Critics
Peter Gibson, a spokesman for Keep Britain Tidy, asserts that Banksy's work is simple vandalism, and Diane Shakespeare, an official for the same organisation, was quoted as saying: "We are concerned that Banksy's street art glorifies what is essentially vandalism." In his column for The Guardian, satirist Charlie Brooker wrote of Banksy "...his work looks dazzlingly clever to idiots."
He has also been long criticised for copying the work of Blek le Rat, creator of the life-sized stencil technique in early 1980s Paris. Blek's own response to such criticism has been varied. He has expressed pleasure at being an inspiration to "an artist that good," and in early 2011 was seen adding to a mural initiated by Banksy in San Francisco.
However, Blek expressed a different perspective later that same year, in the documentary Graffiti Wars, stating:
When I see Banksy making a Madonna with a child or Banksy making rats, of course I see immediately where he takes the idea. I do feel angry. When you're an artist you use your own techniques. It's difficult to find a technique and style in art so when you have a style and you see someone else is taking it and reproducing it, you don't like that. I'm not sure about his integrity. Maybe he has to show his face now and show what kind of guy he is."Read more about this topic: Banksy
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