Who is Banksy? Clues to the street artist's real identity

A London fish bar owner has told how he feared his business could be targeted after a Banksy artwork appeared on his wall while he was on holiday.

"Some local customer actually messaged me with a photo saying, 'Oh, someone's doing graffiti on your wall'," George Christou, of Bonners Fish Bar in Walthamstow, told PA. "I thought 'God, just finally while I’m away'."

"Is someone gonna try and steal it or break in or damage it? You don’t really know what people will do," he recalled, as reported by the London Evening Standard.

The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

Join more than 350,000 subscribers and keep yourself informed with a selection of The Week’s most interesting, enlightening and entertaining stories - plus daily puzzles.

Join more than 350,000 subscribers and keep yourself informed with a selection of The Week’s most interesting, enlightening and entertaining stories - plus daily puzzles.

Sign up

Christou contacted his MP and a local art shop about protecting the image, a silhouette of two pelicans stealing fish from the shop sign, saying this enabled him to "breathe a little bit more" and finish his holiday.

His fears were not unfounded. The Independent reported that a satellite dish on which Banksy had drawn a howling wolf was "taken less than an hour after it was confirmed as authentic".

What Banksy makes of the controversy around his work is not known. Despite being one of the most famous artists in the world, Banksy keeps his life and identity secret – "officially at least", said the BBC.

That might be, said one commentator, because most of his admirers don't want to know who he is.

Speaking on The Rest Is Entertainment podcast in August, The Guardian columnist Marina Hyde said "lots of people don't want to know" because "they like the idea, and I guess they respect the idea, that he doesn't want to be known as an artist in that way".

But for those who do want to know who Banksy is, there are lots of alleged sightings and theories to sink your teeth into.

Has anyone ever met Banksy?

Here are some of the key Banksy “sightings” over the years:

Banksy meets The Guardian, 2003: One of the only journalists to have met Banksy is The Guardian’s Simon Hattenstone. He described the artist as "white, 28, scruffy casual – jeans, T-shirt, a silver tooth, silver chain and silver earring. He [Banksy] looks like a cross between Jimmy Nail and Mike Skinner of the Streets."

Banksy in Bethnal Green, 2007: A passer-by "familiar with Banksy’s work" snapped the artist and an assistant painting a mural in Bethnal Green, east London. The picture “could show the reclusive artist at work”, said the BBC.

Banksy a "nice middle-class boy", 2008: The Mail on Sunday broke the mould by running a sharp picture of a smiling, curly-haired man it insisted was Banksy. His real name is Robin Gunningham, said the paper, which also claimed he was public school educated at the then £9,240-a-year Bristol Cathedral School. Fans of the artist’s "anti-establishment stance" would doubtless be "shocked" to learn of his true identity, the Mail added.

Banksy self-portrait, 2009: When a Banksy "self-portrait" appeared on the side of an office block in east London, the Mail on Sunday felt vindicated. "The image is almost identical to the Mail on Sunday’s picture [of Gunningham]," it said. "It is possible the graffiti art was created by someone else," the paper admitted. "But evidence compiled in a Mail on Sunday investigation suggests that Banksy is indeed Robin Gunningham – and that in his latest graffiti he has coyly acknowledged his unmasking."

Banksy goes to the Playboy Club, 2011: Was that Banksy wearing a vicar’s outfit and a skull mask to a celebrity bash at the Playboy Club in Mayfair, London? Members of the paparazzi insisted it was, Digital Spy wasn’t so sure.

Banksy unmasked in Santa Monica, 2011: Another grainy, out-of-focus picture, this one taken in Los Angeles, was published in the Daily Mail. It showed a man wearing a green baseball cap who the Mail said had just painted the words "This Looks a bit like an Elephant" on a container near a busy motorway.

Banksy in New York, 2013: One of the pictures claiming to unmask the reclusive millionaire street artist was taken in New York in October 2013. It shows a gaunt-looking man wearing a flat cap and "paint-spattered overalls". The snap, taken by one of the stencil artist’s fans, was captured as a delivery truck being used to display one of his artworks was parked on a Manhattan street. When a battery failed and the lights illuminating the picture of a lush garden went off, the man in the cap "sprang into action". There were several men at the scene, but the one in the hat "stood out from the group", reported The Mirror.

