Banksy

Banksy is an English graffiti artist and a sort of cultural “Robin Hood.” His artworks savagely (and with great wit) satirize political, cultural, and ethical targets.

Banksy does not sell photos of his street graffiti or mount exhibitions of screen prints in commercial galleries. He travels around the world freely putting his graffiti art in public locations.

Banksy's stencils feature striking and humorous images occasionally combined with slogans. The message is usually anti-war, anti-capitalist or anti-establishment. Subjects include rats, monkeys, policemen, soldiers, children, and the elderly.

Following is a quote from Banksy:

“The thing I hate the most about advertising is that it attracts all the bright, creative and ambitious young people, leaving us mainly with the slow and self-obsessed to become our artists. Modern art is a disaster area. Never in the field of human history has so much been used by so many to say so little.”

Banksy is believed to be a native of Yate, Gloucestershire, near Bristol, England, and to have been born in 1974. Substantial public uncertainty exists, however, about his true identity. He lives much like author Thomas Pynchon - in complete anonymity.

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