Banksy Quotes
- All Quotes
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'Think from outside the box, collapse the box and take a fucking knife to it.'
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'There's no way you're going to get a quote from us to use on your book cover.' - Metropolitan Police Spokesperson
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'I sucked a lot of liberal cocks to get where I am today.'
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'Art is not like other culture because its success is not made by its audience. The public fill concert halls and cinemas every day, we read novels by the millions, and buy records by the billions. 'We the people' affect the making and quality of most of our culture, but not our art.'
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'Nobody ever listened to me until they didn't know who I was.'
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I started painting graffiti in the classic New York style of big letters and characters but I was never very good at it.
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All graffiti is low-level dissent, but stencils have an extra history. They've been used to start revolutions and to stop wars.
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I tell myself I use art to promote dissent, but maybe I am just using dissent to promote my art. I plead not guilty to selling out. But I plead it from a bigger house than I used to live in.
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'Sometimes I feel so sick at the state of the world I can’t even finish my second apple pie.'
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'We don’t need any more heroes; we just need someone to take out the recycling.'
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'Try to avoid painting in places where they still point at aeroplanes.'
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'You can win the rat race but you're still a rat.'
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The time of getting fame for your name on its own is over. Artwork that is only about wanting to be famous will never make you famous. Any fame is a by-product of making something that means something. You don't go to a restaurant and order a meal because you want to have a sh*t.
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I am unable to comment on who may or may not be Banksy, but anyone described as 'good at drawing' doesn't sound like Banksy to me.
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I like to think I have the guts to stand up anonymously in a western democracy and call for things no-one else believes in - like peace and justice and freedom.
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'People who enjoy waving flags don't deserve to have one.'
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I have a theory that you can make any sentence seem profound by writing the name of a dead philosopher at the end of it.
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Some people criticize me for using sources that are a bit low brow (this quote is from 'Gladiator') but you know what? 'I'm just going to use that hostility to make me stronger, not weaker' as Kelly Rowland said on the X Factor.
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Graffiti is only dangerous in the mind of three types of people; politicians, advertising executives and graffiti writers.
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'I used to tell everyone I meant to be an artist..... I don't do that any more.'
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On Painting Rats, and the Glorification of Them. They exist without permission. They are hated, hunted and persecuted. They live in quiet desperation amongst the filth. And yet they are capable of bringing entire civilizations to their knees. If you are dirty, insignificant, and unloved then rats are the ultimate role model.
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Traditional graffiti writers have a bunch of rules they like to stick to, and good luck to them, but I didn't become a graffiti artist so I could have somebody else tell me what to do. If you're the type who gets sentimental about people scribbling over your stuff, I suggest graffiti is probably not the right hobby for you.
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I mean, they say you die twice. One time when you stop breathing and a second time, a bit later on, when somebody says your name for the last time.
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I don't know if street art ever really works indoors. If you domesticate an animal, it goes from being wild and free to sterile, fat and sleepy. So maybe the art should stay outside.