On the night between 8-9 June, a new artwork by the anonymous street artist Laika appeared in Rome. Since 2019, wearing a red wig and a white mask, the street artist has been active in Rome, fighting against all forms of injustice.
In this special month, she is back with a new ‘poster’ work in Via Labicana, near the Colosseum. The work is entitled ‘Fight for (y)our rights‘ and is dedicated to the LGBTQAI+ community. The title, as well as the image, create a parallelism with the poster of Clint Eastwood’s film ‘Flags for our fathers‘, which here becomes ‘pride’.

“Every year, this is a special month: it is a celebration of all the struggles made so far against discrimination and violence against the LGBTQIA+ community and all those to come…FIGHT ALL for civil rights, to erase discrimination, to eliminate violence and homotranssphobia. Remember that OUR RIGHTS ARE YOUR RIGHTS and vice versa,’ Laika writes on her Facebook account.

We don’t know so much about Laika. On her website she explains the reason for the name, a tribute to the first living being in space, the little dog embarked on Sputnik 2. Her identity is concealed behind a white mask and a red helmeted wig, her disturbing appearance reminding us at times of the vigilante from ‘V for Vendetta’. Although Laika is not as radical and extreme as ‘V’, with her works – which include posters and murals – she enacts a denunciation of the system. Politicians are often the protagonists of her ironic and satirical depictions; Silvio Berlusconi, Matteo Salvini, Boris Johnson and Fidel Castro are just a few of the many subjects covered. Special attention is paid to ingenuity. Laika fights for the defence of migrants, highlights crimes against women and tries to protect the wrongfully imprisoned. Other protagonists of her works are Greta Thunberg, Sonia Hang Zhou, Patrick Zaki and Giulio Regeni.
Her modus operandi, as well as her style, have led her to be called ‘the Italian Banksy‘ and her strong messages reach Italian and international newspapers.

Courtesy Laika