Mr Brainwash (or MBW) is the moniker of eccentric French filmmaker, Thierry Guetta. After years filming the likes of Banksy and Shepard Fairey, he put down his camera and took up the spray-can and become one of California’s most prolific street artists.
MBW started documenting the street art of Shepard Fairey in 1999, and it was through Fairey that he was introduced to Bansky. MBW collected hours of footage following street artists at work often at great personal risk.
It was the introduction to Banksy that helped MBW make the transition from a street art voyeur into an active participant. His work has evolved from a few hand drawn stickers to giant sized paste-ups, and his iconic imagery is now regularly seen on the streets of New York and Los Angeles.
MBW’s first solo show “Life is Beautiful” was in Los Angeles in June 2008; it featured over 100 works in a 15,000 square foot former TV studio and had fans queuing around the block to get in on its opening night. He referenced artists such as Duchamp, Jackson Pollock and Robert Indiana in the works he displayed, but it is Warhol whose influence is strongest. MBW regularly use icons of consumer culture and celebrity and mixes them with early imagery from the Pop Art movement to create his own pop art and graffiti hybrid.
Mister Brainwash (MBW)
2009 Screenprint and spray paint on newspaper Thumbprint, signature, date, and inscription on verso 22 x 22 in. (56 x 56 cm.) SOLD2020 Original color screenprint Hand-signed, dated and numbered in pencil, with fingerprint (verso) 24 x 36 in. (61 x 91.4 cm), unframed Edition of 70 SOLD2000 Eight-color screenprint Signed and numbered, thumb print on verso 22 x 30 in Edition of 250 SOLDMBW started documenting the street art of Shepard Fairey in 1999, and it was through Fairey that he was introduced to Bansky. MBW collected hours of footage following street artists at work often at great personal risk.
It was the introduction to Banksy that helped MBW make the transition from a street art voyeur into an active participant. His work has evolved from a few hand drawn stickers to giant sized paste-ups, and his iconic imagery is now regularly seen on the streets of New York and Los Angeles.
MBW’s first solo show “Life is Beautiful” was in Los Angeles in June 2008; it featured over 100 works in a 15,000 square foot former TV studio and had fans queuing around the block to get in on its opening night. He referenced artists such as Duchamp, Jackson Pollock and Robert Indiana in the works he displayed, but it is Warhol whose influence is strongest. MBW regularly use icons of consumer culture and celebrity and mixes them with early imagery from the Pop Art movement to create his own pop art and graffiti hybrid.