Banksy Limitless at Sussex Mansions
When artwork belongs to the street, how to “museumise” it? Midway through the new Banksy Limitless exhibition, there is a black space with a large-scale reproduction of Devolved Parliament sitting against the wall: a spotlight moves across the various figures of chimpanzees present on the canvas, while in the background, the voices of members of Parliament debating, gradually mutate into animal screaming, scored by an ominous low tune. Graffiti is made for the street, to tickle passersby’s curiosity, surprise ordinary walkers and express social commentary. The striking simplicity and punchy messages of Banksy’s artworks, though, have demanded since their inception a more long-lasting home. Over the years, various exhibitions have grappled with the challenge, while, with the passing of time, the archive continued to be enriched by a wider variety of pieces going hand in hand with historical moments.
Banksy Limitless, in South Kensington, presents a mix of informal settings and museum space. The aforementioned black area, which can be encountered midway through the experience, on the right, offers Abandon Hope, as simple and unadorned as its original Shoreditch Bridge placement, and on the left, a multisensorial immersion into Devolved Parliament. In the same room, pieces from the Crude Oil series – Horse Guard, I fought the law and I won, Sunflowers from Petrol Station and UFO – are hanging in neat frames. Around the corner, a small corridor hosts, among coloured lights and fake plants, 2024’s The Zoo. The tweaks to the environment are carefully curated and serve the morphing series of topics. There is a route to follow, but then each section is free to explore, with graffiti that both blends in and stands out from its physical surroundings.
Starting at level minus one, a long sequence of boards traces the first appearance and circulation of Banksy’s work, from Bristol to Dismaland, the US parades and the Walled Off Hotel in Bethlehem. In front of them, a heavy curtain hides benches and a medium-sized screen where clips are projected, showcasing some behind-the-scenes and spectators’ reactions to selected unveilings and openings of the faceless activist’s new ideas. The astounded expressions at the 2018 Sotheby’s auction when Girl with a Balloon turned into Love is in the Bin (sold a few years later for over £18 million) can be watched both in this room and down the corridor, where the Self Shredding Mechanism is taken apart and exposed in its entirety.
The displays do not follow a chronological order, but rather a loosely thematic one. The beginning is the earliest and most disruptive, touching on the profane works. Quite a lot of the most seen stencilled paintings here: Bomb Hugger, Laugh Now, and Stop and Search. Then, it moves to the political stances: half a room brings in rubble for the setting of the 2022 graffiti among the war-damaged buildings in Ukraine. As for Very Little Helps, many tags explain not only the material and meanings of the subjects represented, but also the numbers of original prints circulating, or the process to get (rightfully or not) the graffiti off the streets and indoors, as happened for No Ball Games.
Moving upstairs, Prankadilly Circus is a take on a Banksiesque London tube platform, dominated by the satirical view of the modern world and its push to homogenise people, particularly finding the best expression in the Soup Can, a changing-in-colour series recalling Warhol’s notorious Campbell’s Soup Cans.
Moving away from the background rattling noise of railtracks, another pristine white area opens up, this time, though, with tall 3D elements hanging from the ceiling, like the Girl with a Balloon against a transparent London Eye. This is the British section, the close-up on everything bearing the Union Jack, UK-specific stories, and the love/hate relationship of Banksy with his home country. It takes the forms of posters of the collaboration with the Bristol Museum and Borderline Offensive for Glastonbury 2024; sculpture Phone Booth; the 2010 Time Out London cover; and the Banksy Bristol T-shirt, distributed in 2021 in a few independent shops in support of the Colston Four. This latter is accompanied by a video with news bulletins and testimonies about the event: this recurring combination of the piece and its effect grounds the item in a context, often highlighting how it is the relationship with the audience (how the public reacts to the release of each item) that defines the impact of the piece, not just the piece itself. And that’s at the core of Banksy’s production, given the short-lived nature of the means with which he expresses himself. That same makeshift but impactful approach is taken on by the South Kensington exhibition, while displaying one of the most comprehensive collections of his work to date.
Cristiana Ferrauti
Photo: Courtesy of Banksy Limitless
Banksy Limitless is at Sussex Mansions from 15th September 2025. For further information or to book, visit the exhibition’s website here.
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