French pop art provocateur Mr. Brainwash celebrates ‘beautiful’ Perth in first Australian exhibition

Simon CollinsThe West Australian
Camera IconFrench-born and LA-based pop artist Thierry Guetta, aka Mr Brainwash. Credit: Supplied

Imagine Paul McCartney not wanting to discuss the Beatles, or cricket legend Dennis Lillee refusing to acknowledge the existence of wicketkeeper Rod Marsh.

That’s how it feels when French-born pop art provocateur Thierry Guetta, aka Mr. Brainwash, feigns ignorance at the mere mention of Banksy, the English street-art godhead who made the then unknown vintage clothes store owner globally renowned via the scintillating, satirical 2010 documentary Exit Through the Gift Shop.

“I don’t know who you’re talking about,” Guetta says in a thick Gallic accent from his adopted home of Los Angeles.

“I have no idea. I know banks, like, Bank of America but, pffft, I have no idea. I hear this word many times in many conversations but I have no idea.”

Seems the 56-year-old has had his brain washed, or he’s just fed up with the usual questions. Who is Banksy? Is he Banksy?

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“Exactly,” is Guetta’s final word on the matter when I revisit the subject later in an interview ostensibly to promote his first ever Australian exhibition at Cottesloe’s Gullotti Galleries, opening on August 8.

Camera IconGullotti Galleries in Cottesloe will host the first ever Australian exhibition of Mr. Brainwash. Credit: Supplied

While he won’t attend the opening because of health reasons, Guetta will appear via video link at the VIP launch on August 7.

He has created Perth is Beautiful, a 55cm by 76cm silkscreen on paper artwork inspired by American painter Norman Rockwell of two children on a park bench looking over the Swan River.

Eighty of these prints, signed by Mr. Brainwash, will be available to purchase via Gullotti Galleries.

The exhibition is the result of a chance meeting at Art Basel in Hong Kong between Guetta and gallery owner Paul Gullotti, who knew of his work thanks to Exit Through the Gift Shop.

There’s no denying that, whether he’ll talk about Banksy or not, the documentary helped transform Guetta from shop owner and family man into hot property in a street art movement that had already gatecrashed mainstream galleries and auction houses.

Camera IconMr. Brainwash designed more than a dozen different covers for Madonna’s Celebration release. Credit: Supplied/Supplied

However, before the documentary, Madonna had tapped him to design covers for her 2009 greatest hits compilation, Celebration, and Michael Jackson had bought several of his works, including one called Peter Pan.

Mr. Brainwash’s fan base includes world leaders (notably Pope Francis and Michelle Obama), famous sporting figures (Brazilian soccer legend Pele and basketball superstar LeBron James) and big name musical acts (Rihanna, Red Hot Chili Peppers, the Black Keys, David Guetta, Avicii, Rita Ora and Rick Ross).

He spent much of the decade since Exit Through the Gift Shop collaborating with companies, corporations and brands, such as Coca-Cola, Sunglass Hut, Burger King and Google all while staging his own Life is Beautiful exhibitions around the world.

“There is something that happens with a film, it travels everywhere,” Guetta says.

“It goes to every country, so you’re in airports and people from all over the world come to you and say ‘I can’t believe it, I saw the movie’. You’re recognised and get cred a lot faster thanks to the movie.

“The movie was a big surprise for everyone, even me. We never expected to be nominated for an Academy Award and for it to be one of the most-seen documentaries in the world.”

True story: on our honeymoon in New York City, my wife and I stumbled on to Mr. Brainwash’s first solo show, Life is Beautiful: Icons, in the Meatpacking District.

I recognised his magpie style of unashamedly pinching from Warhol, Pollock and, indeed, Bansky in a giant image of the Beatles depicted in Kiss greasepaint and an actual yellow cab packaged like a Matchbox car.

Then I spotted the man himself, who greeted us, bombarded us with questions and then invited us out for drinks. (We were ridiculously hungry and had a booking. Damn it.)

Camera IconPop artist Thierry Guetta, aka Mr. Brainwash. Credit: Supplied
Camera IconFrench-born artist Mr. Brainwash with Brazilian soccer legend Pele. Credit: Instagram

Exit Through the Gift Shop ends with Guetta as he shirtfronts accusations that he is a charlatan simply toilet-papering others’ work by declaring that “time will tell” whether or not he is an artist.

