Banksy’s ex-manager lifts lid on life of elusive artist – from burner phones to cunning disguises

Although he is now thought to be in his fifties, Banksy is still as active and well-liked as ever this year after spraying numerous animals all over London. And it seems likely that the elusive artist will continue to create street art until he passes away.

“Banksy will never retire. I have repeatedly instructed him to do so. He needs to enjoy his life”. The comment comes from Steve Lazarides, who knows Banksy better than most. A fellow Bristolian, he worked with, photographed and managed Banksy from 1997 to 2008.

As he prepares to sell the majority of his valuables from their time together, the vibrant character is reflecting on their time together. Sounding like a proud dad, he says: “Banksy, what is all the fuss about? Have a look at what he’s done. Even in the early 2000s, the man was out and performing exhibition drops. He was far from a graffiti artist. 200 live rats were present during demonstrations. He was giving it to the man. Who else will take a photo and deposit it in the Tate? Most people don’t think like that, let alone execute. We entered that place.

The 55-year-old, who was a fan of graffiti and worked for Sleazenation magazine in the late 1990s, first met Banksy. He and Banksy exchange numbers and were sent to photograph her in Bristol. I was completely convinced that he had balls and that we would do anything to assist this child. After the shoot we had a few beers… And then a few more”.

Steve gave Banksy a lift in Bristol shortly after that to collect screenprints, and they immediately started selling the pieces of art together. For a print called Rude Copper, which cost £5, this began in a car. When Steve realized that the prints were more valuable than that, he offered Banksy the money. “I said why don’t we set something up and do this properly. I took an artist and a movement from being worth £250 a canvas to £5million”.

The prices of the prints increased as Banksy’s popularity increased and his reputation expanded worldwide. Steve said: “Did I think it could get that big? Absolutely not. Just two kids were having fun, right?

He claims that it was challenging to keep Banksy’s identity a secret and that he was very reluctant to reveal who he was. The privacy was a significant factor in Bristol when it first came to self preservation. He didn’t want to get caught, he didn’t want to go to jail, fair enough. The anonymity eventually became a disease as time went on and it persisted for longer. Everyone has this figure in their mind, they have a folk hero, and it looks different in everybody’s mind. He never really gets to enjoy the fame he has.

Banksy communicated on cheap pay-as-you-go handsets after each of his street art projects because he thought his anonymity was so important. Steve recalls: “Every couple of weeks, I’ll have to go out and buy two new burner phones with cash and not giving any address. Because I didn’t want to go back to the same store, my ones outside of Central London expanded. I ended up with a room full”.

Steve claims that their most memorable encounter was in 2004 when they both managed to enter the London Natural History Museum. Disguised as an employee, Banksy managed to put a taxidermied rat in a glass-fronted box on the wall.

Steve, who would accompany him on numerous big stunts, said: “The stunt at the Natural History Museum tops the list. In the middle of half-term, sticking a real stuffed rat up in the walls and drilling holes into them will undoubtedly cause some pain. He picked a space that’s just behind the big dinosaur that they’ve got in the entrance. Much to my surprise, he pulled a drill out of his bag”.

Another well-known incident involving Banksy occurred in Tate Britain in October 2003, when he entered the gallery while posing as a pensioner and stumbling upon one of his own creations.

The prints themselves are included in the stunts and wall art as well. Steve hints that the most well-known piece, Girl with Balloon, might be about a former romance. Steve is clearly not a fan and calls it “the housewife’s favourite” holding up a copy in a promotional video, before adding: “Shown a thousand times around the world. Rumor has it that (girl) is his ex-boyfriend, and when she dumped him, he painted this. This is quite true.

But asked to elaborate by the Mirror he says: “The origins of Girl with Balloon will remain a secret, I’ve been sworn to secrecy, so only his Lordship can tell”.

Steve’s online auction with Julien’s is set to net him more than £1million. Items up for grabs include original stencils by the artist, phone notes, project plans, and even pair of Banksy-worn Puma brand Turf War trainers with his name on the inside. The chimpanzee and Banksy rats are sure to attract attention with their stencils. The artist created his own show in 2023 called Cut and Run, which featured a lot of the same stencils.

Steve has since established his own gallery, which has sold Banksy prints and other works, but he wants to move away from him. Before the Banksy mania, I wanted to get on with my life as a photographer because I did this. Although critics claim he is selling private correspondence and drawings that his friend never intended to see or even purchase, he insists that the Banksy escapades should be stopped.

Unsurprisingly, Steve claims that Banksy would be “quietly supportive” of the sale, which sources close to Banksy scoffed at when I spoke with them. Many people point out that Steve’s sale of these items is a sad sign that Banksy and Steve are unlikely to have a drinking relationship in the near future.

Steve says in a movie to promote the sale, “We never really got on, we were different kinds of people.” We both recognised we could have a great working relationship, and we did”.

• The Banksy Archive of Steve Lazarides Auction, runs online until 5pm Thursday at Julien’s Auctions.

Source: Mirror