Latest news with #Stoicism
BBC News
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- BBC News
Five works that reveal the philosophy of Banksy
Banksy's new mural in Marseille is not the first image he has connected to the history of ideas. From Plato to Foucault, a Banksy expert reveals the philosophy behind these popular artworks. Which is the real you, the person you are now or the one you are capable of becoming? It's a heady question, to be sure, and not one you would expect to be confronted with while strolling down a street in Marseille in the waning days of May. Yet it's precisely the existential dilemma that Banksy, who once asserted "being yourself is overrated" – has surreptitiously installed in a cloistered stretch of the quiet Rue Félix Fregier, the site of a new work – the latest installment in the elusive artist's decades-long career as a provocative philosophical prankster. For more than 30 years, Banksy has spiked many of his most iconic works – from his girl reaching hopelessly for a heart-shaped balloon to his masked rioter hurling a bouquet of flowers – with barbed allusions to Old Masters, from Michelangelo to Monet, Vermeer to Van Gogh. But there's more. Beneath his stealthy stencils lies a deep and deliberate engagement with the history of ideas as well, from classical Stoicism to postmodern deconstructionism. On 29 May, Banksy posted on Instagram a photo of his first new piece in more than five months, piquing the internet's interest by withholding its precise location. Discovered shortly thereafter in the major port city in southern France, Marseille, the mural is, at first glance, deceptively simple: a tall silhouette of a lighthouse spray-painted on to a blank beige urban wall; a rusting street bollard positioned nearby; and a painted shadow stretching across the pavement, joining the real-world object to its augmented, if two-dimensional, echo. Stencilled across the black lighthouse are the words: "I want to be what you saw in me." Anyone keen to find a source for the ideas that inform Banksy's new work needs merely to flip open any history of philosophy to Plato's seminal allegory of the cave (from the Fourth-Century BC treatise The Republic), then flip the ancient metaphor on its head. In Plato's parable, prisoners chained inside a cave mistake shadows on the wall for reality, unaware of the truer forms that cast them outside. But here, Banksy, being Banksy, baits us by switching the set-up, reversing the relationship between essence and shadow. In Banksy's mural, the drab bollard casts not a diminished imitation of itself, but something far grander – a lighthouse, a symbol of illumination and guidance. Here, it's the silhouette, not reality, that's true. Banksy's inversion urges us to ask where reality really resides: in what is, or in what might be? His poignant phrase – "I want to be what you saw in me" – is alluringly elastic. Is this the bollard dreaming of being more than it appears? Or the shadow wishing to become light? Or is it all of us – Banksy included – struggling to live up to the better versions imagined by those who believe in us? The answer is surely yes to all of the above. And it's a yes too to the question: 'is this new work a lamp capable of shining light on further levels of meaning in Banksy?' What follows is a brief look back at some of the artist's best-known works and how they too are invigorated by, and often upend, many of the most important philosophical tenets – both social and intellectual – that underwrite who we are and who we might be. Girl with Balloon, 2002 Banksy's new mural in Marseille is not the first to be accompanied by an affecting caption connecting the piece to the history of ideas. Among his most famous murals, Girl with Balloon, which portrays a child reaching towards a heart-shaped balloon drifting away from her, first appeared in 2002 in various locations in London, including on the South Bank, alongside the consoling assertion, "there is always hope". That conviction, which fuels the ceaseless striving for an ideal that is seemingly unobtainable in the mural (there's no way that balloon is coming back) rhymes