Twelve years after the documentary, and our encounter in a massive warehouse in New York, I put his question back to him.

“Van Gogh never sold a painting during his life, you know, and he died kind of sad that he never achieved anything,” he says.

“But today there is not one piece (of his) which is not owned by a museum. Time will tell.”

Camera IconMr. Brainwash’s 2022 artwork Banksy Thrower. Credit: Supplied

Guetta has also compared himself to Marcel Duchamp, who is arguably best remembered for an actual toilet, and Pablo Picasso, who is often attributed with coining the phrase “talent borrows, genius steals” whether he uttered it or not.

He muses that the first caveman to depict a woolly mammoth probably got accused of ripping it off.

He’d rather people think of Mr. Brainwash as a DJ, mixing, sampling and mashing up different influences and existing imagery.

“I’m always mixing,” he says. “The world is round and it turns and churns like a record.”

Camera IconPaul Gullotti of Gullotti Galleries and Mr. Brainwash. Credit: Supplied

And the latest sensation or distraction in art are non-fungible tokens, or NFTs — unique digital artworks that have sold for millions through reputable auction houses.

“Art is something that is always living, it’s alive,” Guetta says. “Who didn’t hear about those things because people woke up one morning and said (shouting) ‘I’m making millions with NFTs’.

“I believe that it’s an evolution of art … you know me, I love it all, so I accept it all.

“There is pop art, there is street art, there is contemporary art, there is everything but in the end it’s just art.”

While Mr. Brainwash has whitewashed Bansky, the master of self-promotion is happy to discuss some of his famous fans.

He says late pop icon Michael Jackson was trying to stay in touch with his inner child, much like Guetta who says he visited Neverland (“his big, big, giant house”) on several occasions.

“For everyone, Michael Jackson is Michael Jackson, he rocked the world with his music,” he says.

Madonna is a perfectionist, who ended up commissioning Guetta to do 13 different designs for various releases relating to Celebration as well a mural for her Hard Candy Fitness gym in Mexico City.

“I understand why she is Madonna after that because she’s very on top of everything she does, in a good way,” he explains.

In March 2016, Guetta installed a mural at Washington D.C.’s Union Market to celebrate Independent Women’s Day with then first lady, Michelle Obama, who put the finishing touches on the work.

His support of her Let Girls Learn movement led to a visit to White House, where the incorrigible artist couldn’t resist leaving behind a little bit of Mr. Brainwash.

Camera IconMr. Brainwash with former first lady Michelle Obama. Credit: Supplied
Camera IconFrench-born artist Mr. Brainwash with pop superstar Rihanna. Credit: Instagram

Guetta laughs as he recalls smuggling in a length of packing tape, emblazoned with his mantra — “Life is Beautiful” — which he then placed on the side of the door leading into the Oval Office.

“I tagged the White House,” he chuckles, “in a good way.”

True or not, it’s a good story.

Art is something that is always living, it’s alive.

From Madonna and Michelle to the pontiff — Guetta has met Pope Francis three times to create artworks in support of the “painting bridges” education foundation.

While he jokes that those projects were “pope art”, he regards them as “real miracles” that make him grateful to be alive — something he takes for granted less now than ever before.

Camera IconFrench-born artist Mr. Brainwash with Pope Francis. Credit: Supplied

Earlier this year, he found himself suffering severe headaches, which led to a doctor (“a saviour”) telling him that death or permanent incapacitation were real possibilities if they didn’t operate to fix swelling on the brain.

“I did not know if I was going to make it or not,” Guetta says, adding with a chuckle that “Brainwash got an operation on his brain”.

While he can see the irony now, at the time he feared time was up.

“The moment when you go to the operation, where they put you down, you think you’re never going to wake up,” he says.

“When you do wake up you see life a different way. Life is a gift. Life is beautiful.

“I’m going to tell you something,” Guetta says with rare sincerity. “We’re all rich, very rich. To be healthy and to wake up in the morning, that’s more important than any money in the world.

“You would give everything you have to be back on your feet. Everybody is a diamond and should be thankful for every single day.

“Life, it is beautiful.”

Perth is Beautiful runs from August 8 to September 19 at Gullotti Galleries, Cottesloe.

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