Art of Words: 5 of the Best Banksy Quotes & Sound Bites | Urbanist Art of Words: 5 of the Best Banksy Quotes & Sound Bites Article by Delana , filed under Street Art & Graffiti in the Art category When you’re a famously elusive artist who refuses to be identified, saying something with words (rather than pictures) is a rare occurrence. But just as Banksy’s art spreads in new and unconventional ways, so do his words. From the few short interviews he has given and the rare quotes that appear on his website, a few nuggets of Banksy wisdom can be culled. This is part six in our eight-part guide to Banksy Art and Graffiti . (image via: Wikipedia ) “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 has been a very vocal opponent of the mainstream art world.

As the quote above illustrates, he seems to feel that artists are little more than self-aggrandizing thieves who trick the public out of their money. He has very publicly refused to be a part of this perceived thievery by avoiding showing his art in formal art galleries. The shows of his work that he has endorsed and participated in have been unconventional shows in abandoned warehouses and traffic tunnels. (images via: BBC ) “The time of getting fame for your name on its own is over. Artwork that is only about wanting to be famous will never make you famous. Any fame is a by-product of making something that means something. You don’t go to a restaurant and order a meal because you want to have a shit.” Although there are many Banksy critics who say that today Banksy’s art is valuable precisely because of his name, there is little doubt that he rose to fame based on his art, not his identity. Since he has never revealed his true identity, the notoriety that his art enjoys today is based solely on the message, the method, and the myth of the man. (image via: Mail on Sunday ) “I have no interest in ever coming out.

I’m just trying to make the pictures look good; I’m not into trying to make myself look good. And besides, it’s a pretty safe bet that the reality of me would be a crushing disappointment to a couple of 15-year-old kids out there.” This quote again illustrates the artist’s aversion to embracing the trappings that go along with being a well-known artist. His main concern is making art that people enjoy, rather than becoming so famous that he isn’t able to walk down the street unhindered. (image via: Wikipedia ) “People say graffiti is ugly, irresponsible and childish. But that’s only if it’s done properly.” Ever the prankster, Banksy has engaged in a few antics which didn’t go over as well as most others. The above picture was taken at the Glastonbury Music Festival in 2007, when Banksy erected a Stonehenge model made of portable toilets. Although it was most likely all in good fun, the model was built near the “sacred circle” where plastic is banned. This proved to be one of his most unpopular stunts to date. Though judging from the above quote, Banksy doesn’t seem to mind that some people don’t enjoy what he does.

(image via: Mappamundi ) “The list of jobs I haven’t done now is so much bigger than the list of jobs I have done. It’s like a reverse CV, kinda weird.” Based on his artistic ability, unique style, and cult status, Banksy has been asked to perform various marketing work for pay. He says that he turns nearly everything down, with the exception of a few choice projects like the album art for Blur’s Think Tank. Like so many aspects of Banksy’s career and public life, there is no way to be sure that the quotes attributed to him actually came directly from him. Even those who have interviewed Banksy can’t be entirely sure that they were speaking to the man himself. But that’s how it goes when you try to pin down one of the most elusive public figures ever. Interview with Chunnel.TV Founder Matthew Berman – Brain Pickings The Silent Music of the Mind: Remembering Oliver Sacks Interview with Chunnel.TV Founder Matthew Berman What Banksy, TED, and a global network of ad agencies have in common, or why the long tail is the shortest way to cultural revolution.

By Maria Popova Today, we’re picking the brains behind Chunnel.TV — a revolutionary entertainment network for left-of-center creative content that acts as a global collaboration tool connecting underground artists and producers alike. A big idea, if we ever saw one. Hey Matt, good to have you. Tell us a bit about yourself, your background and your brand of curiosity. Thanks for this opportunity. I’d like to start by saying how impressed I am by your site, your dedication to Brain Pickings, and your general good-taste. I’m Matthew Berman, co-founder and CMO of Chunnel.TV , an online distribution network for independent films, music, art, and other unique content. I first came about the Chunnel working as a freelance music producer composing tracks for various new media projects. That’s how I met Jake Septimus, whom I ended up interning for and then eventually starting Chunnel.TV with. I’m originally from New York, but I moved to New Orleans to attend university. This past year, I’ve been to the Middle East, South America, Australia, and Asia. I currently live in New Orleans, a city of dark whiskeys and dimly lit taverns, but our main office is in NYC.