richly with aspects of 19th-Century German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer's ideas concerning an unquenchable and irrational "Will" as a fundamental force that drives humanity. When, years later, Banksy mischievously concealed a remote-controlled shredder in the frame of a version of Girl with Balloon that came up for auction in 2018, and sensationally destroyed the work before the eyes of aghast auction-goers, he succeeded in upping the ante on Schopenhauer's belief in the futility of desire by boldly manifesting it himself. Where there's a will there's a fray. Flower Thrower (or Love is in the Air), 2003 Banksy's famous mural of a masked man frozen forever in the instant before he unleashes not a brick or a bomb but a bouquet of flowers may seem, at first blush, to exemplify a pacifist's commitment to peaceful disobedience. The work appears to echo the precepts of Mahatma Gandhi's Satyagraha – a philosophy of non-violence that the Indian ethicist coined in 1919. Banksy's fully flexed figure, incongruously armed with a fistful of beauty, appears to epitomise Gandhi's insistence on wielding moral, not physical, strength. Doesn't it? Or has Banksy slyly subverted the philosophical assertion of pacifistic force by portraying his hero as an enraged rioter? The figure's anger has not been tempered by an appeal to the higher ideals of beauty and truth. Instead, those ideals have been weaponised by Banksy. Here, beauty and truth are not disarming, they are devastatingly explosive. One Nation Under CCTV, 2007 Banksy's mural in Marseille employs a tried-and-true technique to ensure the work protrudes into the urban space in which we'll encounter it – elevating its philosophical potential from something flimsy and flat to something undeniably urgent. It's a tactic he used in a 2007 work that appeared near London's Oxford Street in which he depicts a boy atop a precariously high ladder, spray-painting the penetrating observation that we are "One Nation Under CCTV" in outlandishly outsized letters. Also portrayed within the mural is a uniformed officer and his obedient police dog who surveil the young vandal, while above them all an actual CCTV camera, presumably recording everything, juts out from the wall. The endless layers of surveillance-within-surveillance to which the work attests – as we watch the state watch an officer watch the boy – captures with uncanny precision the philosophical contours of the vast and all-encompassing prison machine in which the French poststructural philosopher Michel Foucault believed everyone in society was now irredeemably enmeshed. In Foucault's study Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison, he resuscitates a blueprint for a prison proposed by the British utilitarian philosopher Jeremy Bentham at the end of the 18th Century, "The Panopticon" (meaning "all seeing"), and uses it as a menacing metaphor for how no one can escape the perniciously penetrating eye of the panoptical state. Mobile Lovers, 2014 Banksy's witty 2014 work Mobile Lovers shines a chilling light on the state of contemporary relationships. The mural depicts a couple whose almost affectionate embrace is interrupted by the deeper fondness they have for the warm glow of their smartphones. The French existentialist philosopher Simone de Beauvoir, who died in 1986, may not have lived long enough to witness the emergence of mobiles. Yet her profoundly influential 1947 book The Ethics of Ambiguity – published exactly 60 years before the iPhone was launched in 2007 – with its exploration of the devastation that detachment and disconnection can wreak on the realisation of our truest selves, is profoundly proleptic of our modern predicament. To be free, de Beauvoir insisted, requires a deep attentiveness to each other. She believed in the authenticity of human encounters, without which life is a futile performance, dimly lit by disposable devices, rather than something profound and meaningful. How Banksy Saved Art History by Kelly Grovier, published by Thames & Hudson, is out now. -- For more Culture stories from the BBC, follow us on Facebook, X and Instagram.
