DNZ – God Save the Kingdom street art in Windsor
Scrolling through Facebook at a pretty unearthly hour in the morning I saw a post about a possible new Banksy in Windsor. It didn’t really look like one to me but all the same it looked like an interesting piece and it was on my way to work, so I thought I’d check it out.
Having had an interest in Banksy works for nearly 25 years, it’s nothing unusual for any stencil anywhere to be wrongly attributed to the artist. If someone spray paints a picture of their cocker spaniel on Watford Gap Services it’s likely someone will at some point erroneously claim it as Banksy’s latest work. This one was closer in style but there are multiple reasons why it didn’t look like one. The slogan for one thing didn’t chime with previous sentiments. The details in the piece such as bridges and outlines used in the stencil were not as expected either. There’s a list that gets longer the more you look. I stopped my car and took some pictures with my phone and posted a couple up on Instagram with the simple caption ‘Spotted in Windsor this morning’. It picked up some likes, and some comments. Some people clearly thought it could be by Banksy. In fact national media outlets were picking up on the story. I think they possibly knew that it wasn’t but it’s an easy story to publish and controversy is engagement, right?
It wasn’t long until it became apparent that DNZ was the artist responsible. Fair play to DNZ, this is a neatly applied multi layer, multi coloured stencil applied to a wall in an area of Windsor that is rarely without passers by. It had obviously created something of a stir locally too, with residents on local Facebook pages already saying how much they liked it and how it should stay. It also sparked a debate on the future of the Ward Royal estate it was painted on too but that’s a different story. There was confusion about its meaning. Who or what was actually needing saving and more importantly from whom? Looking at comments, the jury is still out but the artwork looks set to stay in place and will be bemusing coach loads of visitors to the Royal town of Windsor for some time yet.
