Banksy - The Art of the Prank

August 9, 2011December 15, 2023

Banksy’s Antics Roadshow Premiers on Channel 4 in the UK Saturday

Joey Skaggs was interviewed for Banksy’s upcoming television documentary The Antics Roadshow set to air on Channel 4 in the UK this Saturday, August 13 at 10:45 pm, following the television premiere of “Exit Through the Gift Shop.” Directed by Banksy and Jaimie D’Cruz, produced by Melody Howse.

Quoted from Channel 4:

“Banksy’s ‘incomplete guide to total anarchy’ provides a greatest hits of wayward behaviour, sedition and sabotage.

“The Antics Roadshow is a celebration of the pranksters, hoaxers, jokers, activists and stunt merchants who use public space for their own unauthorised ends. This film brings together a wide range of individuals with all sorts of motivations: but they have all hijacked the public arena to make a noise, be it for comedic, artistic or political ends, and they have all done so using a variety of illicit, and eccentric methods which an audience should probably not try at home.

“Explaining his reasoning behind the show, Banksy said: ‘Basically I just thought it was a good name for a TV programme and I’ve been working back from there’.

“Narrated by Kathy Burke, The Antics Roadshow examines the stories behind some of the most audacious stunts of recent times and what motivates the perpetrators, from mindless boredom to heartfelt political beliefs.”

April 2, 2011December 15, 2023

Culture Jamming, Sureà±os-style

Culture Jamming, Sureà±os-style
by Michael Fallon
Utne Reader
April 1, 2011

Sometimes great cultural breakthroughs are watershed events, celebrated far and wide. When evolutionary forces conspired to mesh Appalachian hill music, Mississippi River Delta blues, and big-city boogie woogie and create a wholly new cultural entity in Elvis Presley, the country duly rejoiced. Other cultural milestones, however, arrive not at all with a bang. They percolate underground for forty years or more, roiling through several generations of evolution, adoption, innovation, and cultural adaptation, until they find a more gradual, quieter, and less publicized acceptance by the mainstream. Continue reading “Culture Jamming, Sureà±os-style”

February 17, 2011December 15, 2023

Banksy’s Hollywood Hype

Posted by Sasha Stone on AwardsDaily.com, February 16, 2011:

Down the Rabbit Hole with Banksy and Mr. Brainwash

When the dust settles of Oscars 2010, which is mercifully in eleven long days, what will remain the most interesting thing about the season isn”t that Roger Deakins might win his first Oscar, and it isn”t the final Toy Story movie finally winning an Oscar, and it isn”t Helena Bonham Carter finally winning an Oscar, or Colin Firth finally winning an Oscar, or The Social Network being shut out of the Oscars (be ready), it”s Banksy. Banksy has crashed the Oscars with what is the most hilarious Oscar prank ever pulled.

I have at last found my relief in Banksy”s participation in the big show. Why? Because he”s nominated for a prankumentary. This has to be a first for Oscar, right? And it”s so clever, no one can yet prove that it isn”t real. But I”m fairly sure, after a couple of viewings, it isn”t real. And it”s a glorious sham.

As if to punctuate the silliness of this, Banksy himself has landed here in Los Angeles and is spraying the city with his essence. These photos, as with all of his work, [are] being memed all over the internet. Sure, it”s possible that Oscar strategists are pretending to be actual people spreading the Banksy word, but it”s working. Continue reading “Banksy’s Hollywood Hype”

January 15, 2011December 15, 2023

More Banksy

14 Great Banksy Street Art Photos and Quotes from Street Art Utopia…
A terrific display of the artist’s hand and mind:

“Think outside the box, collapse the box, and take a fucking sharp knife to it.” “” Banksy

“You”re 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)

“Some people become cops because they want to make the world a better place. Some people become vandals because they want to make the world a better looking place.” “” Banksy (Wall and Piece) Continue reading “More Banksy”

April 29, 2010December 15, 2023

Melbourne Hopes Banksy Will Return to Re-Defile Their Streets

City does give a rat’s for Banksy’s wiped-out art
by Raymond Gill
theage.com.au
April 28, 2010

The curator of Citylights Projects in Hosier Lane, where the Banksy graffiti was erased, says the council is remiss.

Melbourne City Council sent the cleaners into Hosier Lane on Thursday to tidy up the rat-infested garbage, but they caught the wrong rat.

A request by deputy lord mayor Susan Riley to clean up the laneway, world famous for its colourful street art, inadvertently resulted in the painting over of a stencil of a rat by the celebrated British graffiti artist Banksy.

”I went down there on Thursday and saw the cleaners and said: ‘You realise you have just painted over a Banksy?’,” Hosier Lane resident Kerry Butcher told The Age yesterday. ”And they said: ‘We are just doing what we’re told’.”

Banksy, who created several stencils in Melbourne on a visit in 2003, is regarded as the world’s foremost street artist. In 2008, a London wall bearing one of his stencils allegedly sold on eBay for $472,528. His works on paper sell at auction for hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Last week lord mayor Robert Doyle was pictured in The Age under a stencil of himself in Hosier Lane as he praised its street art as a ”legitimate expression of artistic intent”. Continue reading “Melbourne Hopes Banksy Will Return to Re-Defile Their Streets”