Just took a closer look at the auction items. Some of it comes across a bit sad / jilted ex?

Also a nice window into how rigged the system was / is. E.g. Damien Hirst gets to buy 30 or so prints because he's Damien Hirst? While the rest of us stand in line like dickheads.

Meh. Some fun stuff. I’m not too proud to take a shot at some items. Not overly concerned about COAs. “Under Duress” is a pretty sharp name for the auction.

How he loves him ! the guy is in photo in all his auctions !

Some of the items in this auction have all the hallmarks of a psycho ex who hoards every memory they can.

I expect there will be a follow-up auction with a t-shirt that smells of Banksy’s aftershave, cigarette butts with his DNA and a napkin from their first date at a local Wimpy.

Back when these were first sold I think anybody could buy as many as they liked.
No queues or F5 bunfights.
Look at the prices. These were cheap back then, not worth thousands each.

Sad !
Could have given Banksy first refusal, for old times' sake !

Sketches of Banksy have always been little masterpieces ! I saw a lot decades ago.
these ones are very deep and classy : best thing to buy.
prints ? We saw them thousands times. It’s time to see new stuff .

and paintings and sculptures

Does it though? If you believe that Hurst was involved, surely him buying a bunch of prints would make sense? Masquerading as a fan, but really being in on it.

I think that's bollocks, personally. But it's a fun rabbit hole to go down: 

The Makers of Banksy : Is Damien Hirst Banksy’s pudgy-fingered CEO and managing partner? That's my take...

HAM-FISTED BANKSY, GLASGOW, 2001

!(05ay5tfmwjeb1 "Steve Laxarides, Banksy Captured, v1")

Damien Hirst (DH) is a cheeky monkey.

He’s made no secret of his Banksy / Lazarides/ “00’s street-art movement” affiliations whether by Banksy’s 2007’s qua vandalised oil x DH collaboration “Keep it Spotless”…

!(epc1gltxwjeb1 "Banksy, Keep it Spotless, 2007")

… or by his works being sold at Steve Lazarides November 2007 Shadow Lounge auction, presumably as a contribution in kind to Banksy’s launch years end-run while cashing out Laz for 3 mil so he can become Banksy's dealer without a conflict of interest gong forward….

!(01zwqdw4xjeb1 "Lazarides Auction Catalog, 2007")

… or by his works being prominently featured as attractions and sold as art at the not-Banksy Dismaland show…

!(hym28ztaxjeb1 "DH work @ Dismaland, 2015")

…and where his “Unicorn” debuted at Dismaland’s closing party, as if he's tacitly admitting his Banksyness and keystone role in The Making of …

!(hliddspfxjeb1 "Damien Hirst, Unicorn, 2015")

… or by his shamelss shilling to the present of the broader street art brand, launched concomitantly with Banksy to seed a next generation of gallery artist that were mostly posing as street but where the vast majority were actually college-trained artist (See: Graffiti Lives by Gregory J Snyder) with a few Anons and ringers thrown in to expand the branded art offerings.

!(mosql8dt1keb1 "DH with ham-paws shamelessly mugging with Anon Street Art Brand Invader perhaps as played by Sasha Baron Cohen, 2021")

And though DH practically invites himself to be considered as a Banksy Inc insider solely by his Barnumesque antics, the foremost reason I slot him in as Banksy Inc.'s most plausible CEO/Managing Partner, the foremost reason I slot him thus is psychological in a monkey-see monkey-do kind’ve way that syncs with Harold Bloom’s “Anxiety of Influence” qua Oedipal model for artistic production with the twist being him styling himself as an underground Saatchi for a 00’s art movement

!(9muy3ogkxjeb1 "Banksy’s Simple Intelligence Testing by Jeremy Bethany")

By the mid-nineties, DH exploded on the art scene as both MC and lead stake-horse for Charles Saatchi’s Young British Artist’s slate. It made the already rich Saatchi even richer while making him the art force he is to this day ,while it only made DH a very wealthy man but certainly not a rich as he aspired to be in 1998 when Banksy launched. It only naturally follows that DH would try to replicate his mentor’s business model in some form to back a slate of artists with an MC & Stake-horse where he owned a meaningful part of stakehorse to maximise his profits as as Saatchi had done with him in the 90’s while likewise getting points on other artists in the broader slate like inader.

