I am @Banksyideas!

04 December 2015 - 15:54

Not much of a reveal, because unless you're one of the 25k subscribers who followed it on twitter a few years ago, it's doubtful you'll know what it is. But I ran a Banksy parody twitter account for a couple of years which was reasonably famous. It was pretty niche. It was for people who: 1) has heard of Banksy, 2) understood his work to be hack-ish, limply satirical half-ideas and 3) didn't really like Banksy much.

And 25k isn't even a big number. Those bullshit I HEART SCIENCE twitter accounts run by imbeciles who think science is a jpg of space with a caption over the top written in Impact have millions of followers. There's also a fake account called @thereaIbanksy that posts dreadfully unfunny stuff but still somehow has 1.3million followers. So go figure.

But at the time, back in 2011 or whenever I started, it was a fun thing to run. As much as I admire Banksy for popularising street art, his work is rarely more sophisticated than a novelty card you'd find in Clintons. So I started this twitter account, purportedly from Banksy's ideas department, ran it for a couple of years, before I got bored of it and abruptly stopped.

So, I thought I would lazily reprint a selection of the stuff I used to tweet for this Maggie article. Reused content! Here goes a few:

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 20 Apr 2014
Stencil of a child assembling the toy from a Kinder Egg, yeah? The parts fit
together to make a handgun

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 28 Oct 2013
Stencil of Russell Brand throwing a Molotov cocktail made from a champagne
bottle. via @frankieboyle

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 15 Jul 2013
Stencil of Jesus on the cross, with one hand free, taking a selfie
Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 29 Mar 2013

Stencil of Jesus being nailed to a massive hot cross bun
Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 15 Mar 2013
Stencil of a cat licking its arse, but the arsehole looks like Rupert
Murdoch's face and the cat's head is David Cameron's

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 11 Feb 2013
Stencil of Darth Vader throwing Pope Benedict XVI down the Death Star's
reactor shaft (Think that one was when the pope resigned)

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 26 Jan 2013
Stencil of a child making an Apple laptop in a Chinese sweatshop. Caption
beneath reads: "It Just Works"

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 14 Jan 2013 Stencil of the HMV dog being put down at
the vets (When HMV went backrupt.)

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 8 Jan 2013 Stencil of the four horsemen of the
apocalypse, yeah? But they're all on Segways

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 21 Dec 2012 Stencil of Mary between Joseph & God on
the Jeremy Kyle show. Caption reads "DNA results will prove who the real father is."

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 16 Nov 2012 Stencil of Pudsey Bear with the slogan
"Point at where the man touched you". #ChildrenInNeed yeah? (Amid the Saville
revelations)

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 25 Oct 2012 Stencil of the Blue Peter ship being
boarded by Somalian pirates

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 20 Oct 2012 Stencil of Jimmy Saville running the
London Marathon. But look again: he's chasing after a screaming child on her
tricycle

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 14 Oct 2012 Stencil of a junkie using a Lance
Armstrong Live Strong wristband to help him find a vein.

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 13 Jun 2012 Stencil of Danny Boyle's Olympic opening
ceremony, yeah? It consists of hundreds of volunteers shovelling money onto
the Olympic flame

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 12 Jun 2012 Stencil of Freddie Krueger in a
beauticians, yeah? He's getting his nails done while another woman applies a
face pack

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 12 Jun 2012 Stencil of Cameron at a cashpoint called
'UK Economy', ok? It's overdrawn but he's still drawing more out and handing
it to his posh mates

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 11 Jun 2012 Stencil of a pregnant woman giving up
her train seat to a banker. That's the pecking order, yeah?

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 11 Jun 2012 Stencil of a government worker trying to
paint a sign that reads "We are in drought", but he can't cos the rain's
washing the letters away

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 9 Jun 2012 Stencil of a hoodie helping an OAP across
the road, but the OAP is pickpocketing him. Social perceptions, yeah?

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 8 Jun 2012 Stencil of Rapunzel in her tower, letting
down her long hair. But look again: the hair's coming from her armpits.
Feminists, yeah?

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 2 Jun 2012 Stencil of a little girl taking a
shopping trolley for a walk, like it's a dog. She's fallen in love with
consumerism, yeah?

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 1 Jun 2012 Stencil of Leonardo da Vinci drawing a
cock on Mona Lisa's head as she sleeps

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 30 May 2012 Hunting portrait of Cameron posing with
his dead prey. But look again: he's not got his foot on a lion. It's an NHS
nurse he's shot dead

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 26 May 2012 Stencil of Adolf Hitler, yeah? But his
moustache is a bar code. Consumerism is fascism, right?

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 16 May 2012 Stencil of the Blue Peter ship, yeah?
But it's being boarded by a group of Somali pirates (I think you did that one
twice? - Ed Note.)

Banksy Ideas @BanksyIdeas 15 May 2012 Stencil of Alex James from Blur playing
a guitar, yeah? But look again: it's not a guitar, it's a wedge of camembert

It was quite exciting receiving a guaranteed 30+ retweets for bad jokes. And people of the likes of Frankie Boyle would regularly contribute too. I was also once contacted by someone claiming to represent Banksy, wanting to meet me in an East London cafe to discuss business - but I decided not to go to that. Felt a bit Layer Cake.

INCOMING FASCINATING ANECDOTE. I met Banksy once. Seriously. I was working on LoDown, a defunct hip hop magazine in the late 90s (I may have even written about it in a previous Maggie). It was run by a couple of snowboarding obsessed German guys, and based in a flat in Islington. I was writing various things for them and one of their freelance writer-photographers was out, shooting a picture story of Banksy doing the now infamous royal-guard-taking-a- leak stencil, just up the road from the office. Banksy was just starting out, just another guy doing graffiti. And after the shoot (or maybe before, I forget), he popped into the office. I was making tea, offered him one. He didn't want one. And that's that. White bloke, round glasses, west country accent, would be early 40s now, since you asked. A perfectly average kind of guy. WHAT A SCOOP.

Anyway. That's enough of . Toodle pips, yeah?

Jody

Back to the Funny stuff.