Archinect - News

Banksy murals to be digitally preserved as part of new UK art database

2024-02-09T14:28:00-05:00

Art by the famous artist Banksy is to be included in a new initiative to document the UK’s murals. As reported by The Art Newspaper, the project will see more than 5,000 murals from across the UK digitally recorded for access in a free public database.

The project is being overseen by the educational charity Art UK with support from the National Lottery Heritage Fund. The three-year initiative will see public works recorded by a network of volunteer researchers and photographers, alongside documenting the stories behind the pieces.

“The location of murals, the circumstances behind their creation, and the materials used to create them can result in this type of artwork being ephemeral in nature,” Art UK says about the project. “Buildings and housing estates are demolished to make way for new developments meaning that many murals have been lost. We will record the murals as they look now, to provide a record if they are removed, defaced, or suffer environmental damage.”

Related on Arc...

Another Banksy mural destroyed after the building it was painted on was demolished

2023-12-01T17:41:00-05:00

A mural painted by Banksy which first appeared not long after Britain voted to leave the European Union (EU) has been destroyed after the building it was painted on was knocked down. The artwork, said to have been valued at around £1m, first appeared in the coastal town of Dover in 2017, the year after Britain voted to leave the union in a controversial referendum.

The mural, located on the side of the Castle Amusements building, depicted a worker chipping away at one the 12 stars on the EU flag. In 2019, the mural vanished after it was whitewashed. And, now, despite efforts to potentially restore the work, the building it was painted on has been demolished as part of a regeneration project. Prior to the building’s demolition the Dover City Council (DCC) determined that the Banksy could not have been conserved without major costs to local taxpayers.

Previously on Archinect: Banksy's latest mural on abandoned UK farmhouse has been demolished

That being said, the Council has said that its contractor, DDS Demolition, is exploring ways to preserve the artwork in any way. As reported by CNN, the demolition firm has said that pieces of the Banksy have been retrieved and are currently “being assessed.”

Banksy's latest mural on abandoned UK farmhouse has been demolished

2023-03-17T14:13:00-04:00

Banksy had just put the finishing touches on his latest artwork on an abandoned farmhouse in in Kent, England, when shortly after completion, a construction crew demolished the building. Entitled Morning is Broken, the work featured a silhouetted cat and a boy with arms outstretched opening two dilapidated sheets of iron, which were shaped like curtains.

News of the demolition spread across media channels and social platforms like Instagram and Twitter. A report from The Guardian explained that the site, owned by Kitewood, was "earmarked for dozens of new homes" as demolition on the site began on Tuesday, March 14. When workers began demolishing the site, one contractor told the local press they felt "gutted" and "sick realizing it was a Banksy."

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Banksy (@banksy)

This is the second Banksy piece demolished in Kent after another Valentine’s Day message on domestic violence was taken down and reinstalled at the popular town Dreamland theme park by the town council.

For sale in LA: a building with a Banksy OR a Banksy with a building?

2022-09-05T09:00:00-04:00

In 2010, while in town for the Los Angeles premiere of his documentary “Exit Through the Gift Shop,” the British street artist Banksy left a gift for fans: a mural of a girl on a swing, dangling beneath the five-foot red “A” of the word “PARKING” on a gritty downtown lot. Now that girl — as well as the historic building in the downtown fashion district that serves as her canvas — is for sale to the highest bidder.

The historic 26,000-square-foot Downtown Los Angeles building was purchased for $4 million three years prior to the popular documentary's premiere and underwent a $1.8 million renovation before its then-owners filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in April this year.

Art dealer Jeffrey Deitch says the 12- by 33-foot mural’s intrinsic value merits a different kind of appraisal. (“This is free public art. It is not meant to have a commercial value and be resold. That’s not the intention of the artist.”) The best estimate from the previous owners was reportedly $16 million without the girl, which Sotheby’s placed at a minimum of $10 million standing alone. A resolution will come when the building goes to auction on October 6th.

Banksy offers support to turn an infamous UK prison into a new arts center

2021-12-06T15:20:00-05:00

Banksy is getting into the shuffle in the effort to preserve a grade-II listed former prison complex in England called Reading Gaol.

The BBC is reporting that the famed street artist intends to sell the stencil he used for an Oscar Wilde-inspired mural placed on the building’s exterior wall in March at a charity auction which he hopes will command somewhere on the order of £10 million ($13.3 million) to be used towards creating a new arts center.

The historic structure has been up for grabs since 2019 and is reportedly under consideration to be purchased and remade in a scheme authored by the local Reading Borough Council.

A rendering of the proposed arts center plan. Image courtesy Reading Borough Council.

Now, with his literary idol in mind, Banksy’s pledge would help support the Council’s effort that could keep the former complex from being turned into apartment buildings while also paying homage to the artistic underpinnings from which the Picture of Dorian Gray author drew some...

Mr. Brainwash will transform vacant Paley Center into an art museum

2020-02-19T15:22:00-05:00

The artist Thierry Guetta, aka Mr Brainwash, is temporarily turning the former Paley Center for Media in Beverly Hills—designed by the architect Richard Meier in 1996—into his own museum. The French-born Los Angeles-based artist this week sealed a deal that will allow him to lease the building, which was bought by the luxury brand LVMH for $80m in 2018, until it and two other properties the company acquired on North Rodeo Drive are turned into a hotel.

