Don't normally pay attention to the daily fail, but enjoyed reading this... Never seen it before...
There is nothing much else going on, apart from POW being closed... So have a read of this and see what you reckon. Sounds like a good story...
www.dailymail.co.uk/home/moslive/article-1024130/Breaking-Banksy-The-interview-worlds-elusive-artist.html=====
That’s my mum,’ says Banksy.
He’s pointing at a googly-eyed stencil portrait of an old lady. ‘Don’t tell her I gave her funny eyes, though. It’s not her most flattering portrait.’
Before I continue, I should clarify: officially this man isn’t Banksy. But unofficially, he’s so Banksy I want to slice off his face and put it on eBay.
From my past encounters I’m 99 per cent sure it’s him.
He’s the only man in this dirty, poisonous little road beneath London’s Waterloo Station that nobody refers to by name.
They just come up to him, ask a quick question and then scuttle off. He’s tall and well built with slightly shabby hair. His voice has a slight West Country twang lurking behind an otherwise London tone.
We met before, back in 2006, when Banksy was flogging his art to the Hollywood elite for six-figure sums at an LA show that centred on a live painted elephant.
On that night I shared a urinal with Keanu Reeves, had my G&T pilfered by Jude Law, chatted to Brad about where Angelina was going to put their new Banksy statue, and crucially helped stop the four-ton Indian elephant creating the biggest Hollywood bloodbath of all time.
Having been fed 50 bags of M&M’s and a few litres of Red Bull, Nelly was understandably tetchy at being blocked out of his ‘luxury elephant trailer’ by Banksy’s broken-down lorry.
In one of the most surreal hours of my life, I helped the artist move his stricken truck, before giving his crew a lift back to their hotel in a convertible Mustang I’d hired. From that point I was ‘in’. Which is why I’m here now.
‘It was great fun out there,’ he laughs about our time in LA. ‘OK, there’s no elephant this time, but in a way this is much bigger, the biggest thing we’ve ever done. It’s so vast, and every time you walk to the end you notice that something else has changed.’
He’s covered in paint, yet claims not to be working today. When he speaks, everyone listens. Point a camera near him and he runs. Looking askance at my photographer, who’s lurking, he politely reminds me, ‘No photos.’ That’s fine. We’re not here to blow his cover.
A new Banksy mural 'One Nation Under CCTV' painted next to a CCTV camera at a Post Office yard in the West End.
Described as Britain’s Andy Warhol, undercover graffiti guerrilla Banksy is not only our most important working artist, but one of the world’s most elusive criminals.
In January, a wall defaced by his spray can sold for £208,100. Everyone from Jude Law to Brangelina has his politically charged stencils on their walls – and I’m spending a morning watching him create his latest masterpiece, an entire London street graffitied in secrecy and not due to be unveiled until tonight.
Despite countless attempts by the police, his fans and the media, Banksy has somehow managed to keep his identity under wraps since he first became famous around eight years ago.
The story goes that his real identity is so secret even Banksy’s parents don’t realise who their son is; his agent tells me, ‘They think he’s a painter and decorator who’s done very well for himself.’
I’m not sure if I believe that, but I do know the cat-and-mouse game he plays with those trying to find him is both perfectly executed and as tongue-in-cheek as some of his wittier artworks.
The New Yorker, the BBC, Esquire and London’s Evening Standard have all attempted exposés on him, and all have failed.
When the LA Times tried to find out who he was, Banksy unleashed stand-up comedian Simon Munnery as his ‘lawyer’ to confuse matters.
This, despite the fact that Munnery had been drinking heavily all night. His 30-minute rant baffled them enough to make them give up on their scoop. Proof of just how far the artist is willing to go to guard his secret.
His agent and right-hand man Steve Lazarides once told me even he isn’t 100 per cent sure of Banksy’s identity...
Alarming, considering Lazarides owns the artist’s website and gallery and controls all access to him – if you want to buy a £60,000 Banksy-defaced Mona Lisa, Steve is the man you call.
‘I get a note telling me which B&Q car park he’s going to leave his latest box of his canvases in,’ Lazarides once told me.
‘I collect them and leave him a cheque in their place.’ Though he wouldn’t tell me who the cheque was payable to, he was deadly serious, convincingly baffled by the arrangement himself.
Considering Lazarides was previously a West Country chicken-plucker who took photos of Bristol’s graffiti scene in his spare time, it’s not a bad deal, and one he’d be a fool to blow.
It was Lazarides who arranged for me to be part of this top-secret paint-bombing.
No other member of the media even knew about it, let alone got asked to attend, and my invitation was suitably mysterious: just a two-word text reading ‘Leake Street’. Having met Banksy before, I know this means I have to get to Leake Street immediately. It’s 5am.
I find the kind of place urban foxes go to die, filled with junkies and litter.
To be honest, I’m a little nervous. This, after all, is the man who unleashed 164 live rats on art critics at his 2005 show in London’s Westbourne Grove.
On arrival, I see Banksy’s publicist, who I met in LA, loitering in front of what looks like a building site.
A sign on a blue plywood temporary barrier reads ‘Transport for London: road closed for vital maintenance work’. It’s a fake sign.
In truth, Banksy has rented the entire road for six months, and has created a monster behind the faux barrier.
'Space Girl and Bird' sold at auction last year for £288, 000
I’m itching to see what it is. As the publicist bangs on the plywood to be let in, she hands me a piece of paper
On it there’s a note from Banksy himself. It says, ‘Graffiti doesn’t always spoil buildings. In fact, it’s the only way to improve a lot of them.
In the space of a few hours with a couple of hundred cans of paint, I’m hoping we can transform a dark, forgotten filth pit into an oasis of beautiful art – in a dark, forgotten filth pit.’
Fantastic. A chain rattles, a padlock is removed and a 6ft, bald security guard swings the plywood barrier open. I’m in....
Read the rest here...
www.dailymail.co.uk/home/moslive/article-1024130/Breaking-Banksy-The-interview-worlds-elusive-artist.html
