Whoops! £4m Banksy art painted over by builders
WITH his guerrilla style of painting, Banksy is not to everyone’s liking. Which may go some way to explaining just how £4 million worth of the street artist’s work was accidentally destroyed.
Owners of a Caribbean hotel were horrified after builders painted over five of his stencils.
Mistaking Banksy’s signature rats for graffiti, they plastered two coats of thick white paint over some of the drawings at the Geejam Hotel in Jamaica.
A hotel source said: ‘On a visit in
2006 Banksy left 11 stencils as a gift. However, over the summer builders thought a rogue visitor had defaced the walls, and promptly painted over the ones on the outside of the building.
‘When the mistake was realised, they were mortified – as were the owners.’
The five-star boutique hotel, in Port Antonio, is owned by friends of the reclusive painter.