Banksy and the Rise of Outlaw Art TV - Banksy - Banksy: Exit Through the Gift Shop TV - Graffiti Wars TV - Graffiti: From Tags to Riches TV - Banksy Does New York TV - The Banksy Job TV -
In October 2018 the anonymous street artist known as Banksy published this video online. In it he can be seen preparing a custom frame for his panting, Girl with Balloon. The painting is about to be offered for sale at Sotherby’s. Banksy and the Rise of Outlaw Art, Sky Arts 2021
As the hammer struck, the work started to fall through the frame, and as it did it shredded, and everyone witnessed in horror as it was destroyed. It caused a huge stir. ibid.
Painting, or bombing, the New York subway system soon became the primary focus for young graffiti writers obsessed with having their name seen as widely as possible. The nascent art movement developed it own grammar, rules and culture. ibid.
In the summer of 1989 the British Transport Police launched a series of raids to arrest Bristol’s most infamous graffiti artists. The raids were the culmination of Operation Anderson: a year-long investigation into Barton Hill: the biggest anti-Graffiti operation ever to be undertaken in the UK. ibid.
Basquiat and Keith Haring were really the beginning of street art, modern street art. ibid.
For Banksy, there was no influence more important than the French stencil artists: Blek le Rat. Blek, who had first encountered graffiti on a trip to New York, adapted the idea of street art to the European tradition, stencilling political statements on walls … 1981: stencils of rats started to appear in Paris. ibid.
That winter, Banksy entered Tate Britain, placed a painting on the wall and walked into the history books. With incursions into museums and galleries, and other stunts that followed, Banksy pioneered a new type of performance art. ibid.
Palestine: In 2005 … he travelled to the Middle East to paint the West Bank barrier, a controversial wall erected by the Isreali government … The collection of paintings that resulted by met with international acclaim. ibid.
2007 Santa’s Ghetto: The plight of the Palestinians … he held the annual Santa’s ghetto in Bethlehem. ibid.
In 2017 he opened The Walled Off Hotel, a dystopian art installation that marked the 100th anniversary of British control over Palestine. ibid.
A year later Banksy returned home to stage Banksy vs Bristol Museum, his largest exhibition to date. ibid.
Every time I think I have painted something slightly original, I find out that Blek Le Rat did it twenty years earlier. Banksy, Daily Mirror 2008
If you think my graffiti is overrated you’d be right. I only hope that one day I get the lack of recognition I deserve. Banksy
The holy grail is to spend less time making the picture than it takes people to look at it. Banksy
Is this a joke? I’ve never been hit by Robbo in my life. I don’t know who he slapped but I hope they deserved it. Banksy
If you want things to last, you shouldn’t paint them under a bridge on the canal. Banksy
Your mind is working at its best when you’re being paranoid. You explore every avenue and possibility of your situation at high speed with total clarity. Banksy, Banging Your Head Against a Brick Wall
The story of what happened when this guy tried to make a documentary about me, but he was actually a lot more interesting than I am, so now the film is kind of about him. It’s not Gone With the Wind, but there’s probably a moral in there somewhere. Banksy: Exit Through the Gift Shop, 2010
This guy was Thierry Guetta [Mr Brainwash]. A Frenchman who had been living in Los Angeles, emigrating to the United States in the early 1980s. ibid.
An explosive new movement that would become known as Street Art. ibid.
He had accidentally found a focus. The man who would film anything had stumbled into an intriguing underground world. And now that he had found it, he wasn’t about to let it go. ibid.
Shepard [Fairey] was the world’s most prolific street artist. ibid.
Thierry [Mr Brainwash] was constantly meeting new street artists. ibid.
Banksy had started out as a provincial graffiti artist but before long his stencils were appearing all over Britain. Through a series of DIY art shows Banksy was now taking vandalism in an entirely new direction. ibid.
By targeting that world’s most notorious wall Banksy turned a spot of hit-and-run vandalism into an international news event ... Who was Banksy? His work seemed to be everywhere. ibid.
His first major US exhibition Barely Legal. ibid.
The endorsements [of Thierry’s show] were immediately picked up by the media, and within days Thierry was being interviewed by the editor of the city’s biggest listings magazine – LA Weekly. ibid.
Finally the doors opened to a public eager to feast their eyes on the grand debut of Mr Brainwash [Thierry] ibid.
A major new star was born before their eyes. ibid.
By the end of his opening week Thierry would sell almost $1,000,000 of art. Mr Brainwash had arrived. ibid.
1Life is Beautiful stayed open for a further two months. ibid.
Nor did Blek [Le Rat] realise that his own very individual style would be so closely replicated on the streets of Britain. ibid.
This man is described by some as one of the most important figures in counter-culture art. But the chances are you’ve never heard of him. Most of his work no longer exists. And was painted illegally in the first place. King Robbo is a wanted man and protects his identify for fear of arrest. Graffiti Wars, Channel 4 2011
He is one of the pioneers of graffiti writing. A movement that champions freedom of expression, and can be seen on street corners all over the world. ibid.
This is Banksy: the enigmatic street artist who also came from graffiti but has sold a popular and commercially successful version back to the world. ibid.
The different treatment of Banksy and Robby is symptomatic of a wider battle between street art and graffiti. ibid.
The most divisive art feud since Matisse and Picasso. ibid.
For the teenage Robbo from a tough London council estate bombing the trains was a way to raise a big middle finger to authority, as well as a opportunity to get his art seen by as many people as possible. An art gallery on wheels. ibid.
Robbo’s talent and ingenuity made him the undisputed graffiti king in London in the 80s and early 90s. ibid.
All of his work gradually vanished from the walls and trains of London except for this piece – painted in 1985 underneath the British Transport Police Headquarters ... The oldest piece of graffiti in London. ibid.
One night he met a young artist from Bristol called Banksy ... Banksy doesn’t play by graffiti’s rules and never did ... Banksy attacked Robbo’s final piece of work and turned the famous canal-side piece into this ... Banksy’s act was considered sacrilegious by many in the graffiti world. And it brought King Robbo out of retirement. ibid.
Graffiti writing has a strict code of conduct. ibid.
Robbo called into question Banksy’s artistic integrity. ibid.
Shoreditch: this is mecca for the world’s best street art and home to the galleries that bring it to a wider audience. ibid.
This gallery helped to establish Banksy as a selling artist. The fact that Robbo is now exhibiting here has not gone down well with the stenciller’s hardcore supporters. ibid.
But Robbo would never get his chance to retaliate against Banksy. Just days after this filming took place he was found unconscious in the street with life-threatening head injuries. And he’s been in a coma ever since. ibid.
Since Graffiti first started appearing on the streets of the UK almost thirty years ago it’s come a long long way. Graffiti: From Tags to Riches, Sky Arts 2013
Banksy: whose work now sells for hundreds of thousands of pounds. ibid.
Authorities divided on whether street art should be sanctioned. ibid.
Sickboy is keen to distance himself from the hype. ibid.
Like Sickboy, Cyclops is one of the new wave of artists emerging in the wake of Banksy. ibid.