A name, and a hotel, you can Banksy on
‘‘Oh yeah, that was Inkie,’’ Rob Dean, our guide, said casually after he’d stopped for a chat during our walking tour of Bristol’s street art.
Fresh from what was then the world’s longest flight (Auckland to Doha), followed by a flight to London, then a three-hour drive to Bristol, I was more than a little delirious and the magnitude of that throwaway comment was lost on me.
But Dean held my attention as we wandered the streets of that 1000-year-old city. He explained how it all began.
Now a famous artist worth millions, Banksy was once just an unknown kid trying to provoke a reaction and make a difference.
We ambled down to Frogmore St to see one of his best known, earliest pieces of art, The Well Hung Lover. At the time, Dean told us, the city council took a zero tolerance attitude to public art, enraging and provoking Banksy to spray-paint this piece on to a building directly opposite the City Hall, and just out of reach of the removal team. A cheeky move. Attitudes have since changed, of course, and what was once just graffiti is now a work of art.
Later that day, in my hotel room, I Googled Inkie.
Tom Bingle – aka Inkie – is a pretty famous London-based painter and street artist, just one of Banksy’s inner circle. No big deal, then.
In Bristol, the birthplace of Banksy, it seemed like everyone knew who he was, but no-one was telling. We had lunch with a lovely lady who played tennis with Banksy’s mum, and another whose child went to school with him. Those Bristolians can keep a secret though. I left the city a few days later, none the wiser to his true identity.
In our cover story this week, Ashleigh Stewart checks into Banksy’s Walled Off Hotel in Bethlehem, where once again the elusive artist is provoking a reaction, and making a difference.