The artist – at the time in his 20s – was interviewed by Mr Wrench, a former BBC arts correspondent, in the summer of 2003 to mark the opening of Banksy’s Turf War show in east London. An edited version was aired that July on the BBC’s PM programme. However, not all of the material was used. Many years later, Mr Wrench was listening to The Banksy Story podcast, and this prompted him to recover the full interview on a minidisc in his house.
The never-heard-before interview includes Banksy’s thoughts on his own art, on Charles Saatchi and many other issues. You can listen to it here:
There is little doubt that the person interviewed by BBC Radio is the same guy with a Bristol accent who was interviewed on camera by ITV reporter Haig Gordon before the opening of Turf War in July 2003 in London:
ITV’s Haig Gordon interviewed Banksy at the Turf War exhibition, July 2003.
Banksy’s unaltered voice in the two interviews above is strikingly similar to the voice of the person presented as Banksy in another BBC interview three years earlier at the Severnshed exhibition in February 2000:
BBC Bristol interviewed Banksy at the Severnshed exhibition, February 2000.
This line of thought in the “Who is Banksy?” mystery is supported by some photographs in Steve Lazarides’ book Captured from 2019, especially one on page 154 depicting a Banksy consistent with the alleged Banksy in the resuscitated ITV interview. Whether this person is “one of the Banksys” or “the Banksy” will never be known. The puzzle is part of the overall artistic expression, in which we all play a role.
As Steve Lazarides put it in an interview for the French documentary Most wanted from 2019:
“You will never be able to know who Banksy is. At least 50 to 60% of my time was spent trying to keep him anonymous.”
“How?” asked the reporter.
“We did all sorts of things; we did fake news stories; we were way ahead of Donald Trump on the fake news. Part of it was putting out fake news stories; I put the website in my name; and lots of other things I’m not going to tell you.”
Team Banksy hinted that when the show opened, they would take it on tour if it “proved popular.” On 26 August, Pest Control Office confirmed that there would be a tour, and they are now soliciting suggestions for locations and venues. Hopefully, this will bring an end to all the touring exhibitions with fakes and reproductions.
The Scottish newspaper The Herald was first to publish the story:
‘CUT & RUN’, which has been officially authorised by Banksy, will reveal for the first time the stencils used to create many of the artist’s most iconic works. Spanning from 1988 to the present day, Banksy calls the exhibition, which includes authentic artefacts, ephemera and the artist’s actual toilet, ‘25 years card labour’.
“I’ve kept these stencils hidden away for years, mindful they could be used as evidence in a charge of criminal damage. But that moment seems to have passed, so now I’m exhibiting them in a gallery as works of art. I’m not sure which is the greater crime”, the artist told The Herald.
The new exhibition is being staged at the Gallery of Modern Art (GoMA) in Glasgow city centre, the main gallery of contemporary art in Scotland’s largest city. Opening this Sunday, it will run for three months and open all night at weekends. The Herald understands that if the exhibition proves popular, the show may then tour.
Banksy has launched a new exclusive website for the exhibition where one can book tickets: https://cutandrun.co.uk.
No photography is permitted in the main exhibition. The visitors can only take photos in a room after the gift shop, in what is presented as young Banksy’s boys-room:
Banksy’s interest in helicopters started earlyEarly drawing, signed A.M.W…Spitfire, signed A.M.WLord of the Rings poster by Jimmy CautyMagritte posterThere are lots of Christian references in Banksy’s imagery. This could a clue of how that interest started: Bible-school?
The pop-up show opened on 1 October on Church Street in Croydon, just a few miles south of London. If Dismaland was Banksy’s caricature of an amusement park, Gross Domestic Product is Banksy’s caricature of consumer society and shopping hysteria.
The reason for opening the store is not only artistic: There is a trademark dispute between Banksy and a greeting card company using the Banksy brand while selling products with Banksy motives. According to DACS (the not-for-profit visual artists’ rights management organisation in the UK) chairman and media lawyer Mark Stephens: “the law clearly states that if the trademark holder is not using the mark, then it should be handed to someone who will.” The apparent solution: create a merchandise range and open a shop. In Banksy’s own words:
“Everything in the store “has been created specifically to fulfill a particular trademark category under EU law”, Banksy says. “I had the legal sheet pinned up in the studio like a muse.” He adds: “John Lennon said: ‘I’m an artist, give me a tuba and I’ll get something out of it.’ I feel the same way about a trademark dispute.”
