Napalm
Unsigned Print

Napalm is undoubtedly one of Banksy’s most powerful, hard-hitting works, cementing his position as one of the pioneering political contemporary artists. Napalm is a three colour screen print and was released as an unsigned edition of 600. The work reference depicts the photograph taken during the Vietnam War, showing a nine year-old-girl (Kim Phuc) running from the horror of a Napalm blast. The moment was captured by photographer Nick Ut. Banksy took the photograph as his context for creating a disarming juxtaposition – we have two supposedly friendly American icons of consumerism (Ronald McDonald and Mickey Mouse), smiling as they lead the terrorised girl away from a disaster. This artwork is a quintessential and especially strong formulation of Banksy’s critique of the military-industrialist complex, linking violent conflict and capitalism. This is also demonstrated in other works like Bomb Hugger and Happy Choppers.