Forbes
7 days ago
- General
- Forbes
Dealing With Setbacks: A Modern Stoic Approach To Anger Management
Travertine pools in Pamukkale This article may seem at odds with others I have written about the value of emotions and emotional expression—but hear me out. I recently picked up William Irvine's 2019 book, 'The Stoic Challenge: A Philosopher's Guide to Becoming Tougher, Calmer and More Resilient.' His modern application of Stoicism offers a worthy counterbalance to the exhortation/meme to 'feel all the feels,' and provides some great practical advice on dealing with setbacks. I'm generally a fan of emotions. They are the texture and quality of an experience—not just what happened, but what it meant; not just what you learned, but how it touched you or sparked something within. Emotions are data that clue you in to what matters: anger might indicate that a core value, like fairness or justice, is being violated; contentment is a sign that your needs are being met; fear of losing something or someone signals how much you cherish them. Emotions can provide inspiration or fuel for action to create a positive future. And a shared emotion, such as parents' love for their child, can bond us to one another. But indulging emotions can interfere with our ability to move through setbacks. So-called 'negative' emotions—more accurately described as 'difficult' or 'unpleasant'—can cloud our thinking and undermine our agency. When we experience a setback, anger can cause us to lash out at others in unproductive ways; and anger's cousin, blame, can trap us in self-righteousness or victimization. None of this helps solve the problem. Imagine you're heading to a meeting and reach the bus stop just as your bus pulls away. The next one isn't due for 20 minutes. Now what? You could curse the driver—who could clearly see you running to catch the bus—for not waiting for you. You could rage at the MTA for budget cuts that reduced the frequency of buses. You could kick yourself for lingering over breakfast, or fume about having to do the dishes your kids left in the sink. None of this changes the situation. At best, it wastes energy; at worst, it makes things worse by blocking clear thinking. Getting swept up in difficult emotions can amplify suffering—but suppressing them isn't the answer either. Stuffing your anger can be a short-term fix, but over the long haul, you pay a price for bottling up emotions—either by blowing up later or through health problems like ulcers, high blood pressure, etc. Back to the bus stop. What if you could skip the anger and blame? You could choose to use your time more constructively or pleasantly. You could pop into the coffee shop for a latte. You could read over your notes and prepare for the meeting. You could consult the map and realize that walking will get there earlier than the next bus would deliver you, and it's a nice day for a walk! Irvine's modern take on the philosophy of the Greek Stoics calls on us to rise to the occasion when we hit a setback, not by suppressing emotion, but instead by not allowing ourselves to get angry in the first place. They understood that while we can't control external events, we can control our reactions. According to Irvine, the Stoics (currently enjoying a popular resurgence among Silicon Valley dudes sometimes called 'Broicism') were not anti-emotion, but were concerned with reducing the experience of negative emotion, specifically frustration, grief, envy and anger, which Irvine calls 'anti-joy.' He quotes Seneca's On Anger, 'No plague has cost the human race more.' Austrian psychiatrist and holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl is credited with saying,'Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.' Irvine gives that space a time frame: five seconds to reframe a setback before difficult emotions can take hold. His Stoic Challenge framework invites you to see a setback not as something terrible, blameworthy or unfair but instead as a test of your ingenuity and resilience. When you miss the bus or get passed over for promotion, don't leap to 'how terrible, this is bad' and its accompanying feelings of dismay, anger or blame. Instead, reframe the situation as a challenge being offered to you by the Stoic Gods (Irvine's construct; insert any real or imagined being with your best interests at heart). Welcome it as an opportunity to practice virtue, find a clever work-around, and grow stronger. Irvine offers the following approaches to reframing a setback: It could be worse: Practice brief 'negative visualizations' to build gratitude. Stuck without your luggage? At least the plane landed safely. No villain: Resist the urge to assign malicious intent. People may be overcommitted, incompetent—or simply human. This is a story/funny: Imagine the story you'll tell later. Humor helps keep perspective and authorship calls you to agency rather than reactivity. This is a game: You chose this 'field of play.' Challenges are part of the game. How will you meet them? This is a test: See the setback as a challenge from the 'Stoic Gods' to help you grow stronger. Keep your cool and get to work! By offering these alternate frames, he invites us to turn obstacles into a choose-your adventure story. Don't get me wrong—I am still in favor of attending to our emotions and those of others. Irvine's book offers a fresh take on ancient wisdom and provides a handy toolkit for facing setbacks, but it has real limitations and still leaves me somewhat unsatisfied. His approach focuses on the individual and risks turning others into objects. Additionally, though he draws on psychological research, the author dismisses psychotherapy in ways that overlook mental illness and trauma and their profoundly debilitating effects. And for someone whose approach is mind-centric, Irvine doesn't even acknowledge the existence or value of mindfulness meditation practices in managing anger and other difficult emotions. Finally, while he asserts that the Stoic's goal is to eliminate or reduce only unpleasant emotions but not joy or delight, he overlooks how deeply grief and joy are often intertwined in lived experience. That said, I wholeheartedly agree with Irvine: most of us have more capacity to meet adversity than we realize. I'm glad to add the 'Stoic Challenge' framework to my coaching toolkit.