Banksy’s take on Brexit is well known, as we have seen in three pieces during the last two years. The first is the big mural in Dover, unveiled on 7 May 2017. The second piece contributed to last year’s summer exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts with the Vote to Love. And this year, Banksy is back at the RAA summer exhibition with an Archway salvaged from Heathrow Airport.
Banksy’s former agent Steve Lazarides opened an interesting exhibition at his Mayfair gallery of some of Banksy’s most coveted oil paintings, labelled Greatest Hits 2002 – 2008. At the centre of the show are seven unique pieces from the 2005 Crude Oil exhibition. One can also find the original paintings of some of the most iconic prints, such as Christ with shopping bags, Barcode Leopard, and Trolleys. The exhibition runs until 25 August.
Banksy made it into the Royal Academy of Arts with a piece on the Brexit referendum. The Royal Academy of Arts (RA) celebrates its 250th anniversary with an extended summer exhibition. In his own words:
“I entered an early version of this into the RA summer exhibition under the pseudonym Bryan S Gaakman – an anagram of ‘banksy anagram’. It was refused. Then a month later I got a mail from the co-ordinator Grayson Perry asking me to submit something so I sent it again. It’s now hanging in gallery 3.”
The Walled Off Hotel is the latest big exhibition by Banksy, with more than 20 new originals. The hotel is a piece of art in itself and effectively mixes art, politics, and tourism. On the ground floor are approx. 15 new Banksy studio pieces and a museum commemorating “a hundred years since the British took control of Palestine and helped kick start a Century of confusion and conflict”.
On the upper floor, there are eight hotel rooms that are bookable, some of which have Banksy decorations. There is also an exhibition hall with local Palestinian artists, among them Suleyman Mansour.
Photos: R.A.
–
The official video clip from the opening of Walled Off Hotel:
–
As reported by The Guardian on 3 March 2017:
‘Worst view in the world’: Banksy opens hotel overlooking Bethlehem wall
By Emma Graham Harrison
Exclusive: British artist launches Walled Off hotel in hope of bringing Israeli tourists – and dialogue – to West Bank city
The Walled Off hotel may sound utilitarian, even bleak. Its owner says it has “the worst view of any hotel in the world”, while its 10 rooms get just 25 minutes of direct sunlight a day. But, nestled against the controversial barrier wall separating Israel from the Palestinian territories, the West Bank’s answer to the Waldorf offers travellers something more elusive than any luxury destination.
The lodging in Bethlehem is a hotel, museum, protest and gallery all in one, packed with the artworks and angry brilliance of its owner, British street artist Banksy. From the disconcertingly lavish presidential suite where water splashes from a bullet-strafed watertank into the hot tub, to the bunk-beds in the budget room scavenged from an abandoned army barracks, the hotel is playful and strongly political.
All the rooms look out on to the concrete slabs of the wall and some have views over it to pill boxes and an Israeli settlement – illegal under international law – on the hillside beyond.
“Walls are hot right now, but I was into them long before [Donald] Trump made it cool,” said Banksy in a statement. The artist, who fiercely guards his anonymity, first came to Bethlehem more than a decade ago, leaving a series of paintings on the barrier that have become a tourist destination in their own right. Since then, the town’s pilgrim and sightseeing-based economy has been ravaged by ever-tighter Israeli controls on travel between Israel and the Palestinian territories, so the new hotel is expected to provide a welcome boost in jobs and visitor numbers.
Banksy’s reputation is likely to keep all rooms fully booked, but he wants guests to leave with more than just a selfie. “(It’s) a three-storey cure for fanaticism, with limited car parking,” he added in the statement. The hotel opens to guests on 20 March, with bookings via the website. The team hope Israelis, who rarely see the barrier wall up close or visit Palestinian towns, will be among the guests, even though visiting means breaking the law.
“I would like to invite everyone to come here, invite Israeli civilians to come visit us here,” said manager Wisam Salsaa. “We want them to learn more about us, because when they know us it will break down the stereotypes and things will change.”
Israelis are banned from visiting Bethlehem and its famous sites. And although Banksy has chosen a site officially under Israeli military control – meaning it is legal for Israelis to stay there – all the roads to reach it involve an illegal journey through Palestinian-controlled territory.
