Elusive street artist Banksy’s ninth animal-themed mural in nine days, unveiled on a shutter outside London Zoo on Tuesday, depicts a gorilla releasing animals from the zoo, tying together a series of artworks.
The graffiti outside London Zoo, claimed by the artist on Instagram, shows a gorilla lifting a shutter to free birds and a seal, while some of the animals inside look on from outside.
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It is the latest in Banksy’s series of populating the British capital with animals, which began with a goat on Monday last week, followed by two elephants the next day, and monkeys, a wolf, pelicans, a cat, piranhas and a rhinoceros in the days after that.
The frequency of the artworks is unusual for Banksy – whose identity is publicly unknown – and who typically creates his artworks over months, leaving fans speculating about the meaning of the various animals and waiting for the “big” reveal.
The zoo’s commercial operations manager Carl Penman said the latest graffiti was “a huge shock and surprise to all of us at London Zoo.”
“If this is a full stop, what a wonderful full stop it is,” Penman told AFP.
The BBC reported that this article was the last in the series.
“You can see their watchful eyes, which to me look a little unsure about whether they want to be free or not,” Dr. Sharmela Darney said of the animals staring from behind the shutters in the latest artwork.
“But the seals are obviously disappearing and the birds are flying freely too… so maybe it’s about freedom and uncertainty about freedom,” Darney told AFP.
For many, the animal safari added some positivity to their week, as the country is rocked by the stabbing murders of three girls and the violent riots that followed.
Speaking in front of two pelicans painted above a fish shop in Walthamstow, north-east London, Peter McCarthy said it was “great to have it this particular week”.
“It’s great that when there was so much trouble, he was still around the country. He did these wonderful things.”
Removed
For others, the choice of animal makes sense, with some finding the goat to be similar to the Palestinian mountain deer, and others pointing to the artist’s previous work on the climate crisis.
Three artworks have already been removed or stolen, and the rhinoceros artwork displayed Monday was defaced that same day.
Within hours of Banksy’s claim the satellite dish bearing the image of the wolf was stolen, with the cat on the billboard removed by contractors and a police box painted with a swimming piranha removed by the local authority to ensure it was “properly preserved”.
Speaking in front of the cat before it was removed on Saturday, dentist Mitul Patel said he wanted “people to leave his work as it is so other people can enjoy it too.”
Locals and tourists alike are enjoying the artifacts that still exist.
Taking a break from his work, construction worker Owen said the three monkeys in the Shoreditch area of east London were “very exciting” and a “huge topic of discussion”.
Photographer Kevin Mazur, from the US, said he had been “running around taking pictures of all the artworks” and was “anxious” to return to New York.
Retiree Dawn Gould lives around the corner from Goat House in Kew Green, south-west London, and spotted the artwork after it was displayed online last week. “It’s a great excuse to take a stroll in the greenery and have a pint, isn’t it?”
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)