My passion is in music, guitar playing, composing, and recording. What was the first inspiration behind Chunnel? Take us to that very first brainstorming session, the proverbial paper napkin on which you jotted down the original idea. The Chunnel evolved as a series of informal discussions between Jake Septimus and myself. On one hand we were noticing the proliferation of digital media tools, a rise in the quality and quantity of independent content, and a soft-spoken backlash against mainstream content (i.e. reality shows, teen dramas, etc). On the other hand we were witnessing a rising trend towards video on the internet. There was so much content available on the web that neither one of us really knew how to cut through the static. The concept of “underground” is very murky these days. Even Banksy has a website. How do you define “underground” content in Chunnel terms? We see “underground” media as being far on the fringe of mainstream, such that a majority of people wouldn’t know it exists — yet. The beauty of the internet, however, is that major communities can form around these seemingly niche concepts. We’re big believers in the power of human-curated content here.

How do you decide what makes “the Chunnel cut” and what doesn’t? Your editorial filtration system, if you will. Basically, the content has to pass an internal test. We have a team of hip, creative and unique people, and if we all think a piece of content is hot, interesting, or Chunnel-worthy, then we’ll post it up. What’s your relationship with WPP’s United Network? Does it predate Chunnel, or did they reach out to you once you were up and running? WPP’s United Network gave us the money to start the site. Chunnel.TV was incubated from the NYC office of Berlin Cameron United , of United Network. Jake (Septimus) was working as Creative Director when I started doing intern/music work for him, so the relationship did exist prior to launch. They don’t dictate what we put on the site, but they might have some pretty dope techie tools for us to experiment with in the future. We retain creative control and try to bring the user the best possible experience. It’s tricky to talk about commercial work in the context of “underground” culture, but you have a Commercial channel.

We love seeing that – it shows the complex relationship content consumers have come to have with creativity in all its forms. How do you think people’s perception of creative authenticity has evolved in terms of all the great work out there that still falls within the commercial realm? Banksy himself said: The thing I hate 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. While I think most people find the majority of advertising to be nothing more than an annoyance, the stigma of ‘selling out’ has definitely dissipated within society. I also think creative authenticity depends on the product, budget, and client. People will give premium liquor or perfume ads more creative leeway than say Pine-sol, allowing the advertisers to do some really interesting work. That being said, if an advertiser really gets pop culture they could create truly brilliant ads with nearly any brand. What’s your long-term vision for Chunnel and its growth as a cultural agent? Any exciting developments in the works?

We’d like Chunnel.TV to fill the void MTV left when they went mainstream. We hope to capture the imagination of the culturally curious, and introduce people to art, music, film or other content they might not have otherwise seen. We’re working with indie filmmakers to bring exclusive shows to The Chunnel. Our first batch of shows are Reel Review , Jamaica Originates , and Duncan and Eddie , and we expect to have more. We’re also going to open up our platform to guest bloggers and our user base. People are going to have the ability to post articles up on Chunnel.TV, which will be put up on review before published. Also, we’d like to implement a lot more interactive features so us like-minded people could better communicate. It’s going to be an exciting few months for Chunnel.TV. If you could speak at TED, what would the title of your talk be? Will you get a Standing O? Haha, I see you have a TED talk fetish as well. My favorite TED talk is Benjamin Zander on music and passion , so I’d like to perform in a similar vein. My talk would focus on leadership, the benefits and hardships of standing above the fray, and would end in a slow blues jam.

