Banksy Urges Shoplifters to Descend on Guess Store After Stolen Art Accusation

Political street artist Banksy went viral this weekend with a shocking post about the clothing brand Guess. He accused the store in London of using his work on their storefront without licensing it or crediting him. Since Banksy considered this a form of stealing, he encouraged his 11.7 million Instagram followers to go and steal from the store in retribution.

“Attention all shoplifters,” read the eye-grabbing post. “Please go to GUESS on regent Street. They’ve helped themselves to my artwork without asking, how can it be wrong for you to do the same with their clothes?” The post picked up over 1.6 million likes and sparked some fierce debates in the comment section. Many fans were outraged on Banky’s behalf and called out Guess for this flagrant practice. Others wanted to discuss the nuances of intellectual property laws, with plenty of inferences about Banky’s ideology involved.

The Guess store was using one of Banky’s most iconic works of art for its storefront – and one with an apt history in the legal arena. It has been called “Flower Thrower,” “Flower Bomber,” “Rage” and “Love is in the Air,” and it was originally painted in Beit Sahour in the West Bank in 2003. This artwork has been widely replicated and in 2020, Banksy went to court with an English greeting card company called Full Colour Black for reprinting the work without his permission.

Banksy attempted to trademark “Flower Thrower” in 2014 after Full Colour Black began making money off of greeting cards with the artwork on it. However, the European Union trademark office rejected the trademark, according to a report by the BBC. They argued that this request was “inconsistent with honest practices,” since Banksy has never used the artwork to promote or sell goods. Banksy briefly opened a store to try and meet the copyright law requirements, but the EU ruled that this was too little, too late.

“His intention was not to use the mark as a trade mark to commercialise goods and carve out a portion of the relevant market, but only to circumvent the law,” the ruling said. “These actions are inconsistent with honest practices.”

“Banksy has chosen to remain anonymous and for the most part to paint graffiti on other people’s property without their permission rather than to paint it on canvases or his own property,” it said. “He has also chosen to be very vocal regarding his disdain for intellectual property rights.”

That ruling put Banksy’s entire art portfolio up for grabs, as far as some legal analysts were concerned. It appears that Guess is one of the first brands to try and capitalize on that opening. The company has recently started carrying a new clothing line “with graffiti by Banksy,” created in collaboration with a company called Brandalised. According to Guess’ website, Brandalised is “an urban graffiti license whose mission is to offer Banksy fans affordable graffiti collectibles.”

That may leave Banksy with no recourse besides viral Instagram posts. According to a report by TMZ, Guess has closed the Regent Street store since Banksy’s post. The company covered the windows and even hired security to monitor the building. It’s not clear if any shoplifting attempts were made – or if any succeeded.