Previously, the building, rising three stories, functioned as an outpost of the Museum of Television & Radio and then to the Paley Center for Media, which left earlier this month, The Art Newspaper reports. Equipped with the required museum facilities, the structure provides a capable canvas for Guetta to manipulate.

"It’s a dream come true; I still cannot believe it," says Guetta to The Art Newspaper. "We are in 2020 and it feels like I have achieved 20/20 vision. Whenever I set my eyes set on something, I am lucky enough to see it happen."

The museum is scheduled to open later this Spring.

Recent Banksy addition in NYC removed with rumors that property owner will profit from auction

2018-03-20T17:15:00-04:00

Last week, a piece by the anonymous graffiti artist was stenciled onto a building at the northwest corner of 14th street and sixth avenue in New York City. The structure—a former bank building—was tagged with one of Banksy's trademark rats running around a clock that is native to the property. Along with another piece that popped up in the city last week, it is believed to be his latest intervention in the city since his October 2013 "residency".

The work has been drawing crowds to the old HSBC, which is slated for demolition in order to build a 13-story mixed-use building. This morning, according to Hyperallergic, the clock was taken down by four workmen who dismantled the clock motor and mechanism from the interior. The removal was apparently ordered by the property owner and is rumored to be going to auction for the owner to conveniently profit off of.

David Choe: "Why Saving Banksy Means Saving Yourself"

2016-04-09T09:00:00-04:00

Who the fuck cares what Banksy’s real name is. You should care about his art instead, what he’s given you, and stop trying to take more than what’s to be had. Don’t deny yourself great artistic creativity simply to satisfy the curiosity of some blip of an itch that will deny him his anonymity to create. Doing that will make you less than the worst, you wouldn’t even be a super villain scientist, but a spectator searching for a sport to watch that you’re too inept to participate in.

Dismaland, Banksy's anti-capitalist art show, gave host town a £20M boost in tourism

2015-09-28T14:25:00-04:00

Over the past five weeks, more than 150,000 people have visited the subversive theme park in a derelict seafront lido, which had been shut since 2000 and reopened in a blaze of publicity on 20 August. [...] But, it is the town's tourist businesses that have reaped the benefit - to the tune of £20m, says Visit Somerset, more than three times what the trade body initially suggested. [...] Everyone has noted the irony of the anti-capitalist art show boosting business.

Previously: Banksy about to open "Dismaland" pop-up exhibition in British seaside resort

Banksy about to open "Dismaland" pop-up exhibition in British seaside resort

2015-08-19T15:31:00-04:00

Rumors have been circulating around the internet for a few days, but later this week Banksy is now set to open a new pop-up exhibition entitled "Dismaland" at in Weston-Super-Mare, UK. The venue is called "Tropicana", a 10,200-square-foot site to be transformed into "Dismaland", a probable attack on American entertainment giant Disney. [...] As usual with Banksy, the details are very scarce, but earlier this morning Iain Brimecome and Jon Goff were able to fly their drone above the site [...].

Another aerial view of "Dismaland," expected to open later this week. Photo: Iain Brimecome & Jon Goff, image via streetartnews.net.

Photo via @francisclarke on Twitter.

Banksy in the Archinect news:

After Banksy: the parkour guide to Gaza

2015-03-11T14:29:00-04:00

My name is Abdallah AlQassab, nearly 50% of us are unemployed and we are very available to show you around

In response to graffiti artist Banksy's Make this the Year YOU Discover a New Destination Gaza tourist video, the territory's parkour team show us what real life is like there and their dreams beyond the border. To the sounds of Palestine's biggest female hip-hop artist, Shadia Mansour, join Abdallah AlQassab and the rest of the free-running team as they flip, somersault and leap their way round the ruined city

An interview with man behind the “Stealing Banksy?” auction

2014-04-18T14:37:00-04:00

Next week in London, The Sincura Group will be holding a similar auction of street pieces formally by Banksy. That’s the same company that last year successfully sold the Banksy “Slave Labour” wall at auction for just over $1 million. They’ve titled their auction Stealing Banksy? and it will include approximately 18 works, at least 7 of which are street pieces formally by Banksy that have been removed from their original locations, some of them specifically removed for this sale.

5 Pointz "graffiti mecca" in Long Island City faces imminent destruction

2013-11-11T18:21:00-05:00

The artists behind New York’s graffiti haven 5 Pointz have learned that their last-ditch legal effort to save the outdoor gallery will likely fail. “The building, unfortunately, is going to have to come down,” federal judge Frederic Block said in New York’s eastern district court on Friday. [...] “I’m getting the sense that the traditional academic way of looking at things needs to be updated,” Block said.

Banksy's unpublished NYT op-ed declares new WTC is the biggest eyesore in New York

2013-10-27T23:21:00-04:00

Today’s piece was going to be an op-ed column in the New York Times. But they declined to publish what I supplied. Which was this... - Banksy

Free Cooper Remixes Banksy Confessional

2013-10-15T12:23:00-04:00

For the latest in their inventive visual mockery of Cooper Union president and unalloyed economic realist Jamshed Bharucha, the student activists of Free Cooper Union satirically reconfigured a Banksy work that popped up near the school’s campus over the weekend.

Constructive criticism: the week in architecture

2011-05-27T18:03:46-04:00

I've always felt anyone with a paint can should have as much say in how our cities look as architects ...