A painting of Bristol Airport sunk beneath a kitsch seascape appeared on the walls of Bristol City's museum today. Plane Stupid received a report at 12.30pm that a painting, which appears to be a Banksy, had been spotted next to the recently closed exhibition on aviation.
The graffiti artist has previously enjoyed a close relationship with the institution, his exhibition there in 2009 featured several modified landscapes and drew round-the-block queues. But Banksy's reputation is built on his talent for the subversive, and it seems that he's returned to pass comment on 'Flight', the recent aviation industry exhibition.
We're not surprised that Banksy would want to throw a cheeky word in on this one. Expanding Bristol Airport at a time of climate crisis is a seriously dark joke. The unprecedented flooding on Pakistan and Australia have painted a pretty bleak picture of what all our futures could look like.
Minister Eric Pickles recently decided to approve the tarmacking of greenbelt land to expand Bristol Airport, which is expected to add 30,0000 more tonnes of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere every year.
We just can't afford to keep heating the skies. Especially when so many of us can't even afford to heat our homes. It's crazy to put taxpayers' money into new roads for Bristol Airport at a time when public services are suffering massive cuts.
To add insult to injury, as anyone whose been keeping up to date with their Airportwatch reading will know, the west country can expect the airport to export money and jobs from the tourism industry. The UK's annual 'tourism deficit' from aviation is estimated to be at around £17 billion every year. This figure doesn't take into account the loss of revenue created by the lack of VAT on aviation fuel, which effectively subsidises the industry by about £9 billion a year. Almost enough to buy a Banksy...
