Robert Banks aka Banksy is a well known pseudo-anonymous English graffiti artist. I first heard about him in my humanities class and instantly he became one of my favorites. I love what he does. He is believed to be a native of Yate (near Bristol) and born in 1974, but there is substantial public uncertainty about his identity and personal and biographical details. His work always has a message to it which touches on topics like politics, culture, and ethics. Banksy started as a freehand graffiti artist in the late 1980s as one of Bristol's DryBreadZ Crew (DBZ), often assisting writers Kato and Tes. In 1998 he arranged the enormous "Walls On Fire" graffiti jam along with fellow Bristol graffiti legend Inkie on the site of the future "@t Bristol" development. The weekend long event drew artists from all over the UK and Europe and his organisation of the event established his name within the European graffiti scene. By 2000 he had turned to the art of stencilling after realising how much less time it took to complete a "piece". He claims he changed to stencilling whilst he was hiding from the police under a train carriage, and soon became more widely noticed for his art around Bristol and London. Banksy's stencils feature striking and humorous images occasionally combined with slogans. The message is usually anti-war, anti-capitalist, anti-establishment or pro-freedom. Subjects include animals such as monkeys and rats, policemen, soldiers, children and the elderly.
No one really knows much about him, even what he looks like. He tries to remain completely anonymous. He does his art in stencils he makes so when he goes out, he can place the stencil and quickly paint it.
For more information on him you can go to his website...www.banksy.co.uk
Hope you all enjoy it as much as I did.
Oh-Eh,
Kal El
1 comment:
He did a bunch of work in Jerusalem this December. You should have a look at it.
Post a Comment