Quick Facts
Aquarius
Biography
Robert Del Naja (; born 21 January 1965), also known as 3D, is a British artist, musician, singer and songwriter. He emerged as a graffiti artist and member of the Bristol collective The Wild Bunch, and later as a founding member of the band Massive Attack, with whom he is still active. Del Naja has been the focus of speculation regarding the real identity of the pseudonymous artist Banksy.
Music
Del Naja is one of the founding members of Bristol trip hop collective Massive Attack. In addition to his work with Massive Attack, he provided vocals to "Invasion" on Unkle's album Never, Never, Land, and "Twilight" on War Stories.
In December 2012, Del Naja released the first single of his new project called "The Battle Box", which fuses music, art and discourse across one-off live events, exhibitions and exclusive vinyl releases. He counted with the collaboration of artists such as Guy Garvey, and the Higgins Waterproof Black Magic Band.
In December 2014, Del Naja donated ten unreleased music tracks to the Game Jam site "Ludum Dare", for a game event taking place in December. The songs will be used by the site developers to make soundtracks for the games. This new music material is also available for free download.
In February 2015, Del Naja and Thom Yorke released the soundtrack for documentary "The UK Gold". The songs are available for free download.
In 2015 he also collaborated with Jean-Michel Jarre on the Electronica 1: The Time Machine album, resulting in the track "Watching You".
Art work
Del Naja was a graffiti artist before becoming a vocalist. His work has been featured on all of Massive Attack's record sleeves. The graffiti artist Banksy cites his work as an influence. Del Naja is credited as being the first graffiti artist in Bristol. He is also regarded as the pioneer of the stencil graffiti movement and bringing hip hop and graffiti culture from the USA to Bristol in the early 1980s.
Del Naja has co-designed all of Massive Attack's lighting shows with UVA; the shows have been overtly political, dealing with current local and international issues.
Del Naja took part in a group show in 2007 called Warpaint at the Lazarides Gallery in London, featuring his art from the Unkle album "War Stories". He also created an exhibition of flags at "Massive Attack's Meltdown Festival" on London's South Bank in 2008. The installation was called "Favoured Nations". In the exhibition, alternative flags of the British Commonwealth were recoloured in the anarchist red and black and hung from the ceiling of the Royal Festival Hall main floor.
Del Naja and Davidge collaborated with United Visual Artists on the large scale installation 'Volume' at London's V&A museum in 2006. It consists of a field of 48 luminous, sound-emitting columns that respond to movement. Visitors weave a path through the sculpture, creating their own unique journey in light and music.
In a 2010 interview, Del Naja said "Painting is difficult for me because I'm colour blind. Back in the day, I had to label my spray cans with what colour they were because I couldn't tell. It's like the emperor's new clothes: [people] telling me it's great, and me pretending that's what I intended. Del Naja's first solo art show ran in the Lazarides gallery, central London from 24 May to 22 June. The show featured many of the works he created for Massive Attack, reinterpreted especially for the exhibition. The show also featured three one-off 'digital infinity mirrors' two of which contained phrases supplied by Reprieve extracted from drone pilot dialogues. Del Naja and Grant DJ'd at the opening night on 23 May.
Del Naja had a solo art show at the Lazarides gallery in central London from 24 May to 22 June 2013. The show's content spanned a period of over twenty years and featured many of the art pieces that Del Naja created for Massive Attack. Each piece, reinterpreted especially for the exhibition, was hand-printed and finished.
It has been speculated that Del Naja is responsible for creating the artwork attributed to the noted graffiti artist Banksy. In a 2017 segment on the Distraction Pieces podcast, guest DJ Goldie commented on Bansky's work: 'Give me a bubble letter and put it on a T-shirt and write “Banksy” on it and we’re sorted. We can sell it now... No disrespect to Robert, I think he is a brilliant artist. I think he has flipped the world of art over.' The last name of the 'Robert' mentioned was never given, but because of Goldie's friendship with Del Naja, it is highly possible Del Naja was being referenced.
Collaboration with Adam Curtis
A multi-medium show conceived and designed by Del Naja and filmmaker Adam Curtis – in collaboration with United Visual Artists (UVA) – premiered in Manchester in July 2013. The show featured a Curtis film, unofficially titled 'The Plan', which was projected onto a huge screen surrounding the audience. The lighting and LED elements that surrounded the film and players were designed by Del Naja and UVA.
