Syrian artists Tammam Azzam and Ammar Abd Rabbo and Huda Beydoun from Saudi Arabia are adding a flavour of the Middle East to well-known street artist Banksy’s latest pop-up festival Dismaland Bemusement Park in Weston-super-Mare, United Kingdom.
Located in an abandoned leisure facility that closed its doors in 2000, Banksy’s cynical twist to Disney’s amusement parks, features works by more than 40 international artists, including Damien Hirst, Jenny Holzer, and Ben Long.
The quirky offerings at “Dismaland” include a fire-ravaged fairy-tale castle, a stallion sculpted from used scaffolding, a children’s slide on an armour plated riot control vehicle, a portrait artist specialising in portraits of the back of the head, an oil Caliphate themed crazy golf course, and a daily bonfire of Jeffery Archer’s novels.
Azzam is featured with “Freedom Graffiti”, a digital work in which he has superimposed Gustav Klimt’s “The Kiss” on a Syrian war-torn building.
Rabbo is presenting “Into the Wild” — a photograph that measures the extent of the destruction in Aleppo; and Beydoun’s contribution is four digital pieces from her “Documenting the Undocumented” series, in which a recurring Minnie Mouse figure is used to link pop culture, graffiti, and social issues.
