{"id":342631,"date":"2026-03-16T20:53:12","date_gmt":"2026-03-16T20:53:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/342631\/"},"modified":"2026-03-16T20:53:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-16T20:53:12","slug":"heres-the-deal-with-banksys-identity-allegedly-being-revealed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/342631\/","title":{"rendered":"Here’s The Deal With Banksy’s Identity Allegedly Being Revealed"},"content":{"rendered":"

Banksy is, without a doubt, one of the world’s most famous artists. He’s known for his political-leaning street art as well as stunts conducted within the art world itself \u2014 like when his “Girl Without Balloon” painting was immediately destroyed via shredder in 2018, seconds after it was auctioned off.\"Two<\/p>\n

Alexander Scheuber \/ Getty Images<\/p>\n

Banksy’s notoriety is bolstered by the fact that, pretty much the entire time he’s been doing his thing, no one has publicly revealed who he actually is. For a while, people believed that Banksy’s true identity was Robert Del Naja of the influential UK electronic group Massive Attack. At points, people have also theorized that Banksy is actually several people operating under a sort of collective pseudonym.\"A<\/p>\n

Jo Hale \/ Getty Images<\/p>\n

Related: Trump’s MAGA Army Is Absolutely Ripping Him Apart Over The Iran Bombing, And Their Comments Are Pure Unfiltered Rage<\/a><\/p>\n

Confused? Well, a potential bombshell of a report from Reuters<\/a> claims to have uncovered the true, actual identity of Banksy \u2014 but that doesn’t mean the matter is settled in any way, shape, or form.\"A<\/p>\n

JUSTIN TALLIS \/ AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n

First off: The journalists who contributed reportage to the story claim that Del Naja is not, in fact, the sole identity of Banksy \u2014 but, that he may or may not have been a collaborator with Banksy, or within the Banksy project, at some point. Massive Attack’s reps also didn’t respond to comment, so who knows what’s going on there.\"Car<\/p>\n

John Phillips \/ Getty Images<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

Related: “Who’s Gonna Tell Him”: This Fox News Host Tried To Drag Gavin Newsom, And It Backfired In The Funniest Way<\/a><\/p>\n

Instead, Reuters claims that the true identity of Banksy is graffiti artist Robin Gunningham, who later changed his name to David Jones. (Interestingly, Gunningham-slash-Jones hails from Bristol, where Massive Attack were founded as a band. The plot thickens, indeed!)\"A<\/p>\n

Joe Maher \/ Getty Images<\/p>\n

Related: Hillary Clinton Just Hit On One Of Donald Trump’s Biggest Insecurities With Three Words<\/a><\/p>\n

The reporting that led Reuters to allege that Gunningham-slash-Jones is the real Banksy is exhaustive and fascinating, and if you find this story at all interesting I would advise reading the entire story right here<\/a>. One thing you should know, though, is that Banksy’s lawyer has \u2014 very unsurprisingly \u2014 claimed that their reporting is inaccurate.\"A<\/p>\n

Arnold Jerocki \/ Getty Images<\/p>\n

The artist’s lawyer, Mark Stephens, said in a statement to Reuters that he \u201cdoes not accept that many of the details contained within your enquiry are correct.” He also urged the publication to not publish their reporting, claiming that Banksy has been “subjected to fixated, threatening and extremist behaviour.\u201d\"Two<\/p>\n

Matthew Horwood \/ Getty Images<\/p>\n

Related: People Just Noticed What Trump’s FBI Director Secretly Wrote On A Note To Himself During A Hearing, And They Can’t Stop Laughing<\/a><\/p>\n

Stephens also put forth that Banksy’s decision to work \u201canonymously or under a pseudonym serves vital societal interests. It protects freedom of expression by allowing creators to speak truth to power without fear of retaliation, censorship or persecution \u2013 particularly when addressing sensitive issues such as politics, religion or social justice.\u201d\"Two<\/p>\n

WILLIAM WEST \/ AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

Maybe, when you think about it, the real Banksy was the friends we made along the way. At any rate, a fascinating turn of events!<\/p>\n

You Might Like: 29 Lazyish Ways To Deep Clean Your Home You’ll Wish You’d Known About Sooner<\/a><\/p>\n

You Might Like: Literally Just 28 Of The Coolest Products I’ve Seen Recently<\/a><\/p>\n

Also in In the News: JD Vance Made A Really Gross Joke Involving His Own Penis, And Usha Vance’s Face Has Me On The Floor<\/a><\/p>\n

Read it on BuzzFeed.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Banksy is, without a doubt, one of the world’s most famous artists. He’s known for his political-leaning street…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":342632,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[437,434,435,436,5251,438,146,1077,85,46,167551,167552,167553],"class_list":["post-342631","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-artsdesign","tag-banksy","tag-design","tag-entertainment","tag-getty-images","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-massive-attack","tag-robert-del-naja","tag-true-identity"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342631","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=342631"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342631\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/342632"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=342631"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=342631"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=342631"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}