I think I’ll call it Electric Ladyland — unless that’s already been taken. As for the standing ovation, one can only hope. Well, thanks for letting us pick your brains. Any last thoughts left unpicked? Again thanks for your time, I really do love your site. As for everyone else, please check us out at Chunnel.TV and follow us on Twitter or MySpace . I can also be contacted at matt[at]chunnel.tv . Take care. donating = loving Bringing you (ad-free) Brain Pickings takes me hundreds of hours each month. If you find any joy and stimulation here, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner. Monthly donation You looked better on myspace - Banksy « ink and paint 5 years ago You looked better on myspace - Banksy I was browsing my Google+ profile when I came across +Tom Anderson (everyone's friend) discussing art vs advertising. He quoted 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 What do you think? Is Banksy right about modern art being a "disaster area"? Related Banksy. Graffiti Artist. His works, his technique, his Career. Banksy's identity revealed? Banksy is a pseudo-anonymous English graffiti artist. He is believed to be a native of Yate, South Gloucestershire, near Bristol and to have been born in 1974, but there is substantial public uncertainty about his identity and personal and biographical details. According to Tristan Manco, Banksy "was born in 1974 and raised in Bristol, England. The son of a photocopier technician, he trained as a butcher but became involved in graffiti during the great Bristol aerosol boom of the late 1980s." His artworks are often satirical pieces of art on topics such as politics, culture, and ethics.

His street art, which combines graffiti writing with a distinctive stencilling technique, is similar to Blek le Rat, who began to work with stencils in 1981 in Paris and members of the anarcho-punk band Crass who maintained a graffiti stencil campaign on the London Tube System in the late 1970s and early 1980s. His art has appeared in cities around the world. Banksy's work was born out of the Bristol underground scene which involved collaborations between artists and musicians. Banksy does not sell photos of street graffiti or mount exhibitions of screenprints in commercial galleries. Art auctioneers have been known to attempt to sell his street art on location and leave the problem of its removal in the hands of the winning bidder. Banksy's "The Flower Chucker" is included in the feature film The Age of Stupid to represent all modern art stored in an archive after the end of the world as we know it. Career Banksy started as a freehand graffiti artist 1992–1994 as one of Bristol's DryBreadZ Crew (DBZ), write Kato and Tes.

He was inspired by local artists and his work was part of the larger Bristol underground scene. From the start he used stencils as elements of his freehand pieces, too. 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, when he noticed the stencilled serial number and employing this technique 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 or anti-establishment. Subjects include rats, monkeys, policemen, soldiers, children, and the elderly. In late 2000, on a trip to Sydney and Melbourne, Australia, he met up with the Gen-X pastellist, visual activist, and recluse James DeWeaver in Byron Bay, where he stenciled a parachuting rat with clothes pin on nose above a toilet at the Arts Factory Lodge. This stencil can no longer be located.

He also makes stickers (the Neighbourhood Watch subvert) and sculpture (the murdered phonebox), and was responsible for the cover art of Blur's 2003 album Think Tank. 2002 On 19 July 2002, Banksy's first Los Angeles show debuted at 33 1/3 Gallery, a small Silverlake venue owned by Frank Sosa. The show, entitled Existencilism, was curated by 33 1/3 Gallery, Malathion, Funk Lazy Promotions, and B+. 2003 In 2003 in a show called "Turf War", held in a warehouse, Banksy painted on animals. Although the RSPCA declared the conditions suitable, an animal rights activist chained herself to the railings in protest.

He later moved on to producing subverted paintings; one example is Monet's Water Lily Pond, adapted to include urban detritus such as litter and a shopping trolley floating in its reflective waters; another is Edward Hopper's Nighthawks, redrawn to show that the characters are looking at a British football hooligan, dressed only in his Union Flag underpants, who has just thrown an object through the glass window of the cafe. These oil paintings were shown at a twelve day exhibition in Westbourne Grove, London in 2005. 2004 In August 2004, Banksy produced a quantity of spoof British £10 notes substituting the picture of the Queen's head with Princess Diana's head and changing the text "Bank of England" to "Banksy of England." Someone threw a large wad of these into a crowd at Notting Hill Carnival that year, which some recipients then tried to spend in local shops. These notes were also given with invitations to a picturesonwalls.com Santas Ghetto exhibition. The individual notes have since been selling on eBay for about £200 each.

