Fiona Banner

Banner’s work consists of sculpture, drawings, installations, books and performances. She frequently makes use of language and its physical form. The punctuation mark, for instance, has been transformed into sculpture that literally punctuates the exhibition space; and her large wall drawings describe, in words, subjects ranging from popular films to the Battle of Hastings. 

In later works she used parts of military airplanes, armaments that in her view attest to the failure of language. Nose Art comprises two nose cones of fighter jets (Harrier Jump Jets) which are installed high on the wall. Added to their surface is a graphite drawing of ‘pinstripes’. Banner often works with this motif, taken from the pinstriped suit – thesymbol of London City’s male bastion of power. The term ‘nose art’ refers to a kind of military folk art in which popular icons, such as movie stars, are painted on airplanes. Banner regards the nose cones as the most heroic part of an airplane, and in this work she ironically links ‘masculinity’ with hunting trophies and women’s breasts.