Banksy in Tel Aviv, 2017: A woman claimed to have noticed the artist at an Israeli shopping centre just north of Tel Aviv. It came days after Banksy had opened an exhibition in Bethlehem. Video footage shot on a mobile phone shows the mysterious man, wearing a white hat, blue shirt and camouflage trousers, carrying a stencil before putting up a hand to cover his face. Israeli newspaper Haaretz cast doubt on the report, saying the man caught on camera was indeed a British graffiti artist, but James Ame, who is married to an Israeli woman.

Banksy 'caught on camera' in Hull, 2018: Footage recorded by a scrap dealer in Hull is said to reveal the "original" Banksy – believed to be Gunningham. The man, who bears a striking resemblance to Gunningham, was caught on video in Hull at the same time that three "Banksy" artworks were discovered in the city. According to The Independent the artist was spotted wearing a baseball cap and sunglasses to shield his identity, metres from a daubing that was later confirmed to be genuine.

Banksy takes to the tube, 2020: A video posted by the artist on Instagram in July 2020 shows a man "presumed to be Banksy" get on a Circle Line train before spraying a stencilled rat onto a carriage, said the BBC. The man in the video was "disguised as a cleaner" - but before the artist was able to share the footage, real Transport for London cleaning staff had "wiped away" the work. "In the current climate, it’s perhaps reassuring that the cleaners on the Tube did their job quickly and efficiently", wrote BBC London transport correspondent Tom Edwards.

Banksy ‘snapped’ in Norfolk, 2021: Gorleston-on-Sea resident Sam Jermy spotted an "elusive" street artist in August 2021, after hearing that murals similar to the style of Banksy’s work had appeared in other nearby seaside towns. "What a shame he didn’t zoom in on the face" when capturing the supposed "man with the can" on camera, said ITV Anglia.

Bowler hat Banksy 'spotted', 2023: Some builders were convinced they spotted him in the flesh when a "mysterious man" was seen "hanging around the site of the artist's latest mural" in Broomfield, near Herne Bay, Kent, said LadBible. "We saw him yesterday, he was here taking a picture of the mural," said a contractor.

Gunningham again, 2024: A man said to bear a "striking resemblance" to Gunningham was spotted beside a tree-themed painting in Finsbury Park, north London in March 2024. "Has Banksy finally let his mask slip?" wondered Mail Online.

Is Banksy another well-known artist?

Perhaps rather than holding a Clark Kent-style ordinary day job, Banksy’s alter ego is already well-known in the art world. The Daily Telegraph suggested in 2016 that "Banksy" could be an alias for trailblazing British artist Damien Hirst. "The pair collaborated for the piece Keeping It Spotless, which features a French maid sweeping under a spot painting," said the paper.

Another of "the most famous claims" is that he is Massive Attack's Robert Del Naja, "living a double life in plain sight", said The Independent. Del Naja was raised in Bristol and is also a name in the street art scene, so "it's no surprise" the two have been linked, it added.

The rumour mill has also suggested that Gorillaz founder and artist Jamie Hewlett is "the person behind the mystery artist", wrote Andipa, after an anonymous forensic expert claimed paperwork allegedly showed Hewlett to be linked to every company Banksy is connected with.

Is he really multiple people?

One theory that has long done the rounds is that rather than being a single lone artist, Banksy is in fact a number of people.

In his book "The Unusual Suspects", William Kasper claimed he is actually four people. One of the "Banksys" he unmasked is James Hallewell, "a British born street artist believed to have earned his chops in the northern town of Sheffield in the late 1990s", said the Daily Beast. "While there is plenty of doubt that Hallewell is the 'original' Banksy, it is very likely that he is one of Banksy’s key assistants and collaborators."

According to The Independent, journalist Craig Williams has suggested that Banksy "is really a collective of artists associated with Massive Attack rather than one person, cross-referencing the sudden appearance of Banksy murals with the band’s tour dates in a viral blog post of August 2016, finding a number of matches".

"The 'multiple Banksys' idea… provides a simple explanation for how a graffiti artist who has daubed tens of thousands of images on walls around the world and even built mock theme parks has managed to avoid identification by mainstream media and hipster blogs," said the Daily Beast.