A Limited run of 50 signed posters containing 10 uncut notes were also produced and sold by pictures on walls for £100 each to commemorate the death of Princess Diana. One of these sold in October 2007 at Bonhams auction house in London for £24,000. 2006 Banksy held an exhibition called Barely Legal, billed as a "three day vandalised warehouse extravaganza" in Los Angeles, on the weekend of 16 September. The exhibition featured a live "elephant in a room", painted in a pink and gold floral wallpaper pattern. After Christina Aguilera bought an original of Queen Victoria as a lesbian and two prints for £25,000, on 19 October 2006 a set of Kate Moss paintings sold in Sotheby's London for £50,400, setting an auction record for Banksy's work. The six silk-screen prints, featuring the model painted in the style of Andy Warhol's Marilyn Monroe pictures, sold for five times their estimated value. His stencil of a green Mona Lisa with real paint dripping from her eyes sold for £57,600 at the same auction.

In December, journalist Max Foster coined the phrase, "the Banksy Effect", to illustrate how interest in other street artists was growing on the back of Banksy's success. 2007 On 7 February 2007, Sotheby's auction house in London auctioned three works, reaching the highest ever price for a Banksy work at auction: over £102,000 for his Bombing Middle England. Two of his other graffiti works, Balloon Girl and Bomb Hugger, sold for £37,200 and £31,200 respectively, which were well above their estimated prices. The following day's auction saw a further three Banksy works reach soaring prices. Ballerina With Action Man Parts reached £96,000; Glory sold for £72,000; Untitled (2004) sold for £33,600 - all prices being significantly above estimated values.

To coincide with the second day of auctions, Banksy updated his website with a new image of an auction house scene showing people bidding on a picture that said, "I Can't Believe You Morons Actually Buy This Shit." In February 2007, the owners of a house with a Banksy mural on the side in Bristol decided to sell the house through Red Propeller art gallery after offers fell through because the prospective buyers wanted to remove the mural. It is listed as a mural which comes with a house attached. In April 2007, Transport for London painted over Banksy's iconic image of a scene from Quentin Tarantino's Pulp Fiction, with Samuel L. Jackson and John Travolta clutching bananas instead of guns. Although the image was very popular, Transport for London claimed that the "graffiti" created a general atmosphere of neglect and social decay which in turn encourages crime.

On 27 April 2007, a new record high for the sale of Banksy's work was set with the auction of the work 'Space Girl & Bird' fetching £288,000 (US$576,000), around 20 times the estimate at Bonhams of London. On 21 May 2007 Banksy gained the award for Art's Greatest living Briton. Banksy, as expected, did not turn up to collect his award, and continued with his notoriously anonymous status. On 4 June 2007, it was reported that Banksy's The Drinker had been stolen. In October 2007, most of his works offered for sale at Bonhams auction house in London sold for more than twice their reserve price. Banksy made a tribute art piece over his famous Pulp Fiction piece. The tribute was for 19-year-old British graffiti artist OZONE, who was hit by an underground train in Barking, East London, along with fellow artist WIZE, on 12 January 2007. The piece was of an angel wearing a bullet-proof vest, holding a skull.

He also wrote a note on his website, saying: "The last time I hit this spot I painted a crap picture of two men in banana costumes waving hand guns. A few weeks later a writer called Ozone completely dogged it and then wrote 'If it's better next time I'll leave it' in the bottom corner. When we lost Ozone we lost a fearless graffiti writer and as it turns out a pretty perceptive art critic. Ozone - rest in peace". Banksy has published a "manifesto" on his website. The text of the manifesto is credited as the diary entry of one Lieutenant Colonel Mervin Willett Gonin, DSO, which is exhibited in the Imperial War Museum. It describes how a shipment of lipstick to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp immediately after its liberation at the end of World War II helped the internees regain their humanity. However, as of 18 January 2008, Banksy's Manifesto has been substituted with Graffiti Heroes #03 that describes Peter Chappell's graffiti quest of the 1970s that worked to free George Davis of his imprisonment.

A small number of Banksy's works can be seen in the movie Children of Men, including a stenciled image of two policemen kissing and another stencil of a child looking down a shop. In the 2007 film Shoot 'Em Up starring Clive Owen, Banksy's tag can be seen on a dumpster in the film's credits. Banksy, who deals mostly with Lazarides Gallery in London, claims that the exhibition at Vanina Holasek Gallery in New York (his first major exhibition in that city) is unauthorized. The show featured 62 of his paintings and prints. 2008 Over the weekend 3–5 May in London, Banksy hosted an exhibition called The Cans Festival. It was situated on Leake Street, a road tunnel formerly used by Eurostar underneath London Waterloo station. Graffiti artists with stencils were invited to join in and paint their own artwork, as long as it didn't cover anyone else's. Artists included Blek le Rat, Broken Crow, C215, Cartrain, Dolk, Dotmasters, J.Glover, Eine, Eelus, Hero, Pure evil, Jef Aérosol and Tom Civil.

