UK Home Secretary James Cleverly has slammed Banksy’s migrant boat artwork as “disgusting”, describing it as a “celebration of the loss of life in Kane”, after the British artist confirmed he was behind the display. Glastonbury music festival weekend.
On Sunday, Banksy uploaded a video featuring migrant mannequins hoisting an inflatable boat over the heads of thousands of revelers by Bristol punk band Idles on Friday night. The raft was set in motion when the band performed Danny Nedelko’s 2018 song, which opens with the lyrics: “My blood brother is an immigrant, a beautiful immigrant.” A spokesperson for the group said they were not aware of the stunt until after the concert. The boat reappeared on rapper Little Simz’s set when he performed on the Pyramid stage on Saturday.
Missing the work of Banksy and Idles, Cleverly told Sky News today: “There are loads of people out there joking and celebrating about criminal acts that cost lives. People die. People die in the Mediterranean, they die in the Channel. This is not funny. It’s vile.”
Asked if Labor could be a comment on the right-wing Conservative party’s failure to tackle the issue of migrant crossings, he said: “Our ability to solve this problem has been obstructed at every stage by the Labor party, who want it. border control”.
Cleverly added: “The hypocrisy of the left on this issue breathes and to joke about it, to celebrate it at a pop festival when children die on the Channel, is completely unacceptable.”
Cleverly was taking part in an interview ahead of Thursday’s general election, in which his party is set to suffer a heavy loss, according to polls.
Banksy has a long history of connecting his work with the migrant crisis. In August 2020, he funded a real ship, named Louise Michel after the 19th century French feminist and anarchist, to rescue refugees making the perilous crossing from North Africa to Europe. Italian authorities seized the ship in March 2023, then released it, as Giorgia Meloni’s government tightened humanitarian operations in an attempt to stem a surge in Mediterranean crossings.
In 2019, Banksy left his mark on the Venice Biennale with a stencil of a migrant child wearing a life jacket holding up a glowing neon pink, and in 2015 he drew a portrait of the late Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple. a black bin bag slung over one shoulder and an original Apple computer in hand in the Calais refugee camp known as “The Jungle”.
In a statement accompanying the work in Calais, Banksy said: “We often think of migration as a drain on a country’s resources, but Steve Jobs was the son of a Syrian migrant. Apple is the most profitable company in the world, turning over $7 billion (£4.6 billion) a year taxes, and only exists because a young man from Homs was allowed to enter.
