We got a new Banksy just in time for Christmas
Following a series of animal-themed pieces last year, including a piranha-filled police box in the City and monkeys swinging on a bridge on Brick Lane, and a judge looming over a protester outside the Royal Courts of Justice (which was quickly scrubbed after it appeared in September), Banksy has been back at work in the capital.
The street artist has confirmed that he’s responsible for a new mural that appeared on a wall above a row of garages on Queen’s Mews in Bayswater. The piece depicts two children dressed in winter clothing lying down, with one of the figures pointing to the sky above.
An identical mural has also appeared outside the Centre Point tower by Tottenham Court Road, though Banksy has only confirmed that the Bayswater artwork is his. Centre Point has long been associated with homelessness; after it was completed in 1966, the tower was left empty for a decade and became a site for protests about the city’s housing crisis, with homelessness charity Centrepoint taking its name from the building.
Speaking to the BBC about the artwork, artist Daniel Lloyd-Morgan said he believed that it makes a point about child homelessness. “Everybody is having a good time but there are a lot of children who are not having a good time at Christmas,” he said. “It’s a busy area. Quite poignant that people aren’t stopping. They walk past homeless people and they don’t see them lying on the street.” He added, “It’s kind of like they’re stargazing. It’s quite fitting that the kids are pointing up like they’re looking at the North Star.”
Banksy enthusiast Jason Tomkins echoes the idea that the mural is a “clear statement on homelessness”. He also noted that one of the children looks identical to a boy catching snowflakes on his tongue featured in a 2018 artwork in Port Talbot, saying “this is quite unusual for him to use the same little boy again, because he has never done that.”