Music for film
As Massive Attack
- 1995 Batman Forever (Joel Schumacher) – Hunter Gets Captured By The Game/with Tracy Thorne
- 1997 The Fan (Tony Scott) – Hot Knives and Hymn Of The Big Wheel
- 1997 187 – Spying Glass dub, Karmacoma dub and Better Things dub
- 1998 Pi (Darren Aronofsky) – Angel
- 1999 The Matrix (Wachowski Siblings) – Dissolved Girl
- 1999 The Insider (Michael Mann) – Safe From Harm remix/
- 2000 Snatch (Guy Ritchie) – Angel edit
- 2012 Savages – Paradise Circus (Gui Boratto remix)
Robert Del Naja w/ Neil Davidge / 1.6
- 1997 Welcome to Sarajevo (Michael Winterbottom) – Wire/ End-titles
- 1997 The Jackal – Superpredators (version) – opening titles; end credits
- 2001 Moulin Rouge (Baz Lhurman) end credits – Nature Boy w/ David Bowie
- 2002 Blade 2 – I Against I w/ Mos Def
- 2004 Bullet Boy (Saul Dibb)- Robert Del Naja and Neil Davidge full score and end titles song
- 2005 Danny The Dog (Louis Leterrier) – score and soundtrack record (160k sales to date)
- 2007 Battle In Seattle (Stuart Townsend) – full score
- 2007 In Prison My Whole Life (Marc Evans) – full score and end title song 'Calling Mumia'/with Snoop Dog
- 2008 Trouble The Water (Carl Deal) – full score
Robert Del Naja with Euan Dickinson
- 2008 Gomorrah – (Matteo Garrone) Herculaneum (winner of best song – Italian Oscars).
- 2010 Women Are Heroes (JR). 2011 Dias De Gracia (Everardo Valerio Gout) Summertime/with Scarlett Johansson.
- 2013 The UK Gold (Mark Donne) with Thom Yorke. 2015 The Standing March (JR/Darren Aronofsky)
With The Insects
- 2009 44 inch Chest (Malcolm Venville) full score with Angelo Badalamenti
Musical scene and artistic peers
Robert Del Naja's music has been associated with the Bristol Sound.
Del Naja has said of the Bristol Scene: "We all grew up listening to punk music and funk stuff and those attitudes sort of snuck into our music. That sort of brought people from different circles together and maybe it wasn't as 'cultural melting pot' as it all sounds but because Bristol is quite a small place, it becomes a lot more focused then."
Political stance
Del Naja has been critical of the government policies of the United Kingdom. He was strongly opposed to the 2003 war against Iraq, and with fellow musician Damon Albarn personally paid for full page adverts in the NME magazine. Massive Attack have previously played two shows in Israel, but have declined recent offers. They have described this "not an action of aggression towards the Israeli people" but "towards the [Israeli] government and its policies", arguing that "the Palestinians [in Gaza and the west bank] have no access to the same fundamental benefits that the Israelis do."
In 2005 Del Naja organised and performed at a charity concert in Bristol for Tsunami Relief with Adrian Utley and Geoff Barrow of Portishead. The two-night event featured Massive Attack, Portishead, Robert Plant, The Coral and Damon Albarn. Del Naja and Marshall performed three shows in 2005 in support of Hoping, an organisation that helps raise money, support projects for Palestinian youth in refugee camps in the Gaza strip and the west bank, Lebanon and Syria.
Del Naja and Thom Yorke of Radiohead threw an unofficial office Christmas party at an occupied UBS bank in London in December 2011, in recognition and support for the international Occupy movement.
Having previously boycotted playing at Bristol's Colston Hall due to its connection with the city's historic slave trade, in October 2012, Del Naja heavily criticised Bristol Mayor candidate George Ferguson because of his membership of a local organisation the Society of Merchant Venturers. The organisation dates back to the 16th century and had many connections with the Bristol slave trade, continuing to this day as an elitist private organisation, open to very few by invitation only. In November 2012 Del Naja then took a surprising stance to reverse his position and endorse the politically independent, wealthy, ex LibDem parliamentary candidate, George Ferguson. Del Naja was cited by local media as saying that the other candidates had only party political agendas at heart and a newly elected mayor needed more imagination to help implement creative projects for Bristol.
In July 2014 Del Naja and Marshall visited the Bourge-El Barajneh refugee camp in Lebanon to meet with Palestinian volunteers at an educational centre. The band's profit from the show in Byblos was donated to the centre.
Personal life
Del Naja was brought up in the Bishopston district of Bristol. His father is an immigrant from Naples in Italy and as a result Robert is a passionate supporter of the S.S.C. Napoli football team, as well as Bristol City.
