
I've never read anywhere, or gotten the impression through his work, that Banksy is a feminist or an advocate of racial diversity. So today I'm reading all these articles on Dismaland and I'm a little saddened and put off that an artist of such prominence would resort to using Disney characters' likenesses to hawk his dystopian theme park. I think, or I thought, Banksy is/was more creative and progressive than that. Isn't his name alone enough to draw attention to this place?
And I have a hard time swallowing the fact that he and his 50 friends and whoever else was involved in creating this sat around for months discussing how dark and disturbing they could get with this project. I'm in this unprecedented stage in my life where I have to stop and think: So, not once did any of them stop and think, "Hey, lots of people respect us, they value our thoughts, they'll be coming here in droves... Instead, how can we make this place be, like, a call to action to them? To change the world?" Though political, societal issues abound in Dismaland, I don't think it's getting any sort of large point across. The horse meat scandal was resolved years ago. The people sticking their heads through the "selfie hole" on a plain white wall are still all too happy to do so (I read a review saying that attraction had the longest line of any); they aren't picking up on how ridiculous the selfie phenomenon has become. I get the feeling nothing in this world is going to change as a result of this large-scale dreary exhibition.
Disney is not what's wrong with the world. And the brand is actually working to reconcile the criticisms it gets. In line with the times, stronger female characters have been the center of the last four or five Disney movies. The shows on the Disney channel feature surprisingly diverse cast members (unfortunately they still need to work on giving lead roles to diverse actors; Zendaya is a start, though) - many are even racially ambiguous; this way, they're never really seen doing stereotypical things. They're doing "normal" things (well, normal for children's television shows). Disney helps to "normalize" minorities in that way. Many of the families on the shows are blended. One has a stay at home dad. Another show came under fire a few years back for the main character's best friend having gay parents.
As a minority and a mom and the child of a gay father, this kind of stuff is important to me right now. And I'm glad Disney showcases a bit of diversity, because my kids need to see it. So, maybe what's really bothering me about this oversized Banksy exhibit is: I've outgrown this kind of stuff? Dismaland is dark for darkness' sake and that's, frankly, a waste of time and energy in this day and age.
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