Near Buckingham Palace: New Banksy artwork appears in London

The several-meter-high statue on the median strip of the main street Pall Mall shows a marching man holding a flag in his right hand that obscures his face. You can see “Banksy” writing on the base.

“There was a little space there”

“There was a little space there,” said the spokeswoman about the location on a traffic island. Banksy’s video ends with a shot of a man looking at the statue and saying, “No, I don’t like it!”

Numerous onlookers gathered in front of the statue. “We’re wondering how the hell he managed to put this statue just a stone’s throw from Buckingham Palace,” art student Ollie Isaac told an AFP reporter. He associates the statue with “the resurgence of nationalism around the world and in this country.”

There are numerous other statues nearby, including those of King Edward VII and Florence Nightingale, considered the founder of modern nursing. A work by Banksy appeared on nearby Shaftesbury Avenue in 2004 and was stolen shortly afterwards.

Banksy, who comes from Bristol, continues to attract attention all over the world with his street art works, and his works are sold for millions. There has been speculation about the artist’s identity for years; he himself keeps away from the public.

Most recently, the Reuters news agency tried to shed light on the mysterious artist. The report is based on an arrest report from New York from 2000 and statements from witnesses who claimed to have seen Banksy during a visit to Ukraine. Two decades ago, a British newspaper reported that Banksy was the Briton Robin Gunningham, who later changed his name to David Jones.