Definitely possible. Care to elaborate?

this is in Times Square- where the US had a terror scare just a week before Banksy’s arrival . so its rather funny he’s getting his portrait drawn in Times Square with a mask like that

I don’t agree that it is better than busk or isn’t. Art in any genre is always copied, street art included; copied and improved upon (usually). While busk’s piece acts as a taunting to fans who do not know who he is and gives them a picture, a portrait even, but masked questions the heart of one’s identity. The real question for him it seems, is if identity really matters when the work is what is being critiqued. Banksy’s piece on the other hand explores the same identity question, but the fact that it is Times Square NYC make the piece an even more affable joke. The most famous masked street artist is in one of the most public places in the world getting a portrait drawn of him, and his identity is still secret. Just like sneaking into the Louvre or Brooklyn Museum, this piece subversively makes fun and taunts the audience by using their own infatuation with his identity against them.

That was not supposed to sound so convoluted, but there is a lot of depth to the piece below the surface on both ends.

This is nothing new, Banksy takes most of *his* ideas from somewhere else. Though most of the sources are obscure enough not to get recognised, and so the braindead sheep-like consumers continue to lap it up with embarrassingly fawning adulation. The really interesting thing here is how advertising and marketing techniques have become so highly evolved and cleverly disguised that most people think all of this commercial hype is somehow underground and rebellious. They then swiftly graduate to becoming part of a group of cult-like ‘followers’ who act as unpaid evangelists for the brand, thus it becomes a self perpetuating entity. Some even take this fan lifestyle to an extreme and base their entire social life around it, writing blogs, going on forums, being part of a the same sad old ‘rent a crowd’ who seem to turn up to every urban art gallery opening to parasite off of the free booze and try to pretend they’re cool, trendy, and part of something…rather than the pathetic peripheral hangers-on it’s so apparent they really are.

*the term ‘his’ is used here to refer to the large number of people that now comprise the organisation.

what is your role within this art world we pathetically devour ourselves over then dorkus? Be you the great beholder of all knowledge? Be you our prophet Banksy? surely not just a mere parasite or follower of the cult.

I’ve heard stencils are the new freehand.

Thanks RJ for the clarification.

And Banksy certainly aware of Subcomandante Marcos, the Zapatista leader who uses a false name and only ever appears in public wearing a balaclava, but I think I’ve started reading too much into this.

In fact I’m wrong, because Daft Punk steals the style of another old school band named Space…