Banksy’s first non-street art exhibition was called “A Romantic View of Easton”. It was organised by Paul Kelly and took place in a flat in Easton, Bristol. There was an early version of Love is in the Air.
Banksy did an interview with the Knowledge Magazine the same year, where he explained his move into oil on canvas:
“What I’m facing is this compromise between making images that are more beautiful than my graffiti but get seen by less people. I think doing a gallery show would be kind of a step down, both in terms of how many people see your shit and what type of person sees it.”
Here are some of the works Banksy presented at the exhibition in Easton:
Photos: Mark Simmons – Home Sweet Home, Banksy’s Bristol.
THE MILD MILD WEST. BRISTOL 1999
The Mild Mild West is one of Banksy’s most iconic freehand works. Banksy painted it in broad daylight on a building in Stoke Croft, Bristol. It’s a response to several incidents in the late 90s with the Bristol police breaking up rave parties in full riot gear.
CARLTON ARMS, NEW YORK. 1999
A few months later, Banksy visited New York and the Carlton Arms Hotel on East 25th Street, where he decorated a stairwell and the room 5B.
From the magazine Curbed New York:
“The artists are mostly up-and-comers, but some went on to garner significant acclaim—none more so than Banksy, who decorated a stairwell and room 5B in 1999, years before he became the world’s most famous street artist. His colorful murals of cartoonish animals are a far cry from the satirical monochrome stenciling for which he later became known.
But outside the lobby there’s another early Banksy with more recognizable motifs: a fat cat politician smoking a cigar, a campaign poster of Elvis in Mickey Mouse ears, and a ballot box with a stick of dynamite wedged inside.
One of the managers, Hugo Ariz, says that Banksy—whom he describes as “a very funny, nice, regular kind of guy”—was experimenting with stenciling while at the hotel, and some of his practice stencils lying around somewhere. Ariz recently unearthed a rolled-up canvas that turns out to be a Shadowman painting by Richard Hambleton, the street artist whose sinister figures covered downtown Manhattan in the 1980s. Apparently, the Basquiat and Haring contemporary lived and worked at the hotel for a year; you can spot some of his pieces in the corridors and near the front door.”
Source: https://ny.curbed.com/2017/9/29/16384778/nyc-hotels-carlton-arms-banksy-artwork
Banksy unofficial 