Frontier, 2006
Oil on canvas
Exhibited
Barely Legal, Los Angeles, 2006
Catalogue Note
Created for Barely Legal in Los Angeles in 2006, Frontier is Banksy’s meditation on the death of the American frontier myth. A romantic Western landscape, complete with covered wagon, horses and endless open plains, is interrupted by the towering neon signs of roadside motels, casinos and fast-food restaurants. The untamed wilderness has been replaced by commercial spectacle.
The title is deliberately ironic. The frontier once represented exploration, self-reliance and limitless possibility; in Banksy’s version, it has become a landscape colonized not by pioneers but by corporate branding and consumer culture. The towering signs overwhelm both the wagon and the natural scenery, suggesting that commerce has become the new conqueror of the American West.
Like many of the works produced for Barely Legal, Frontier explores the tension between myth and reality. By inserting unmistakably contemporary symbols into a nostalgic landscape, Banksy reveals how historical ideals are gradually eroded by commercialization. The result is both humorous and melancholic: a vision of the American Dream where the horizon is no longer defined by nature, but by advertising.
