Banksy Mild Mild West Defaced

It got tagged the other week, and painted out again in black paint quickly, but now it’s been done pretty irrevocably. The Banksy Mild Mild West piece on Stokes Croft, which had survived intact for 9/10 years or so has now been gone over in red paint.

All still a bit unclear at the moment, but seems these people at Appropriate Media may be behind it.

In the early hours of this morning, Banksy’s ‘Mild Mild West’ on Stokes Croft in Bristol (UK) was repainted by a member of Appropriate Media, presenting an alternative version of this ‘alternative Bristol landmark’.

Through this action, Appropriate Media asks ?What is the value of street art??. How much time and money will be spent to restore this urban ‘masterpiss’ by urban masterpisser, Banksy.

Come on, you only care about it cos its a Banksy and he sells his lazy polemics to Hollywood movie stars for big bucks.

Come on, you only care about it cos makes you feel edgy and urban to tour round the inner city in your 4×4, taking in the tired coffee table subversion that graffiti has become.

Graffiti artists are the copywriters for the capitalist created phenomenon of urban art.
Graffiti artists are the performing spray-can monkeys for gentrification.

We call for the appropriate and legitimate use of public and private property.
We are taking matters into our own hands

We will not seek permission

We will retaliate

Seemed like it was only a matter of time really once the fencing around the building next to it came down, and you could get right up to it easily enough.

That’s the last Banksy freehand piece gone then isn’t it? Think so.

UPDATE 7:30pm

Got some photos of it this evening, turns out the paint may have been water based, and has mostly cleaned off, but it’s not pretty.

Doesn’t look too bad in the long shot.

Bit less classic in the close up

The policemen seem to have lost some paint round the legs. The damage round the ‘upper thighs’ of the one on the right is from a previous tagging of it a week or two ago that got painted out by PRSC.

The teddy hasn’t come off too badly.

But the white bits below are a bit of a mess.

Caught up with PRSC people down there too. As they saw it, they had three options this morning after what they describe as an “artistic intervention” on the piece. Leave it as it was, clean it up, or paint over the whole thing. Apparently, after taking a straw poll of people walking past, the decision, perhaps unsurprisingly, was to clean it up.

So they spent today washing the paint off before it dried, and also cleaning the Panik piece below if at the same time. As they see it, each piece is of equal merit and worth.

UPDATE 07/04/09 1:15pm

For interest, here’s a photo taken by PRSC of the previous tagging stencil thing that was done on the piece a week or two ago, painted out by them pretty much straight away.