there's a lot of careful design that goes into some of these - think about all the functions they have to fulfill. no sharp bits so that moving parts won't wear through anywhere (or hurt someone who jumps on it), molded fastening points for the soft stuff to attach and not come off, long service life, plus the mechanics (that pooh bear looks complicated)...i think they're quite beautiful.
i have a brush-your-teeth barney (circuit bending...no less than he deserves) that looks a bit like a 19th century diver's helmet crossed with the head of bender from futurama. there's also a jumping tigger that looks like a gourd with ventilation holes on top. very funny to watch in action.

'head of steam' is about right.

reckon that robber might come back with with trebuchet? or maybe some good old fashioned boiling oil.

p.s - how do you know that tim's wrong? refering to the u.k...

"The detection or clear up rate has fluctuated somewhat over the years, but the general trend since 1988 is downwards. As with the statistics relating to crime trends, interpretation of detection rates is fraught with difficulties. Aggregate trends will always mask differences between offence categories, and the detection rate is influenced by the mix of offences recorded by the police. Home Office research makes it clear however that there is no straightforward policy change or set of recommendations that will ensure that detection rates improve."

"Crime and Justice in Britain: Trends, Analysis and Conclusions"

Julian V. Roberts

Centre for Criminology, Faculty of Law, University of Oxford

i knew that the property prices in hackney were overinflated, but i didn't know they were this bad...

maybe the 1 million is for the extra suite of reception rooms he's dug.

"aaah. hang on guys. just realised i've got the key here..."

RevRagnarok is spot on. there's a name for these things which i can't quite remember. i found a whole book on them once...

fetsishforperception:

- its not about taste, its about public space and the ownership of the visual environment. what banksy does the equivalent of a mammal rubbing his scent glands up against trees. before he did this piece, that wall was a neutral surface which didn't jostle for space (either visually or politically), and in a city as cluttered as london, that can be important. now its a big bit of 'banksyworld' and i don't care for it. i feel the same way about many billboards, all tv screens on buses, on the underground and so on.

and of course everyone's part of the system - it's just some of us have different ways of expressing our opposition to it (or not) in more nuanced ways. have a look at joseph beuys's 7000 oaks for another approach, and for how to get things done. i know he's a different sort of artist by the way, but banksy's stock is very high and he could be doing much more imaginitive stuff.

i would lay a weeks wages on banksy having shopped in tescos, used cashpoints (he has to put all that money in a bank somewhere) and he'd certainly be up for the police using CCTV evidence if he was mugged on oxford street. all stuff he uses in his work.

i don't have a problem with his stance, but i do have a problem with his double standards, and his work being such one-liners, with a touch of cynicism for good measure...

ok neatorama, time to 'fess up. are you, or are you not owned by, or in the pay of the 'daily mail'?

*yawn*

that post office compound is round the corner from me, and to be honest i think this makes the place look more shitty than it did before. he's pushed as a radical who speaks to the man on the street, but the truth is he made his name working in a very small, very fashionable area of london, populated by artists and media types who swoop in when they spot somewhere with 'cred' (and where they can make plenty of money on their apartments). he's as an integral part of 'the system' (by which i mean the market forces he critiques) and relies upon it as much as anyone to sell their product.

their are many ways to articulate your protest against things in public spaces - a brief tour of 20th (and 21st) century art will throw up multiple examples of artists vastly more eloquent and interesting...

i've been swimming one-eyed in glycerol while drunk and on mushrooms, and now i'm going to drive home from mumbai. do i win a prize?

gaaa! turn off that music! "listen to the roar! do you hear that?" NO BECAUSE YOU'VE EDITED IN STUPID POMPOUS MUSIC OVER THE TOP!

damn. i meant the incredible hulk.

here we go again with the 'johnny foreigner treats animals badly' rubbish. a few questions:

1 - "In the East" - where is that exactly?

2 - "The way a society treats its animals is pretty indicative of the way it treats its citizens." - what's the difference between society and its citizens? and BTW, no it's not.

3 - "In the West we stun animals before slaughter" - after we force them to grow in cramped conditions, cut off their beaks, pump them full of growth hoemones etc etc. - have you visited any modern industrial animal processing plants lately? i have an audio recording of a pig slaughtering plant in canada if you're interested...

4 - "(you can find the video evidence on the net)" - i can probably find videos on the net of dwarves juggling bowling balls on stilts underwater dressed as wonderwoman if i look hard. surely proof that "in the west" we humiliate dwarves. is the tsunami of kitten videos on youtube proof that america loves kittens?

sorry. maybe i'm over-reacting - it's just that photos like these aren't just photos - you can tell a lot by the way they get disseminated and re-presented...

*gets of high-horse*

aaaah. the daily mail. "miracle or madness?". attention seeking more like.

i don't want to sound like a git, but i'm imagining tom phillips might have something to say about it...

http://www.tomphillips.co.uk/humument/