What does the world’s most famous graffiti artist do when he can’t hit the streets? He works from home, just like the rest of us.
In a new work of art shared on the artist’s website and Instagram account, Banksy shows what he has been up to while quarantined. Captioned "My wife hates it when I work from home.", the results are sure to give you a laugh in a time when we could all use one.
The photographs show a bathroom overrun with rats—a nightmare at any time but especially when we’re potentially stuck at home with them. In typical naughty Banksy fashion, these rats run amok, nearly knocking the mirror off the wall, creating a mess with the toothpaste, and engaging in other antics. Meanwhile, in the mirror’s reflection, one rat seems to tally the days stuck indoors on the bathroom’s back wall. While some of us may be going stir-crazy, hopefully, we haven’t resorted to trashing the place yet, and neither have our quarantine-mates.
Rats are recurring characters in Banksy’s works, the creatures embodying the artist’s trickster approach to art and social commentary. Often dressed in dapper outfits or uniforms, rats have played a number of roles in his graffiti works. Sometimes bearing tongue-in-cheek messages and other times just hanging out on the street corner, these common Banksy characters are now occupants of the artist's bathroom, where they are up to no good, though they certainly seem to be having a good time.