In late August 2008, marking the third anniversary of Hurricane Katrina and the associated levee failure disaster, Banksy produced a series of works in New Orleans, Louisiana, mostly on buildings derelict since the disaster. A stencil painting attributed to Banksy appeared at a vacant petrol station in the Ensley neighbourhood of Birmingham, Alabama on August 29 as Hurricane Gustav approached the New Orleans area. The painting depicting a hooded member of the Ku Klux Klan hanging from a noose was quickly covered with black spray paint and later removed altogether. His first official exhibition in New York, the "Village Pet Store And Charcoal Grill," opened October 5, 2008. The animatronic pets in the store window include a mother hen watching over her baby Chicken McNuggets as they peck at a barbecue sauce packet, and a rabbit putting makeup on in a mirror. The Westminster City Council stated in October 2008 that the work "One Nation Under CCTV", painted in April 2008 will be painted over as it is graffiti.

The council says it will remove any graffiti, regardless of the reputation of its creator, and specifically stated that Banksy has no more right to paint graffiti than a child. The work was painted over in April 2009. In December 2008 a Banksy image of a diver in a duffle coat in Melbourne Australia was vandalised. The image was protected by a sheet of clear perspex, however silver paint was poured behind the protective sheet and then tagged with the words "Banksy woz ere". It is thought the image has been destroyed. 2009 May 2009, parts company with agent Steve Lazarides. Announces Pest Control the handling service who act on his behalf will be the only point of sale for new works. On June 13 2009, the Banksy UK Summer show opened at Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery, featuring more than 100 works of art, including animatronics and installations; it is his largest exhibition yet, featuring 78 new works. Reaction to the show was positive, with expectations that large numbers of visitors would come to Bristol to see it.

Notable art pieces In addition to his artwork, Banksy has claimed responsibility for a number of high profile art pieces, including the following: At London Zoo, he climbed into the penguin enclosure and painted "We're bored of fish" in seven foot high letters. At Bristol Zoo, he left the message 'I want out. This place is too cold. Keeper smells. Boring, boring, boring.' in the elephant enclosure. In March 2005, he placed subverted artworks in the Museum of Modern Art, Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Brooklyn Museum, and the American Museum of Natural History in New York. He put up a subverted painting in London's Tate Britain gallery. In May 2005 Banksy's version of a primitive cave painting depicting a human figure hunting wildlife whilst pushing a shopping trolley was hung in gallery 49 of the British Museum, London. Upon discovery, they added it to their permanent collection. Banksy has sprayed "This is not a photo opportunity" on certain photograph spots.

In August 2005, Banksy painted nine images on the Israeli West Bank barrier, including an image of a ladder going up and over the wall and an image of children digging a hole through the wall. In April 2006, Banksy created a sculpture based on a crumpled red phone box with a pickaxe in its side, apparently bleeding, and placed it in a street in Soho, London. It was later removed by Westminster Council. BT released a press release, which said: "This is a stunning visual comment on BT's transformation from an old-fashioned telecommunications company into a modern communications services provider." In June 2006, Banksy created an image of a naked man hanging out of a bedroom window on a wall visible from Park Street in central Bristol. The image sparked some controversy, with the Bristol City Council leaving it up to the public to decide whether it should stay or go. After an internet discussion in which 97% (all but 6 people) supported the stencil, the city council decided it would be left on the building.

In August/September 2006, Banksy replaced up to 500 copies of Paris Hilton's debut CD, Paris, in 48 different UK record stores with his own cover art and remixes by Danger Mouse. Music tracks were given titles such as "Why am I Famous?", "What Have I Done?" and "What Am I For?". Several copies of the CD were purchased by the public before stores were able to remove them, some going on to be sold for as much as £750 on online auction websites such as eBay. The cover art depicted Paris Hilton digitally altered to appear topless. Other pictures feature her with a dog's head replacing her own, and one of her stepping out of a luxury car, edited to include a group of homeless people, which included the caption "90% of success is just showing up". In September 2006, Banksy dressed an inflatable doll in the manner of a Guantanamo Bay detainment camp prisoner (orange jumpsuit, black hood, and handcuffs) and then placed the figure within the Big Thunder Mountain Railroad ride at the Disneyland theme park in Anaheim, California. Technique Asked about his technique, Banksy said: "I use whatever it takes.