The hotel, a former pottery workshop, has a dystopian colonial theme, a nod to Britain’s role in the region’s history, the reception and tea-room a disconcerting take on a gentlemen’s club where a self-playing piano provides an eerie soundtrack. The fire flickering in the grate glows under a pile of concrete rubble, like a blaze at a bomb site, a classical bust in a niche is wreathed in clouds of gas snaking out of a tear gas canister and, in traditional seascapes, the beaches are littered with life-jackets discarded by refugees.
“It’s exactly 100 years since Britain took control of Palestine and started rearranging the furniture – with chaotic results,” Banksy said. “I don’t know why, but it felt like a good time to reflect on what happens when the United Kingdom makes a huge political decision without fully comprehending the consequences.”
Upstairs, original Banksy artworks decorate several of the rooms. In one, an Israeli soldier and a Palestinian protester thump each other with pillows, the feathers fluttering down towards the real pillows of the bed below. In another, a pack of cheetahs crouch over a zebra-print sofa, where padded entrails snake out of a cushion. The bookshelves are packed with carefully chosen titles – A Room With a View at the end of one, Cage Me a Peacock on another stack. The elevator is walled off, too, the doors jammed half open to show concrete breeze blocks, hung with an “out of service” sign.
A small museum explains the wall, the controls on movement and the troubled history of the region, curated together with Essex University professor Gavin Grindon. “If you are not completely baffled, then you don’t understand,” the presenter of a video history signs off.
Also in the building, part of a plan to promote dialogue, is a gallery showing the work of Palestinian artists. It is the first in Bethlehem, says curator Housni Alkateeb Shehada, and a way for artists, who often find it hard to travel, to reach a wider audience.
He wanted to project art on to the barrier wall which lies just five meters away, but decided in the end that it would be too risky, a reminder of the conflict and restrictions that looms over all the people living in Bethlehem. “We are very afraid,” said Shehada. “We don’t know what is going on there with the soldiers and it is forbidden.”
Banksy dismissed worries that security concerns would keep people away, pointing out that he had packed out a “bemusement park” in an unglamorous English seaside town for weeks.
“My accountant was worried some people will be too scared to travel to the West Bank, but then I remind him – for my last show they spent a whole day in Weston-super-Mare.”
Dismaland was a temporary art project organised and financed by Banksy, constructed in the seaside resort town of Weston-super-Mare in Somerset, England. Prepared in secret, the pop-up exhibition at the Tropicana, a disused lido, was “a sinister twist on Disneyland” that opened during the weekend of 21 August 2015 and closed permanently on 27 September 2015, 36 days later. Banksy described it as a “family theme park unsuitable for children.” 4,000 tickets were available for purchase per day, priced at £3 each.
The show featured 58 artists from the 60 Banksy initially invited to participate. The list included Damien Hirst, Jenny Holzer, Jimmy Cauty, Tracy Emin, Jeff Gillette, David Shrigley, Paco Pomet, Escif, Peter Kennard, and many more.
Banksy created approximately 15 new works for Dismaland:
Grim Reaper at Dismaland
Some of Banksy’s pieces at Dismaland. Photos: R.A.
–
The official Dismaland trailer:
–
The Dismaland Programme
Maybe the best way to get an understanding of Dismaland without having been there is through the official programme. You can download it here:
List of artists at Dismaland in order of appearance in the programme:
Bill Barminski. California, 1962. ‘The cardboard security room’
Ben Long. UK, 1978. ‘The cornice ice cream’
Stephen Powers. USA, 1968.
Jenny Holzer. Ohio, 1950.
Caitlin Cherry. Chicago, 1987.
Caroline McCarthy. Ireland, 1971.
Banksy. UK, 197?
Dietrich Wegner. Australia. ‘The mushroom cloud’ and the ‘Baby in the vending machine’
Andreas Hykade. Germany, 1968.
James Joyce. UK.
Brock Davis. USA. The Broccoli painting
Josh Keyes. USA, 1969. ‘The great white shark’
Leigh Mulley. UK. Balloons
Jani Leinonen. Finland, 1978. ‘Modified cereal boxes’
Barry Reigate. UK, 1971.
Jeff Gilette. California, 1979. Conceptual inspiration for Dismaland.
