For over a week, the mysterious street artist Banksy took to the streets of London and, under the cover of night, took the Big Smoke for a walk on the wild side by introducing stenciled wildlife into the urban cityscape.
Every day, for nine consecutive days, a new Banksy mural depicting a member or members of the animal kingdom appeared somewhere in the city. They perched on the roofs of buildings and swung from infrastructure. One of the portrayed animals even get very, very friendly with Nissan Micra. After each discovery, the artist claimed the work as his own via posts on Instagram.
There was no explanation as to why he chose to decorate the city with elephants, monkeys, and fish (oh my), which suited his followers well enough. Half of the pleasure of a new Banksy every day was speculating what message the artist was trying to send.
“The camera is looking at the falling rocks, rather than what’s causing them to fall,” one person wrote on the Banksy’s Instagram post of a stenciled goat standing just so on the buttress of a wall new Kew Bridge in Richmond, a town in southwest London, as rocks tumble from beneath the animal’s feet. “Goats are adapted to climbing on narrow ledges, so it isn’t in danger, but the camera’s view doesn’t give the full picture. So I’d guess that it’s referencing the need to understand that news needs context before forming an opinion.”
On a post in which Banksy “claimed authorship” of three stenciled monkeys swinging from a bridge over Brick Lane, near Shoreditch High Street, one user wrote that the work “can be seen as a critique of the chaotic and irrational behavior in society, especially during the Trump era and the fears of terrorism.” The monkeys, the user went on, might symbolize “the masses blindly following a fragile path, reflecting how populism and fear can lead to reckless actions.” Heady stuff.
Unless Banksy himself chooses to make a statement on his metropolis-wide menagerie, speculation and appreciation is all we’ve got. Like with criticism, anything is fair game.
It’s in that spirit that we present Banksy’s array of wildlife, ranked.
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The Cat
Image Credit: AFP via Getty Images Banksy’s stretching cat, which was found in northern London on a decaying, plywood billboard on August 10 was the least dynamic of the lot. Like many of Banksy’s works, it wasn’t there for long. Despite that, crowds booed as the mural was taken down just hours after it was spotted, according to the BBC.
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The Elephants
Image Credit: Photo by Yui Mok/PA Images via Getty Images The second work to appear featured two elephants facing each other, their heads poking out of boarded up windows on the side of a building in Chelsea, their trunks reaching out implying a caress is just moments away. It’s a bit saccharine, but thinking about two elephants inside the apartment building was rather enjoyable.
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The Wolf
Image Credit: Photo by Jordan Pettitt_PA Images via Getty Images On August 8, sharp-eyed mural hunters spotted a howling wolf stenciled onto a satellite dish above a brick storefront in the Peckham borough of South London. It was the fourth mural in the series. While the placement was spot on, the lupine figure loses points for breaking the pattern (until it was found the number of animals in each mural was increasing) and for being stolen by masked men in broad daylight, shortly after being discovered.
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The Monkeys
Image Credit: Photo Henry Nicholls/AFP via Getty Images The third mural, spotted on August 7, showed a trio of monkeys swinging on a makeshift vine on the side of a subway station in East London. There was movement, it was hidden in plain sight, and at this point people started wondering just how far Banksy was willing to go down … the rabbit hole. The only thing lacking was the dollop of comedy that graces the best of Banksy’s oeuvre.
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The Goat
Image Credit: Getty Images The first mural had it all and is only this far down on the list because of how good the remaining for are. The mural showed the outline of a mountain goat, precariously perched on the buttress of a building near London’s Kew Bridge. The goat appeared to be looking at the depths below while his unsure footing causes rocks to slip from beneath his feet. On the same wall, a few feet away, an actual security camera took stock of the situation, leading social media users to speculate that Banksy was making a statement about the security state, our collective relationship with the media, or the plight of Palestinians in Gaza.
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The Pelicans
Image Credit: Getty Images With his fifth mural Banksy really started to get creative with placement. On August 9 two stenciled pelicans were found above the yellow sign of a fish and chips takeaway shop, Bonner’s Fish Bar, in the northeastern London neighborhood of Walthamstow. One of the giant birds was tossing a fish into its own mouth. The other was in the process of plucking a fish off the restaurants sign.
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The Gorilla
Image Credit: Photo credit should read Matthew Chattle/Future Publishing via Getty Images Second and third place are a tossup, but ironically the bronze goes to Banksy’s August 13 finale: the image of a gorilla lifting up a gate and releasing a slew of wild, though mostly harmless, animals into the city. A seal and a flock of birds have already escaped thanks to the gorilla’s efforts. In the background float the lit-up eyes of more soon-to-be freed beasties.
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The Rhino
Image Credit: PA Images via Getty Images Yes, it’s a touch crude. But it’s very, very funny. Second place goes to Banksy’s August 12 mural, which features a giant rhinoceros mounting a two-door Nissan Micra mini-hatchback. The poor automobile’s back bumper basically touches the dusty ground underneath. It’s no match for the rhino’s heft. Sadly the graphic graffiti suffered the same fate as so many of Banksy’s public murals. A short while after it was found the animal had been obscured by a competing graffiti artist’s tag (trying to make a name for ourselves, are we?) and the car was removed, ruining the context.
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The Fish
Image Credit: AFP via Getty Images Top placement goes to the third-to-last work in the series, which was also the most colorful. On August 11, the windows of a small police guard station in London’s financial district were painted to resemble a fishtank, complete with a school of fish. But take a closer look. Are there vicious little teeth behind those fishy lips?
According to Kelly Grovier, who has written a forthcoming book titled How Banksy Saved Art History, that’s no docile school of fish but rather “the circling creatures formed a ghostly shoal of ghoulish piranhas.” Woe to whoever tries to take a selfie in that tank. Grovier told the BBC that Banksy’s seventh installment proved that “as ever with Banksy, there is more than meets the eye.”
She also noted the possible art-historical allusion to Damien Hirst’s formaldehyde-soaked shark, adding that Banksy “took Hirst’s work to the next level of meaning. Thirty-three years since Hirst first unveiled his vicious vitrine, that once-shocking shark has begun to lose its bite. By updating the YBA icon and resharpening its resonance in the context of policing, Banksy rehabilitates a work whose relevance was a little long in the tooth.”
