A new piece of Banksy street art has appeared.
The work depicts a silhouette of a goat precariously perched on top of some masonry on the exterior wall of a building at London’s Kew Bridge.
The piece shows the goat looking down towards the ground, with debris falling down the side of the building.
The guerilla artist, famed for his politically-themed works, confirmed the goat piece on his Instagram page.
In March this year, another Banksy appeared overnight on the side of a building near Finsbury Park.
It showed a splattering of green which has been painted behind a bare tree to look like foliage, with a stencil of a person holding what appears to be a pressure hose next to it.
The site then attracted legions of Banksy fans to catch a glimpse at it.
But within three days the mural was defaced with white paint. It prompted the local council to erect a metal security fence to protect it from further damage.
The Kew artwork is Banksy’s first since a stunt at Glastonbury festival in June in which an inflatable dinghy full of dummies dressed as migrants launched into the crowd, live on the BBC.
It happened during a set by alternative chart-toppers Idles, who had led the crowd in a chant of ‘f*** the king’, which was also broadcast live on BBC 4 as part of their coverage of the long-running music and arts festival in Somerset.
Many fans at the Other Stage – traditionally billed as the alternative to the flagship Pyramid Stage – thought the inflatable life raft, carrying a number of seated dummies in high-visibility vests, was a prop for their politically charged headline set.
His identity remains cloaked in mystery, his work the subject of endless speculation and his art a major tourist attraction.
Since the 1990s Banksy has dominated the street graffiti with his well known satirical installations of humorous images usually paired with anti-war or anti-capitalist slogans.
The so called ‘Banksy effect’ has seen people buy up his work for small fortunes. His Love Is in the Bin was sold in London in 2021 for a staggering £18.6million – a record for one of his pieces.
But his art has also been the target of several council campaigns to clean up graffiti and paint over the murals, sparking outrage from his many fans.
The elusive artist confirmed his latest work on Monday morning, a tree mural which appeared overnight in Finsbury Park, north London.
But a representative for Idles said that the boat was created by fellow Bristolian Banksy, and that the band were not aware of what had happened until after they came off stage.
The demonstration is thought to have been a nod to Rishi Sunak’s tough stance on tackling the small boats crisis – a key battleground for Nigel Farage’s Reform UK party during the general election campaign.
The graffiti artist previously funded a migrant rescue ship, which was impounded in Italy last year after responding to distress calls in the Mediterranean.
The Mail on Sunday previously revealed Banksy to be Robin Gunningham, a middle-class artist who has repeatedly refused to confirm his identity.
His reputation is founded on the popularity of his trademark stencil-style art in public spaces – including on walls in London, Brighton, Bristol and even on the West Bank barrier separating Israelis and Palestinians.
He has dozens of celebrity collectors including Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie and Christina Aguilera, and his work repeatedly sells for hundreds of thousands of pounds.
He is also known for his headline-making stunts, such as leaving an inflatable doll dressed as a Guantanamo prisoner in Disneyland, California, and hanging a version of the Mona Lisa – but with a smiley face – in the Louvre, Paris.
Three years ago, his Girl with Balloon piece self-shredded moments after being sold at acution for £1.1 million.
It was later re-sold for more than £18 million.