And though I’ve yet to cover the topic in full, the facts show that Banksy was initially as much a fiction intended to launch a 00’s rebranding of mural as street art with a stand-alone Anon artist at its lead, a brand rep like Hirst if you will, while a full slate of street artists were being stake-horsed on both sides of the pond with US Gallerist Jeffery Deitch shoulding the launch costs of his US-based (& global) slate (Fairey, Swoon, Os Geminos, Blu, Faile) while the UK slate (Banksy, Insect, Invader, JR, Mode 2, etc) had no manifest backer, with Lazarides the everyman acting as a MC proxy for DH in 90's with unseen money backing him and the broader venture so he could go from zero to major gallerist in a year with his "Outsiders Book, the compliment to Banksy's Wall & Pieces, establishing his legit art white castle cred.. It’s hard to think of who else in the UK could have been behind launching it UK with Laz MCing and dealing the slater other than DH.

On top his mugging for Banksy Inc and there being a classical psychological basis for him acting as financial ringleader, he also as Damien Hirst was modelling the belligerent (and drunk) artist during Banksy’s formative years until he got sober in 2007 like a drunken porto-type for the more straight-edge-ish working class Banksy Anon.” Additionally, DH concedes in a 2011 interviewer “After my dad left I got into quite a lot of trouble; burglaries, robbing, shoplifting. Crime is creative” filling out the trouble youth element of Banksy character. In total, there are more than enough similarities to see DH as the Banksy prototype though for my nickel I find the Banksy fiction far more interesting than DH as the real deal.

And when the Banksy artist withdrew their support from the larger venture — another coming attraction — DH saw himself as enough of draw to keep the Dismaland venture vital though the consensus is it didn’t make the grade of an “official” Banksy show and was largely panned by the art press.

From a means, motive and opportunity perspective, there is no better candidate for Banksy’s 1st money-in & production-support angel investor/incubator, which very well may be why the first item found in DH’s “Wreck of the Unbelievable” is a Golden Monkey in a wink-wink nod to the placarded apes that surely in some part helped fund DH’s branded effort at creating an art fiction.

​

!(sqrc0o0uxjeb1 "Damien Hirst, the Golden Monkey,2011")

The pictures in Steve Lazarides Banksy Captured don’t match. supporting the notion of multiple Banksys, with this first one from Wall & pieces being slight of build, thin-bodied and thin-fingered w/ a distinct neck between the head and shoulders…

!(42abwy9rxjeb1 "Skinny Slight Banksy")

… as does this larger version of the 1st Banksy show, this time played by official Banksy wall-art fitter Rob Gunningham…

!(l4oh5dxbyjeb1 "Rob G as medium sized banksy w/ neck sans ham-paws")

… while this last one with the fat fingers and barely a hint of neck bears a solid resemblance to DH’s pudgy digits and less than pronounced neck.

!(8dsxn85jyjeb1 "Bloated ham-pawed Banksy 2001")

Though I do have and will present other likely Banksy backers down the road, DH is far and away the stake horse for Banksy CEO. look at the paws on that bloke. I also have a Hirst -Lucy McKenzie link which is a longer story for another day.

Thanks for reading

Agree with Lroy that the notes and sketches are interesting and great history.

But it would be great if Laz gave a lot of the money to a British or Banksy charity and not all profiting. He would be seen as a better character in the whole story rather than an associate cashing in.

Coa’s aside , there are some very cool unique pieces in there
Will test the importance of the coa I guess as they are undoubtedly by Banksy

Banksy has long being caught out of being a fraud and his little company pest control made falsely dated COAs. Is Lazarides trustlevel obtained from working with a known hack till 2008?

The whole lot of this could be fake and copies, it's not authenticated , plain and simple.