For those of you who don’t know Banksy, he’s the sickest street artist on the planet. I’ll allow no contention about it.

The anonymous English native, supposedly born around Bristol around 1974, terrorized the world with his meticulously stenciled and cuttingly insightful graffiti for so many years in succession that the world had no choice but to accept him. He went from having his pieces painted over by the government to having his pieces being sold on the spot by art directors who left it to the buyer to figure out how to remove it and take it home.

In a dramatic assertion of his presence and importance in the real art world, Banksy has recently staged a coup d’etat of the Bristol Museum, which, for the entire summer, was completely filled with his own subversive art, everything from graffiti to animatronics. As the story goes, Banksy contacted the museum manager, who happened to be a fan of his work, and planned and installed the whole thing under the guise of “renovating” the museum.

To ice his massive, sugary cake of not-giving-a-fuck, Banksy didn’t even bother to clear this with the museum’s board of directors. They found out about the display at the same time as the rest of the public. The aforementioned manager, exceptional dopeness and balls of steel notwithstanding, still doesn’t know the identity of Banksy, as he cleverly showed up disguised as a member of his crew of movers. Sick.

On the Street

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At the Museum

In honor of Banksy and his tremendous dopeness, I’ve also put together a showcase of brilliant and beautiful street art from around the world, which I will be publishing tomorrow.

Update: The second article in this feature can be found here.

Related posts:

1. Ode to a Banksy: Guerrilla Art