Banksy

N/A

N/A

1990 – present

$20 million

@banksy

He’s anonymous, and yet, his stenciled graffiti art and its related exploits are known, seen, and criticized the world over. Banksy is one of the best-known living street artists without actually being known. His identity remains a mystery—albeit with a few educated guesses made throughout his career—but his work, which can pop up unannounced on streets, walls, and bridges just about anywhere, is iconic for its passionate anti-establishment socioeconomic and political themes. 

Banksy is based in England, but aside from that and a brief physical description of him from a 2003 face-to-face interview with The Guardian, not much else is known about Banksy, the person. His long-running escape from the spotlight has only made it burn brighter, and to that degree, it’s made his art more compelling. It’s allowed the “Banksy effect” to take over and revitalize street art. And instead of focusing on the man behind the art, Banksy’s art speaks for him, building the shadowy portrait of a character determined to affect social change with counter culture ideals, some stencils, and cans of spray paint.

Right now, there are three theories to Banksy’s identity, each concerning a different person. To many, he’s believed to be an English man named Robin Gunningham, born in 1973 just outside of Bristol. Former associates and classmates of Gunningham have corroborated this, and a 2016 study of the locations of Banksy’s artwork in connection with known addresses of Gunningham’s seemed to confirm this rumor to some scientists.

For the 2016 study, scientists at Queen Mary University of London used geographic profiling—a technique used to catch criminals—to “catch” Banksy. These scientists selected 140 suspected Banksy works in London and Bristol to build a geoprofile of the artist. The location of these selected works suggested clusters of “hot spots” that were narrowed down to pinpoint Banksy. Those hot spots centered around a pub, a playing field, a residential address in Bristol, and three addresses in London. Then, using publicly available information, the researchers concluded that all the locations were either Banksy’s haunts or living spaces.

Another guess at Banksy’s identity was done by a forensics expert in London who found that a “J Hewlett” is associated with every company that’s known to be connected to Banksy and his produced works. He picked up on the trail by going through Companies House, a site that registers company information for the public, finding that “J Hewlett” is the ultimate owner of all Banksy companies. That “J Hewlett” is thought to be English comic artist and Gorillaz founder Jamie Hewlett—a guess that was shot down by Hewlett’s publicist, but given the available evidence, plus the fact that Banksy’s artwork appears in a Gorillaz music video, who’s to say this London expert is wrong?

The third rumored Banksy is English artist Robert Del Naja aka 3D, the frontman for the band Massive Attack. He was a graffiti artist himself in the ‘80s, and is a confirmed personal friend of Banksy. May he actually be Banksy himself? Perhaps, especially because the appearance of some of Banksy’s murals and Massive Attack tour stops have coincided. Either way, it’s just another educated guess into Banksy’s true identity.

Graffiti art is illegal and considered vandalism to law enforcement and public officials, so to avoid legal scrutiny, Banksy must conceal his identity to continue his work.

According to The Guardian’s 2003 interview, Banksy is described as “white, 28, scruffy casual – jeans, T-shirt, a silver tooth, silver chain and silver earring. He looks like a cross between Jimmy Nail and Mike Skinner of the Streets.”

So much of Banksy’s work can be found around Bristol, London, and a host of other English cities, but his graffiti murals also cover walls in New York, Jerusalem, Amsterdam, Melbourne, San Francisco, Toronto, Los Angeles, New Orleans, Chicago, and Bethlehem.