Over the summer, BBC Radio 4 released a new podcast The Banksy Story which delved into the mysterious artist and coincided with the first ever Banksy retrospective which was held at the Glasgow Gallery of Modern Art. Ex-employees are featured on the podcast and the series aims to “chart the elusive artist’s compelling journey from street artist to global phenomenon”.

Upon listening to the podcast, former BBC arts correspondent Nigel Wrench recalled an interview he had done with Banksy in 2003, of which only part was released. He located a minidisc he had with the full interview on, which contains never-before-heard insights into Banksy, including what appears to be a confirmation of Banksy’s first name. BBC Radio 4 have now released an extra episode of the podcast including this new revelation. In the interview, Wrench asks Banksy, “are you happy for me to use your name? I mean, The Independent has,” to which Banksy replies yes, before Wrench continues “Is it Robert Banks?” and Banksy responds, “It’s Robbie”. Variations of the name Robin, Robert and Robbie have long-since been associated with Banksy.

The name ‘Robin Gunningham’ was recently used as the first defendant in a legal action accusing the artist and his company of defamation. This is an important clue; as early as 2008 the Daily Mail were claiming that Banksy was Robin Gunningham. In 2016, researchers at Queen Mary University in London used geographic profiling to work out who Banksy was and came to the conclusion that Gunningham was “the only serious suspect”. Interviews with Gunningham’s former school friends also supported this theory, with one claiming that “he was extremely talented at art. I am not at all surprised if he is Banksy.”

Banksy did not confirm or deny that he was Gunningham in 2008 when the theory was first put forward, saying that, “I’m unable to comment on who may or may not be Banksy.” There are many reasons why Banksy, and those working for him, might want to maintain the street-artist’s anonymity, and there has been further speculation that the public might not really want to know Banksy’s true identity. Michel Boersma, curator of the exhibition The Art of Banksy, said “the public don’t want the mystery to stop because it’s a lovely fairytale. The art world doesn’t want his identity to be known because it would take away from the mystique – and the mystique makes money.”

The recently uncovered material in the 2003 interview includes other interesting insights into Banksy. He told Wrench, “I’m not really into the art world, the ‘Brit art’ thing. I don’t know… it’s not something that interests me, really. I’m more into art that’s voted for by people with their feet than I am into one millionaire judging you and telling people whether you’re ‘art’ or not.” Banksy’s dismissal of the consumerist aspect of the commercial art world is well known, although his works do now sell for huge sums at auction: his record being Love is in the Bin which sold at Sotheby’s in 2021 for £18.6 million.

The Banksy Story is available to listen to on BBC Sounds.