Does the phrase "too soon" apply to street art? New York-based artist Hanksy is known for parodies that combine two seemingly unrelated things into one funny portrait (like Tom Hanks and Banksy), but the art that he posted on his Instagram this week won't be very funny to some people.
According to ANIMAL, the Eazy-E Bola piece was pasted in Chinatown at the corner of Division and Canal Streets. If you haven't figured it out by the name, it's a combination of the late rapper Eazy-E, who died in 1995 from AIDS, with the very deadly Ebola (the virus, not the Jersey-brand heroin) that is spreading through West Africa. The rapper is drawn in the shape of the virus strand with two guns and a bottle of pills. The caption for the image reads "Straight Outta Congo," a play on the N.W.A song "Straight Outta Compton."
ANIMAL points out that the Congo is not in West Africa, and asked the artist the artist about the new work: "Don’t get me wrong, Ebola is like hella serious omg, but American media just loves to sensationalize things...Then again I was in Texas last week and came down with a pretty nasty cough. Maybe I should get myself checked out."
Hanksy's followers seem to get and love the humor and have been adding their own rapper/virus mashups in the comments for the post, including "Flurida," "Cerebral PaulWallsy," "Cancer-Mix-a-Lot," and "Kanye West Nile Virus."
[via ANIMAL]