Sometimes that just means drawing a moustache on a girl's face on some billboard, sometimes that means sweating for days over an intricate drawing. Efficiency is the key." Stencils are traditionally hand drawn or printed onto sheets of acetate or card, before being cut out by hand. Because of the secretive nature of Banksy's work and identity, it is uncertain what techniques he uses to generate the images in his stencils, though it is assumed he uses computers for some images due to the photocopy nature of much of his work. He mentions in his book, ' Wall and Piece ', that as he was starting to do graffiti that he was always too slow and was either caught or could never finish the art in the one sitting. So he devised a series of intricate stencils to minimise time and overlapping of the colour. Identity Banksy's real name is not, as is commonly believed and has been widely reported, Robert or Robin Banks. His year of birth has been given as 1975. Simon Hattenstone from Guardian Unlimited is one of the very few people to have interviewed him face-to-face.

Hattenstone describes him as "a cross of Jimmy Nail and British rapper Mike Skinner" and "a 28 year old male who showed up wearing jeans and a t-shirt with a silver tooth, silver chain, and one silver earring". Banksy's parents think their son is a painter and decorator In May 2007, an extensive article written by Lauren Collins of the New Yorker re-opened the Banksy-identity controversy citing a 2004 photograph of the artist that was taken in Jamaica during the Two-Culture Clash project and later published in The Evening Standard in 2004. In October 2007, a story on the BBC website featured a photo allegedly taken by a passer-by in Bethnal Green, London, purporting to show Banksy at work with an assistant, scaffolding and a truck. The story confirms that Tower Hamlets Council in London has decided to treat all Banksy works as vandalism and remove them. In July 2008, it was claimed by The Mail on Sunday that Banksy's real name is Robin Gunningham.His agent has refused to confirm or deny these reports.

In May 2009, the Mail on Sunday once again speculated about Gunningham being Banksy after a 'self-portrait' of a rat holding a sign with the Gunningham shot on it was photographed in East London.[68] This 'new Banksy rat' story was also picked up by the Times newspaper[69] and the London Evening Standard. Banksy himself states, on his website: "I am unable to comment on who may or may not be banksy, but anyone described as being 'good at drawing' doesn't sound like banksy to me." Controversy In 2004, Banksy walked into the Louvre in Paris and hung on a wall a picture he had painted resembling the Mona Lisa but with a yellow smiley face. Though the painting was hurriedly removed by the museum staff, it and its counterpart, temporarily on unknown display at the Tate Britain, were described by Banksy as 'shortcuts'. He is quoted as saying: "To actually [have to] go through the process of having a painting selected must be quite boring.

It's a lot more fun to go and put your own one up." Peter Gibson, a spokesperson for Keep Britain Tidy, asserts that Banksy's work is simple vandalism, and Diane Shakespeare, an official for the same organization, was quoted as saying: "We are concerned that Banksy's street art glorifies what is essentially vandalism". In June 2007 Banksy created a circle of plastic portable toilets, said to resemble Stonehenge at the Glastonbury Festival. As this was in the same field as the "sacred circle" it was felt by many to be inappropriate and his installation was itself vandalized before the festival even opened. However, the intention had always been for people to climb on and interact with it. The installation was nicknamed "Portaloo Sunset" and "Bog Henge" by Festival goers. Michael Eavis admitted he wasn't fond of it, and the portaloos were removed before the 2008 festival.

Quotations by Banksy "If you have a statue in the city centre, you could go past it every day on your way to school and never even notice it, right - but as soon as someone puts a traffic cone on its head, you've made your own sculpture. — from The Independent" "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." "People say graffiti is ugly, irresponsible and childish... but that's only if it's done properly." "Think outside the box, collapse the box, and take a sharp knife to it.