Lee Madgwick. UK. The rural solitary house with Internet access
Paco Pomet. Spain, 1970. ‘Once upon a time’, ‘Internacional’ and ‘Bloody Trees’
Laura Lancaster. UK, 1979.
Zaria Forman. USA, 1982.
Jessica Harrison. UK, 1982. Small porcelain figures.
Kate MacDowell. USA. The hare wearing a gasmask
Maskull Laserre. Canada, 1978. Janus – the wooden carousel horse.
Severija Inčirauskaitė. Lithuania, 1977.
Amir Schiby. Israel. The four palestininan boys in Gaza.
Sami Musa. Palestina.
Neta Harari Navon. Israel, 1970.
Huda Beydoun. Saudi Arabia, 1988.
ESCIF. Spain, 1980.
LU$H. Australia
Axel Void (Alejandro Hugo Dorda Mevs). USA.
Jimmy Cauty. UK, 1956. ADP – the miniature urban landscape
Tim Hunkin & Andy Plant. UK. ‘The Astronauts Caravan’
Block 9. UK. ‘The Fairytale Castle’
David Shrigley. UK. The ‘I am an imbecille’ balloons
Scott Hove. USA.
Ronit Baranga. Israel.
Dorcas Casey. UK. The horses in the Cinderella castle
Polly Morgan. UK. Taxidermist animals
Damien Hirst. UK, 1965. ‘the Unicorn’
Mike Ross. USA. ‘Big Rig Jig’
Michael Beitz. USA.
Peter Kennard & Cat Phillips. The David Cameron Billboard
Wasted Rita. Portugal, 1978. Written messages on big Post-Its.
Paul Insect & Bäst. UK and USA.
Greg Haberny. USA, 1975.
Nettie Wakefield. UK, 1987.
Darren Cullen. UK, 1983. The Pocket Money Loan installation
Tinsel Edwards, UK
Ed Hall, UK. The banners
Dr Gavin Grindon. UK. Museum of Cruel Objects
Joanna Pollonais, Canada.
Suliman Mansour. Palestina.
Tammam Azzam. Syria, 1980.
Shadi Al Zaqzouq. Libya, 1989.
El Teneen. Egypt
Mana Neyestani. Iran.
Fares Cachoux. Syria.
–
Dismaland Reviews
The Guardian published a surprisingly negative review of Dismaland on 21 August 2015:
In Dismaland, Banksy has created something truly depressing
By Jonathan Jones
The artist’s ‘Bemusement Park’ claims to be making you think, but as an actual experience it is thin, threadbare and, to be honest, quite boring
This place is unreal. A dilapidated pub, desperate-looking big wheel and grim promenade perfectly express the melancholy of the British seaside. But that’s just Weston-super-Mare on a cloudy morning. Dismaland is even stranger. Or so I hope, as I join the very first visitors to Banksy’s “Bemusement Park” waiting to see what lies behind a miserably gothic sign on the battered facade of a decaying lido.
People have been waiting for hours in a queue that stretches far along the prom. A thousand free tickets have been given away to Weston-super-Mare residents for this first public day. All ages and subcultures, from punks to a man dressed entirely in union jacks, are waiting to have their bags searched.
There are two layers of security as we pour in: real and fake. The fake security is one of the funniest moments of the day. Created by Californian artist Bill Barminski, it consists of cardboard X-ray machines and tables of cardboard objects supposedly taken from visitors. But this joke about modern security systems does not change the fact that before you enter Dismaland you do actually get your bag thoroughly inspected by very real security guards who asked one visitor if he had any knives or, get this, spray cans. All graffiti in Dismaland is official graffiti.
You can see why Banksy needs to control spontaneous art. Already the streets between the railway station and his attraction have been enlivened by rival street artists. Banksy. He’s so famous that Weston-super-Mare’s lucky golden ticket holders rush into the park already taking pictures, and I too am caught up in the thrill. This has been in the Daily Mail and everything, it’s got to be special.
Greeters – or rather, sulkers – wear Mickey Mouse ears and T-shirts that say DISMAL. Instead of being forced to smile all day they have to grimace all day. Some are so good at it they appear genuinely pissed off. It’s infectious, for me at least.
