Bold, bright and blonde – Banksy’s Kate Moss wittily pays homage to Andy Warhol’s iconic portraits of Marilyn Monroe. Moss flaunts Monroe’s most iconic attributes – her signature curls, flirtatious eyelashes, boldly-defined lips, and prominent beauty-spot. As well as Monroe’s superimposed features, the addition of flat, solid color in contrasting tones of purple and orange acts to capture Warhol’s vivid Pop aesthetic. Although Moss emulates Monroe so closely, she does not imitate her gaze – whereas Monroe seductively stares straight out at the viewer, Moss gazes into the distance with a tantalizingly nonchalant coolness.

In recreating Warhol’s work in the 21^st Century, Banksy both praises the artist and adds a new level of criticality. In Marilyn (1967), Warhol glamorizes fame but simultaneously satirically comments on the notion of celebrity and its position as ‘spectacle’ in consumer culture. Repeating Monroe’s portrait through screenprinting, her image became a commercial product, no longer attached to her as an individual but as a product of her era. Kate Moss is arguably Monroe’s successor: a contemporary fashion icon, she is one of the most famous supermodels of her time. Banksy uses the image of Kate Moss with the same intentions as his predecessor – the commodification of visual icons.