" "You paint a hundred chimpanzees and they call you a guerilla artist." Bibliography Banksy has self-published several books that contain photographs of his work in various countries as well as some of his canvas work and exhibitions, accompanied by his own writings: Banksy Gorilla | BANKSY in his own words taken from his artw… | Flickr BANKSY in his own words taken from his artwork, books, website and interviews. If you want to say something and have people listen, you have to wear a mask. If you want someone to be ignored then build a lifesize bronze statue of them and stick it in the middle of town. Nobody ever listened to me until they didn't know who I was. Please Note: I am unable to comment on who may or may not be Banksy, but anyone described as being "good at drawing" doesn't sound like Banksy to me. I have no interest in ever coming out. I figure there are enough self-opinionated assholes trying to get their ugly little faces in front of you as it is.

You ask a lot of kids today what they want to be when they grow up, and they say, "I want to be famous." You ask them for what reason and they don't know or care. I think Andy Warhol got it wrong: in the future, so many people are going to become famous that one day everybody will end up being anonymous for 15 minutes. I'm just trying to make the pictures look good; I'm not into trying to make myself look good. I'm not into fashion. The pictures generally look better than I do when we're out on the street together. Plus, I obviously have issues with the cops. And besides, it's a pretty safe bet that the reality of me would be a crushing disappointment to a couple of 15-year-old kids out there. Maintaining anonymity can be kind of crippling. I gave a painting to my favorite pub to settle a tab once, which they hung above the bar. So many people came in asking questions about it I haven't been back there for two years. In retrospect getting your work in the newspapers is a really dumb thing to do if what you do requires a certain level of anonymity. I was a bit slow there ...

within a week [of Barely Legal] there were journalists from the Daily Mail at the door of my dealer's Dad's chip shop asking if he knew where they could find me. All the attention meant I lost some of the element of surprise. A few days after the show in Los Angeles opened I was painting under a freeway downtown when a homeless guy ran over and said, "Hey—are you Binsky?" I left the next day. The time of getting fame for your name on its own is over. Artwork that is only about wanting to be famous will never make you famous. Any fame is a by-product of making something that means something. You don't go to a restaurant and order a meal because you want to have a s**t. The last time I did a show, I thought I’d got a four-star review, then I realized they said, “This is absolute ****.” I get support from people I would least expect, and hate from people who I considered to be on my side. When someone buys my work, they know that they’re indirectly funding street damage, and you’d be surprised who’s cool with that. I’ve always felt that if you paint graffiti, you’re first and foremost in the entertainment business.

You’re in public space, so what’s the point in thinking you only do it to amuse yourself? It’s all about entertainment. It’s about entertaining the crowd while the pickpockets go ’round the back. People say graffiti is ugly, irresponsible and childish. But that's only if it's done properly. The Holy Grail is to spend less time making the picture than it takes people to look at it. Some people want to make the world a better place. I just wanna make the world a better-looking place. If you don't like it, you can paint over it! T.V. has made going to the theatre seem pointless, photography has pretty much killed painting but graffiti has remained gloriously unspoilt by progress. If you don't own a train company then you go and paint on one instead. It all comes from that thing at school when you had to have name tags in the back of something... that makes it belong to you. You can own half the city by scribbling your name over it. When explaining yourself to the Police it's worth being as reasonable as possible. Graffiti writers are not real villains.

I am always reminded of this by real villains who consider the idea of breaking in someplace, not stealing anything and then leaving behind a painting of your name in four foot high letters the most retarded thing they ever heard of. Remember crime against property is not real crime. People look at an oil painting and admire the use of brushstrokes to convey meaning. People look at a graffiti painting and admire the use of a drainpipe to gain access. A lot of people think that scuttling around stencilling images onto buildings in the middle of the night is the action of a sad, frustrated individual who can't get attention or recognition any other way. They might be right, but I've done gallery shows and, if you've been hitting on people with all sorts of images in all sorts of places, they're a real step backwards, painting the streets means becoming an actual part of the city. It's not a spectator sport. Is graffiti art or vandalism? That word has a lot of negative connotations and it alienates people, so no, I don't like to use the word 'art' at all.

