Man speaks out after hiring Banksy for £50 – then painting over his mural: “I have no regrets at all”

"It was just another art project back then"

A man has spoken out about a period where he hired Banksy to conduct an art workshop for £50 that included a mural, which was then painted over.

Peter de Boer, a senior practitioner on the Bristol City Council, was interviewed by BBC yesterday (January 15) about engaging Banksy – whose identity remains anonymous – for art classes at a local youth club in the 1990s.

In these classes, Banksy taught graffiti to groups of Bristol teens, whom de Boer said was a “true collaboration” where they “were engaged, having fun and sharing ideas”.

“If you look at the photos, you can see the way he was working with the young people,” de Boer told BBC, which published pictures of the classes on the condition of retaining Banksy’s anonymity.

Banksy was hired for £50 to run a workshop with the kids, who were excited to work with the artist even as “nobody thought twice about who he was”.

“The thing that struck me back then was he didn’t really have an ego. He was doing art with them, rather than doing art for them,” de Boer revealed. “In the morning, he sat around a table with the children, talking about their ideas. Then they would all just muck in and spray these things that were invented.”

“It wasn’t more Banksy than the young people, it was definitely a kind of 50/50 thing,” he added.

However, over time, the murals that came out of these classes did not last. “I personally painted over a Banksy. I threw a Banksy stencil away when I was clearing up,” de Boer said, adding that he has “no regrets at all” about doing it.

“Back then, it was much more about working with and engaging young people. And it was just another art project back then.”

De Boer, then a senior youth worker, had been looking for local artists to help inspire and teach youths in the area of west Bristol. Per BBC, a friend suggested an artist, later revealed to be Banksy, who had begun to gain attention for his works in the city.

“I got his phone number, so I used to call him up and ask if he’d come and do some art projects. He was really keen,” de Boer said. BBC noted that de Boer reached out to Banksy in the same year that the artist revealed his ‘Mild Mild West’ mural, which was painted in response to an incident at a warehouse rave where partygoers were attacked by riot police.

Last December, Blur’s Alex James revealed that Banksy was backstage at their Wembley reunion and “loved” the show. The artist has remained anonymous through the decades, even as speculation has continued. In 2020, Art Attack presenter Neil Buchanan had to deny persistent rumours that he is Banksy.

Another popular fan theory is that Banksy is actually Massive Attack’s Robert del Naja, and it was fuelled further by a Goldie interview in 2017 where he referred to Banksy as “Rob”.

Last March, it was revealed that Banksy could be forced to reveal his real name if a legal tussle over the authenticity of one of his prints winds up in court.