A good way to really get your barrings around a new city or town is on foot, which is exactly what Ms. Buddha and I did after dropping off our stuff at the Airbnb, Bologna. We took a roam around the city to get familiar with Bologna (wasn’t too hard) but then stumbled upon a surprising exhibit that I just looked and Ms. Buddha and said “I wanna go”. The show was titled “Street Art – Banksy & Co. and was at the Palazzo Pepoli in Bologna – being a pretty decent fan of street art as a genre in general, it was a pleasant surprise to bump into a show!
We actually already brought some groceries, we bought tickets and also asked for some coins to use one of their lockers – the young women there were very Italian (slim and stylish) – but a bit cold for my taste – one was a little friendlier than the rest though.
The exhibit was split into about 3 floors across different galleries and frankly, it was quite impressive – Ms. Buddha and I both got an audio-guide and it certainly made the experience a lot more enjoyable. The great thing was that even though the name was “Banksy & Co.” there were a decent number of “Co’s” there including some of my favourites like DRAN – who kind of has the satirical style of Banksy but I think conveys more of a childish innocence in his works because of the deformed ratio in the characters:
Other works were also shown there – such as Blu who is a local in Bologna – his art is a bit more morbid – but there’s a beauty in such a direct way of conveying things:
Apart from drawings, there were also a lot of sculpture work, including one that Ms. Buddha and I quite liked because of the “cuteness?” – by Ron English.
And of course, you can’t have a “Banksy & Co.” show without Banksy – they situated his work in the center hall and frankly, I felt a bit bad for the other artists because there were a LOT of people looking at Banksy’s works but other areas were actually quite thin. Of course, Banksy doesn’t need much introduction:
All in all, an excellent exhibit, especially when you factor in the fact that neither Ms. Buddha nor I expected to find this here. We spent about 3 hours here and by the end of it our legs were so tired that we went straight home for dinner!
Buddha Explores 