As cameraphones snap everything in sight, the gloom of the British seaside at its most dilapidated and moribund wells up in me. Memories of amusement arcades in Rhyl. Banksy has created something truly depressing. There at the heart of Dismaland is the fairytale castle, ruinous and rancid. The lake around it has a fountain that is a police water cannon. But an empty feeling is starting to hollow me out. Where’s the fun I was promised? Well, I wasn’t promised any fun, just dismalness. But surely not this dismal.
Inside the festering wreck of a fairytale castle, Cinderella’s coach has crashed. Flash bulbs create indoor lightning as paparazzi photograph her. Shock! It’s like the death of Diana. But there’s no emotion. The lifesize tableau, by Banksy himself, is just one big smirk. Wait. He’s built a castle. He leads us into it … For this? It’s such a trite, simplistic joke.
Dismaland is not all crap jokey installations, however. There are political one-liners here as well as artistic ones. People are queuing up to go inside a caravan with intense displays about the evil of our fascist police state. There is also a huge model of said fascist police state, with tiny police cars everywhere, blue lights flashing right across a diorama of a city at night.
The irony of the security on the way into Dismaland is underlined by all the references to CCTV and the wicked security establishment that pervade it. Yet that obvious double standard goes much deeper. Dismaland is a kind of consummation, for me, of all that is false about Banksy. It claims to be “making you think” and above all to be defying the consumer society, the leisure society, the commodification of the spectacle. Disneyland packages dreams, Dismaland is a blast of reality. But it is just a media phenomenon, something that looks much better in photos than it feels to be here. “Being here” is itself just a way of touching the magic of Banksy’s celebrity – that’s why everyone is taking pictures. This is somewhere to come to say you went. As an actual experience it is thin and threadbare, and I found, to be honest, quite boring.
I felt I was participating in a charade where everyone has to pretend this is a better joke than it is. In reality the crazy fairgrounds and dance tents at rock festivals are far more subversive – because they are joyous.
Perhaps you need intoxicants to enjoy Dismaland, and I was there at 11 in the morning. But its failure to create joy is self-defeating. Funfairs really are strange, wild places, as film-makers have known since Tod Browning made Freaks and rock music has known since the Doors recorded Strange Days. But in Dismaland, the rather well established idea that fairs are bizarre is not taken anywhere new or interesting.
As a news story, a media sensation, it works wonderfully – but up close, this is a Potemkin theme park. It’s not an experience, just a pasteboard substitute for one. Indeed, it is a mere art exhibition. Dismaland does not offer the energy and danger that real theme parks do. Instead, it brings together a lot of bad art by the seaside.
Banksy shows a painting of a mother and child about to be overwhelmed by a tsunami. The grotesquely clumsy crudeness of his painting technique up close, and without any excuse that he did it quickly to evade the cops, is embarrassing. But nastiest of all is the work’s peculiar lack of human feeling. We are – apparently – meant to think it’s funny that the wave is about to kill these beachgoers. They have lots of commodities, you see – sun cream and stuff. All the detritus of consumer capitalism. See the wave of the future crush them! This heartless allegory is worthy of Maoist propaganda. As art it is sterile and dead.
Banksy does better with a figure of Death riding a dodgem. This would be a lot of fun if you could go on the dodgems and try to dodge death. Sadly you just have to watch. It elicits a half laugh.
At least a visit to Dismaland is a real, sustained chance to assess Banksy as an artist. His one-dimensional jokes and polemics lack any poetic feeling. Devoid of ambiguity or mystery, everything he has created here is inert and unengaging. Cinderalla dies and no one gives a toss. What a good joke about our time, that one of the most famous critics of the way we live now is nothing more than a media-savvy cultural entrepreneur.
Banksy’s taste in other artists is no more insightful. Most of the artists he’s selected for this seaside outing are as one-dimensional as his own visions.
Only one image held me. It has been a long time since I was thrilled to see a Damien Hirst but among all the half-baked efforts here, Hirst’s gold-framed vitrine containing a unicorn has a true strangeness. It is not preachy or self righteous. Nor is its fascination easily explained. It is a real fairground attraction, freakish and bizarre. Dismaland needs a few more unicorns. So does Weston-super-Mare. So do we all.
On 1 October 2013, Banksy began a one-month residency on the streets of New York. Team Banksy produced one street art piece in different locations daily for the rest of the month. Chronological sequence, from 1 to 31 October:
Grim Reaper at Better Out in New York
–
Banksy published a film clip where he summarised his New York residency:
Banksy unofficial 