Banksy fake banknote artwork joins British Museum collection (theguardian.com).
The work, entitled Di-faced Tenner, was one of thousands of copies produced by the artist in 2004 as part of a planned art stunt. Unlike the other artwork, a fake cave painting on concrete [titled “Peckham Rock” which “he cheekily” hung on the wall of one of its galleries in 2005 where it went unspotted by staff for several days], which was loaned again to the museum for a recent exhibition on dissent and protest, the note has been donated to the museum by the artist’s representative Pest Control.
Featuring the face of Princess Diana—the BPD “princess we invented to fill a vacancy” (theguardian.com, Aug. 2017) and quintessential expression of British ability to nostalgically miss wood for fairytale trees —instead of the Queen’s, the note has been altered to read “Banksy of England” and the motto: “I promise to pay the bearer on demand the ultimate price.” And with curator of modern money at the museum chappie saying he had “been trying for years to get hold of a genuine Di-faced Tenner to add to the museum’s collection of ‘skit notes’” but that “because [Banksy] was effectively producing them as photocopies, anyone else could do that as well, so there was no way to really verify whether they were from Banksy or not.”
The artist described the origin of the Diana £10 notes in his 2010 Oscar-nominated film Exit Through the Gift Shop, saying he had made £1m pounds worth, planning to throw them off a building. He had handed some notes out at Reading festival, but realised the stunt was backfiring when people started taking them to the bar to spend. “It was like, holy shit, we just forged a million quid, and obviously for that you’d go to jail for ten years.” Distribution was speedily halted.
But now having Instagram to self publish clips for awed austerity hero-worshiping audience describing “the origins” of his dadaist escapades such as shredding a print the moment is was sold (related stories below).
Recent/related stories
- Banksy mural dedicated to Bataclan terror victims stolen in Paris (Latest Picks 27th January 2019)
- Banksy leaves ‘Season’s greeting’ on a Port Talbot garage (Blog 19th December 2018)
- Banksy’s ‘The Girl With Balloon’ artwork shreds itself the moment sold at auction (Blog 6th October 2018)
Share this story