Banksy
There's obviously nothing wrong with selling your art - only an idiot with a trust fund would tell you otherwise. But it's confusing to know how far you should take it.Collection: Trust
Art should comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable.Collection: Art
Not everyone will understand your journey. That's okay. You're here to live your life, not to make everyone understand.Collection: Journey
Nobody ever listened to me until they didn't know who I wasCollection: Graffiti
I’ve learnt from experience that a painting isn’t finished when you put down your brush – that’s when it starts. The public reaction is what supplies meaning and value. Art comes alive in the arguments you have about it.Collection: Art
People say graffiti is ugly, irresponsible and childish... but that's only if it's done properly.Collection: People
The greatest crimes in the world are not committed by people breaking the rules but by people following the rules. It's people who follow orders that drop bombs and massacre villages.Collection: Art
Speak softly, but carry a big can of paint.Collection: Hipster
A wall is a very big weapon. It's one of the nastiest things you can hit someone with.Collection: Art
You can win the rat race but you're still a rat.Collection: Inspirational
There's nothing more dangerous than someone who wants to make the world a better place.Collection: Interesting
I just wanna make the world a better-looking place. If you don't like it, you can paint over it!Collection: World
The bad artists imitate, the great artists steal.Collection: Artist
A lot of people never use their initiative because no-one told them to.Collection: Independent
I don't know why people are so keen to put the details of their private life in public; they forget that invisibility is a superpower.Collection: People
Imagine a city where graffiti wasn't illegal, a city where everybody could draw whatever they liked. Where every street was awash with a million colours and little phrases. Where standing at a bus stop was never boring. A city that felt like a party where everyone was invited, not just the estate agents and barons of big business. Imagine a city like that and stop leaning against the wall - it's wet.Collection: Wall
Fight the fighters, not their wars.Collection: War
Nobody knows what you feel inside unless you tell them.Collection: Nobody Knows
The art world is the biggest joke going. It's a rest home for the overprivileged, the pretentious, and the weak. And modern art is a disgrace - never have so many people used so much stuff and taken so long to say so little.Collection: Art
Is graffiti art or vandalism? That word has a lot of negative connotations and it alienates people, so no, I don't like to use the word 'art' at all.Collection: Art
You don't need planning permission to build castles in the skyCollection: Sky
Live as a villain, die as a heroCollection: Hero
Writing graffiti is about the most honest way you can be an artist. It takes no money to do it, you don't need an education to understand it, and there's no admission fee.Collection: Writing
The people who run our cities dont understand graffiti because they think nothing has the right to exist unless it makes a profit... the people who truly deface our neighborhoods are the companies that scrawl giant slogans across buildings and buses trying to make us feel inadequate unless we buy their stuff.... any advertisement in public space that gives you no choice whether you see it or not is yours, it belongs to you ,, its yours to take, rearrange and re use.Asking for permission is like asking to keep a rock someone just threw at your head.Collection: Running
Bus stops are far more interesting and useful places to have art than in museums.Collection: Art
It's a very frustrated feeling you get when the only people with good photos of you work are the police department.Collection: People
Film is incredibly democratic and accessible, it's probably the best option if you actually want to change the world, not just re-decorate it.Collection: Movie
If at first you don't succeed, Call an airstrike.Collection: Firsts
If you are dirty, insignificant and unloved then rats are the ultimate role model.Collection: Dirty
People who enjoy waving flags don't deserve to have one.Collection: People
I have no interest in ever coming out. I’m just trying to make the pictures look good; I’m not into trying to make myself look good. And besides, it’s a pretty safe bet that the reality of me would be a crushing disappointment to a couple of 15-year-old kids out there.Collection: Crush
As far as I can tell the only thing worth looking at in most museums of art is all the schoolgirls on daytrips with the art departments.Collection: Art
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.Collection: People
I wouldnt want to be remembered as the guy who contaminated a perfectly legitimate form of protest art with money and celebrities.Collection: Art
I used to tell everyone I met to be an artist..... I don't do that any more.Collection: Artist
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.Collection: Mean
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.Collection: Drawing
Policemen and security guards wear hats with a peak that comes down low over their eyes. Apparently this is for psychological reasons. Eyebrows are very expressive and you appear a lot more authoritative if you keep them covered up. The advantage of this is that it makes a lot harder for cops to see anything more than six foot off the ground. Which is why painting rooftops and bridges is so easy.Collection: Eye
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.Collection: Art
You're advised not to drink the replica Arab spring water.Collection: Spring
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.Collection: Good Luck
I figure there are enough self-opinionated assholes trying to get their ugly little faces in front of you as it is. You ask a lot of kids today what they want to be when they grow up, and they say, 'I want to be famous.' You ask them, 'For what reason?' and they don't know or care. I think Andy Warhol got it wrong - in the future, so many people are going to become famous that one day everybody will end up being anonymous for 15 minutes.Collection: Growing Up
Remember crime against property is not real crime. People look at an oil painting and admire the use of brushstrokes to convey meaning. People look at a graffiti painting and admire the use of a drainpipe to gain access.Collection: Real
Painting something that defies the law of the land is good. Painting something that defies the law of the land and the law of gravity at the same time is ideal.Collection: Law
This is a big surprise I don't agree with the concept of award ceremonies, but I'm prepared to make an exception for the ones I'm nominated for. The last time there was a naked man covered in gold paint in my house, it was me.Collection: Men
You live in the city and all the time there are signs telling you what to do and billboards trying to sell you something.Collection: Cities
I give away thousands of paintings for free.Collection: Giving
All I know about what people think of my gear is what a couple of my friends tell me, and one of them always wants to borrow money, so I'm not sure how reliable he is.Collection: Couple
Some people represent authority without ever possessing any of their own.Collection: People