Graffiti artist’s ‘mindless crime’ (From Keighley News)
Get involved: send your pictures, video, news and views by texting KNEWS to 80360, or email
Graffiti artist’s ‘mindless crime’
9:10am Thursday 23rd December 2010 in Keighley By David Knights
The Keighley Town Council “dedication” before it was painted over
A graffiti artist who daubed pictures on buildings around Keighley has been blasted by town councillors.
But one of the council’s fiercest critics has hailed the Highfield teenager as “Keighley’s Banksy”. Former councillor David Samuels compared him to Britain’s most renowned graffiti artist.
The teenager painted cartoon dinosaurs and slogans on the wall next to Reids bookshop, in Cavendish Street. He also spray-painted similar pictures on Keighley Market Hall, in South Street, outside Holycroft Primary School and on Marriner Walk, off Worth Way.
The 19-year-old was subsequently arrested by police and released after receiving cautions for eight offences.
The row blew up this week because the teenager had dedicated his Cavendish Street artwork to Keighley Town Council. The dedication was covered over with white paint last weekend but the dinosaur pictures remained. Keighley’s deputy mayor, Cllr Mick Westerman, this week said: “It’s definitely not a town council art project. As far as I’m concerned it’s graffiti and criminal damage and we know nothing about it apart from we’ve seen it.”
Fellow town councillor Graham Mitchell described the graffiti as a “mindless crime”.
Mr Samuels, who resigned as a town councillor earlier this year, said he did not know the graffiti artist. But he said: “I know there’s an upswell of dislike for the town council and this is probably one of the manifestations. Obviously there will be others.”
Mr Samuels said one local school was so impressed with the man’s graffiti that it had asked him to “finish the job off”.
He added: “He’s Keighley’s Banksy. I hope he succeeds legally in his artistic endeavours.
“He’s used his initiative, obviously illegally, which I can’t condone, but from an artistic point of view it’s brilliant.”
Bradford Council’s anti-graffiti team was this week due to clean graffiti off some of the walls around Keighley.
l Comment Page 10
