A
graffiti artist from
Bristol,
UK. His anti-corporate and anti-government stencil work can be seen around many cities, from
Manchester and
London to
San Francisco and
Barcelona. The reason he uses stencils is basically because he wasn't any good at doing freehand stuff, and decided that in a 24-hour city, you need to be able to hit your target in 40 seconds or so, to avoid any unwanted attention from
pigs or passers-by.
He held an art
exhibition once, by spraying over an entire street and keeping the
location secret until the day of the show, when he
emailed people on his
mailing list, inviting them to go there. Each image was numbered, and people could order original
prints through an associate of his.
A lot of what Banksy does is subversive as well as dangerous. He invaded Barcelona
Zoo, climbed into the penguin enclosure, and sprayed "I'm sick of
fish" as well as prisoners' tally marks on the walls. He also added "
Mind the Crap" to every step on the
Tate Gallery on the night of a major show. He seems to like the theme of rodents and simians in his work, especially ones carrying tools and weapons. This is all a part of what he sees as the lower people "coming up from the sewers" to make changes.
He has only ever been
caught by the police once, when he was in
New York and someone told the
cops that he was defacing a
billboard.
Unfortunately, not much else is known about him, because if it was,
a lot of people would want to have a
lot of words with him. He has had two books of grafitti
published,
"Banging Your Head Against A Brick Wall" and
"Existencilism". And he also has a website, which can be found (funnily enough) at http://www.banksy.co.uk
Sources:
Bizarre Magazine
www.banksy.co.uk
Oolong
www.squall.co.uk