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If you want someone to be ignored then build a life-size bronze statue of them and stick it in the middle of town. It doesn’t matter how great you were, it’ll always take an unfunny drunk with climbing skills to make people notice you.

Banksy

I love the way capitalism finds a place – even for its enemies.
BANKSY

Capitalism Enemy Way
The one thing you can rely on is if you get disturbed halfway through a painting and it looks a bit naff, then someone will preserve that piece, remove it and a few months later it’ll be paraded round Sotheby’s by people wearing white gloves.
BANKSY

Looks People White
Brandalism Any advertisement in public space that gives you no choice whether you see it or not is yours. It belongs to you. It’s yours to take, rearrange and re-use. Asking for permission is like asking to keep a rock someone just threw at your head.
BANKSY

Giving Rocks Space
But there’s no way round it-commercial success is a mark of failure for a graffiti artist. We’re not supposed to be embraced in that way. When you look at how society rewards so many of the wrong people, it’s hard not to view financial reimbursement as a badge of self-serving mediocrity.
BANKSY

Artist Self Views
I like to think I have the guts to stand up anonymously in a western democracy and call for things no-one else believes in – like peace and justice and freedom.
BANKSY

Believe Justice Thinking
A lot of mothers will do anything for their children, except let them be themselves.
BANKSY

Children Mother Parenting
It doesn’t take much to be a successful artist-all you need to do is dedicate your entire life to it.
BANKSY

Artist Needs Successful
If you feel dirty, insignificant or unloved, then rats are a good role model. They exist without permission, they have no respect for the hierarchy of society, and they have sex 50 times a day.
BANKSY

Dirty Models Role Sex
I don’t think you should have to pay to look at graffiti. You should only pay if you want to get rid of it.
BANKSY

Graffiti Should Have Thinking
Live as a villain, die as a hero
BANKSY

Dies Hero Villain
Gaza is often described as ‘the world’s largest open air prison’ because no-one is allowed to enter or leave. But that seems a bit unfair to prisons – they don’t have their electricity and drinking water cut off randomly almost every day.
BANKSY

Air Cutting Drinking
If you have a statue in the city centre you could go past it every day on your way to school and never even notice it, right. But as soon as someone puts a traffic cone on its head, you’ve made your own sculpture.
BANKSY

Cities Past School
I tell myself I use art to promote dissent, but maybe I am just using dissent to promote my art. I plead not guilty to selling out. But I plead it from a bigger house than I used to live in.
BANKSY

Art Guilty House
You’re mind is working at its best when you’re being paranoid. You explore every avenue and possibility of your situation at high speed with total clarity.
BANKSY

Art Creativity Mind
A recent survey or North American males found 42% were overweight, 34% were critically obese and 8% ate the survey.
BANKSY

Found Males Surveys
The bad artists imitate, the great artists steal.
BANKSY

Art Artist Great Stealing
Nothing in the world is more common than unsuccessful people with talent, leave the house before you find something worth staying in for.
BANKSY

Art House People
I’ve learnt from experience that a painting isn’t finished when you put down your brush – that’s when it starts. The public reaction is what supplies meaning and value. Art comes alive in the arguments you have about it.
BANKSY

Alive Art Painting
It’s a very frustrated feeling you get when the only people with good photos of you work are the police department.
BANKSY

Feelings People Police
People say graffiti is ugly, irresponsible and childish… but that’s only if it’s done properly.
BANKSY

Graffiti Ironic People
If you don’t own a train company then you go and paint on one instead… it all comes from that thing at school when you had to have name tags in the back of something… that makes it belong to you. You can own half the city by scribbling your name over it.
BANKSY

Cities Names School
The holy grail is to spend less time making the picture than it takes people to look at it.
BANKSY

Art Holy Grail People
A wall is a very big weapon. It’s one of the nastiest things you can hit someone with.
BANKSY

Art Graffiti Wall
If it doesn’t matter, get rid of it. If you can’t get rid of it, it matters.
BANKSY

Get Matter Rid
You don’t need planning permission to build castles in the sky
BANKSY

Castles Needs Sky
Some people represent authority without ever possessing any of their own.
BANKSY

Authority People Piece Wall
We don’t need any more heroes; we just need someone to take out the recycling.
BANKSY

Hero Need Recycling

If you want someone to be ignored then build a life-size bronze statue of them and stick it in the middle of town. It doesn’t matter how great you were, it’ll always take an unfunny drunk with climbing skills to make people notice you.

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If you want someone to be ignored then build a life-size bronze statue of them and stick it in the middle of town. It doesn’t matter how great you were, it’ll always take an unfunny drunk with climbing skills to make people notice you.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Banksy Quotes