Wall Street Journal
24-04-2025
- General
- Wall Street Journal
‘Beyond Stoicism' Review: Part-Time Philosophy
The worst readers, Nietzsche claimed, are like 'plundering troops' who loot the few ideas they can use and trash the rest. But what if the texts in question are a hodgepodge of good sense and nonsense? Isn't selective pillage the best, not worst, way to read them? How you answer that question will shape how you judge 'Beyond Stoicism,' written by three self-proclaimed modern stoics: Massimo Pigliucci, a professor of philosophy at the City College of New York; Gregory Lopez, the founder of New York City Stoics; and Meredith Alexander Kunz, the creator of the Stoic Mom blog. Despite its title, the book is not limited to Stoicism but seeks wisdom from thinkers of other philosophical schools as well.
Belfast Telegraph
24-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Belfast Telegraph
‘When we realise we have this one life, it makes us want to wring every last drop out of it'
It's only minutes into our interview with Northern Irish television sports journalist Orla Chennaoui when we discover a mutual interest in the work of Ryan Holiday, an American author and podcaster who is widely credited with bringing the ancient philosophy of Stoicism to a modern audience. Holiday's name comes up because we're talking about the Co Derry woman's wellness brand, Ten Times Braver.
Yahoo
20-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Navy cancels speech by podcaster who planned to reference its ban on more than 300 books
Author Ryan Holiday was going to give an address to the Naval Academy — until the military branch discovered he was going to reference the academy's recent sweeping book ban. For years Holiday has been giving lectures on the virtues of Stoicism — he hosts a podcast called The Daily Stoic — and planned on speaking to the sophomores this week on the 'theme of wisdom.' But the Navy canceled those plans an hour before he was set to speak, he said in a New York Times op-ed Saturday. Ahead of his address, he sent over his prepared slides, which included a reference to the academy's removal of 381 books. In January, President Donald Trump signed an executive order ending the 'radical indoctrination' in K-12 schools, prompting schools to pull books from classrooms that don't align with Trump's agenda. Although the Naval Academy is a college, in March, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered the school to review its books at the Nimitz Library to ensure that it complies with the president's order. On April 4, the Navy issued a press release listing the hundreds of books that were removed. That list includes How To Be An Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi and I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou. According to Holiday, his reference to the book ban made some at the school 'extremely worried about reprisals if my talk appeared to flout' the president's order. He was asked to remove them from his speech; he declined and it was cancelled, he wrote. The school 'made a schedule change that aligns with its mission of preparing midshipmen for careers of service,' a Navy spokesperson told the Times. 'The Naval Academy is an apolitical institution.' 'I had no interest in embarrassing anyone or discussing politics directly. I understand the immense pressures they are under, especially the military employees, and I did not want to cause them trouble,' Holiday wrote in the op-ed. 'I did, however, feel it was essential to make the point that the pursuit of wisdom is impossible without engaging with (and challenging) uncomfortable ideas.' He walked through some of his prepared remarks, which included making the point that there was political pressure in the 1950s to pull books from the shelves, but then-President Dwight Eisenhower refrained from doing so. 'My idea is that censorship and hiding solves nothing,' the president told reporters shortly after his 1953 inauguration. Eisenhower then pointed to all of the materials that circulated before World War II that went unread but could have perhaps helped anticipate the tragedies that were about to strike. 'What I am talking about is let's educate ourselves if we are going to run a free government, and let's [not] be afraid of its weaknesses as well as its strength,' he said. Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf was not among the books pulled from the library, Holiday noted. 'As heinous as that book is, it should be accessible to scholars and students of history. However, this makes the removal of Maya Angelou's I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings inexplicable,' he wrote. 'Whatever one thinks of D.E.I., we are not talking about the writings of external enemies here, but in many cases, art, serious scholarship and legitimate criticism of America's past.'