You know what hip-hop has done with the word 'ni**er' - I'm trying to do that with the word vandalism, bring it back. Bus stops are far more interesting and useful places to have art than in museums. Graffiti has more chance of meaning something or changing stuff than anything indoors. Graffiti has been used to start revolutions, stop wars, and generally is the voice of people who aren't listened to. Graffiti is one of those few tools you have if you have almost nothing. And even if you don't come up with a picture to cure world poverty you can make somebody smile while they're having a piss. My sister inspired me to do it. She was throwing away loads of my pictures one day and I asked her why. She said "it's not like they're going to be hanging in the Louvre." I thought why wait until I am dead? Van Gogh used short, stumpy brush strokes to convey his insanity -- I use short, thin ledges above mainline train tracks. The art world is the biggest joke going. It’s a rest home for the overprivileged, the pretentious, and the weak. Writing graffiti is about the most honest way you can be an artist.

It takes no money to do it, you don't need an education to understand it and there's no admission fee. I'd been painting rats for three years before someone said "that's clever, it's an anagram of art" and I had to pretend I'd known that all along. People are taking the piss out of you everyday. They butt into your life, take a cheap shot at you and then disappear. They leer at you from tall buildings and make you feel small. They make flippant comments from buses that imply you're not sexy enough and that all the fun is happening somewhere else. They are on TV making your girlfriend feel inadequate. They have access to the most sophisticated technology the world has ever seen and they bully you with it. They are The Advertisers and they are laughing at you. You, however, are forbidden to touch them. Trademarks, intellectual property rights and copyright law mean advertisers can say what they like wherever they like with total impunity. f**k that. Any advert in a public space that gives you no choice whether you see it or not is yours. It's yours to take, re-arrange and re-use. You can do whatever you like with it.

Asking for permission is like asking to keep a rock someone just threw at your head. You owe the companies nothing. Less than nothing, you especially don't owe them any courtesy. They owe you. They have re-arranged the world to put themselves in front of you. They never asked for your permission, don't even start asking for theirs. 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. Every new campaign, Nike emails me to ask me to do something about it. I haven’t done any of those jobs. The list of jobs I haven’t done now is so much bigger than the list of jobs I have done. It’s like a reverse CV. I have been called a sellout, but I give away thousands of paintings for free, how many more do you want? I think it was easier when I was the underdog, and I had a lot of practise at it.

The money that my work fetches these days makes me a bit uncomfortable, but that's an easy problem to solve—you just stop whingeing and give it all away. I don’t think it’s possible to make art about world poverty and then trouser all the cash, that’s an irony too far, even for me. I love the way capitalism finds a place—even for its enemies. I’m always trying to move on. You’re not supposed to get dumber as you get older. You’re not supposed to just do the same old thing. You’re supposed to find a new way through and carry on. ... Anything that stands in the way of achieving that piece is the enemy, whether it’s your mum, the cops, someone telling you that you sold out, or someone saying, “Let’s just stay in tonight and get pizza.” A lot of people never use their initiative because nobody told them to. The human race is an unfair and stupid competition. A lot of the runners don't even get decent sneakers or clean drinking water. Some people are born with a massive head start, every possible help along the way and still the referees seem to be on their side.

It's not surprising some people have given up competing altogether and gone to sit in the grandstand, eat junk food and shout abuse. What we need in this race is a lot more streakers. If you win the rat-race you're still a rat. People who get up early in the morning cause war, death and famine. I'm out of bed and dressed, what more do you want? Become good at cheating and you never need to become good at anything else. There are no exceptions to the rule that everyone thinks they're exceptions to the rule. Only when the last tree has been cut down and the last river has dried up will man realize that reciting red indian proverbs makes you sound like a f**king muppet. People who enjoy waving flags don't deserve to have one. I Don’t Believe In Anything. I’m Just Here for the Violence. Sometimes I feel so sick at the state of the world I can't even finish my second apple pie. I originally set out to try and save the world, but now I’m not sure I like it enough. I like to think I have the guts to stand up anonymously in a western democracy and call for things no-one else believes in - like peace and justice and freedom. Done

Question: Who is quoted as saying "... advertising ... attracts all the bright, creative and ambitious young people, leaving us mainly with the slow and self-obsessed to become our artists. ... Never in the field of human history has so much been used by so many to say so little"?
Answer: """Banksy"""