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Sky News
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Sky News
Banksy shares image of latest street art - as location found after speculation
Banksy has shared an image of what appears to be his latest street art - without revealing its location. But after London-based art dealer MyArtBroker said on Instagram that the artwork is in the southern French port city of Marseille, the Associated Press has tracked it down to a street near the city's port. The graffiti artwork, which has appeared on a wall, is of a lighthouse and features a message which reads: "I want to be what you saw in me." The lighthouse has been made to look like it is the shadow of a bollard that is on the edge of the pavement. Banksy, an anonymous graffiti artist from Bristol, shared two photos of the artwork on his Instagram page on Thursday, triggered speculation over where it may be. Banksy's artworks often address issues such as war, poverty, government corruption, consumerism, and social injustice. However, any potential meaning of his latest street art is not immediately clear. MyArtBroker has speculated that Banksy's work touches on "perspective, meaning and marginalised voices" because Marseille is a "hub for migration and cultural exchange". The quote used by Banksy could have been taken from a song by Tennessee-based country band Lonestar, called Softly, which features the lyric: "I want to be what you see in me. I want to love you the way that you love me." Last year, a swathe of animal-themed Banksy works including a rhino seemingly mounting a silver Nissan Micra, two elephant silhouettes with their trunks stretched out towards each other, and three monkeys that looked as though they were swinging on a bridge, appeared across London.
Sky News
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Sky News
Banksy shares image of latest street art - as people speculate over its location
Banksy has shared an image of what appears to be his latest street art - without revealing its location. The graffiti artwork, which has appeared on a wall, is of a lighthouse and features a message which reads: "I want to be what you saw in me." The lighthouse has been made to look like it is the shadow of a bollard that is on the edge of the pavement. Banksy, an anonymous graffiti artist from Bristol, shared two photos of the artwork on his Instagram page on Thursday, triggered speculation over where it may be. London-based art dealer MyArtBroker has said on Instagram that the artwork is in the southern French port city of Marseille. Banksy's artworks often address issues such as war, poverty, government corruption, consumerism, and social injustice. However, any potential meaning of his latest street art is not immediately clear. MyArtBroker has speculated that Banksy's work touches on "perspective, meaning and marginalised voices" because Marseille is a "hub for migration and cultural exchange". The quote used by Banksy could have been taken from a song by Tennessee-based country band Lonestar, called Softly, which features the lyric: "I want to be what you see in me. I want to love you the way that you love me." Last year, a swathe of animal-themed Banksy works including a rhino seemingly mounting a silver Nissan Micra, two elephant silhouettes with their trunks stretched out towards each other, and three monkeys that looked as though they were swinging on a bridge, appeared across London.
The Guardian
18-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
David Hockney's rarely seen early works united in new London exhibition
When one of David Hockney's iconic swimming pool pictures sold for $90.3m (£70.3m) in 2013, he became the world's most highly valued contemporary artist. Now paintings, drawings and prints that he sold for a few pounds in the 1960s are being brought together for the first time in a new exhibition. John Kasmin, an art dealer who first recognised Hockney's potential in the early 1960s when the artist was studying at the Royal College of Art (RCA), told the Guardian that Hockney's prices then 'rarely ever went above 20 quid'. He was selling works for as little as £5. Before setting up his own gallery, Kasmin began displaying Hockney's paintings, prints and drawings from a back room of a London gallery because his then boss did not appreciate them enough to exhibit them. 'Yet it wasn't difficult to sell them,' Kasmin said. 'He was popular straight away.' He first came across Hockney in 1961, when the artist was so short of money for paint and canvas that he had turned to the RCA's printmaking department, which offered free materials. Kasmin, 90, recalls him as a shy young man: 'We got on straight away. I'm only three years older than him.' He went on to sell Hockney drawings for between £18 and £22 and to give him his first solo show in 1963 – a sellout exhibition with works priced at about £300 or £400. This month, Kasmin's grandson, Louis Kasmin, is staging an exhibition of Hockney's lesser-known early works. Titled In the Mood for Love: Hockney in London, 1960-63, it opens at Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert in London on 21 May. Louis Kasmin said: 'Many of these [works] haven't been seen publicly in decades. Some of them were bought in the 1960s and have remained with their owners. Some have travelled privately between collections and dealers without featuring in exhibitions. 'As such, the works on display are the lesser known, but no less engaging, paintings from this period. For example, we have been fortunate enough to bring together the print The Hypnotist, the drawing study for the oil of The Hypnotist, and a painting called Figure Being Hypnotised. All three of these works relate to one of Hockney's most famous paintings, which is hanging in the Fondation Louis Vuitton Paris show, and have never been exhibited together.' Sign up to The Guide Get our weekly pop culture email, free in your inbox every Friday after newsletter promotion Hockney is the Bradford boy who set off for Los Angeles and found inspiration in the American dream, swimming pools and sunlight. His masterpieces include A Bigger Splash, 1967 – now in Tate Britain – in which he captured a shimmering turquoise pool under the intense light of the California sky. John Kasmin recalled that it originally sold for about £300: 'If it sold now, it might be £100m.' Supported by the David Hockney Foundation, the Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert show explores 'the making of Hockney, both the artist and the individual'. The exhibition catalogue notes that these early works, leading up to his departure for the US at the end of 1963, represent a critical period in Hockney's artistic evolution, bridging a gap between figuration and the burgeoning experimentation of the 1960s: 'These pictures … are filled with expressive figures, often depicting intimate scenes from his own life, such as portraits of friends, lovers, and himself. At the same time, his early use of vivid, flat areas of colour and innovative compositions hinted at the direction he would later take with his famous series of California landscapes and swimming pools.' The paintings include Two Friends (in a Cul de Sac), 1963, which features two naked men and reflects Hockney's exploration of his sexuality at a time when homosexuality was still criminalised in Britain. Louis Kasmin said: 'Lots of them have annotated backs saying '£8' or '£12' or '£17'.' He added: 'The works we have brought together have never really been hung side by side … Hockney's shows often have a famous work or two from this period, but never a real survey.'
Daily Mail
09-05-2025
- Business
- Daily Mail
The Hezbollah 'financier' linked to BBC Bargain Hunt star: Wealthy art collector Nazem Ahmad is a suspected 'blood diamond' dealer and money launderer who is sanctioned by Britain and US 'for funding terror group'
Dressed in blue jeans and reclining in a sleek leather armchair, he looks every inch the high-flying international businessman. But Nazem Ahmad is in fact a wanted man - accused by the US and UK of using his role as an art collector and diamond trader to raise funds for Hezbollah, the brutal Iran-backed terror group. The 60-year-old was today named in court as a business contact of art dealer and BBC Bargain Hunt star Ochuko Ojiri, who had been accused of selling Ahmad £140,000 worth of art in 2020 and 2021 despite being aware of his background. Today, at Westminster Magistrates' Court, Ojiri dramatically pleaded guilty to eight charges under section 21A of the Terrorism Act 2000 by failing to report the transactions to the authorities. According to prosecutors, Ojiri first struck up a business relationship with Ahmad in October 2020. By this point, Ahmad had already been sanctioned by the US Treasury, with officials accusing the dual Belgian-Lebanese national of being a 'major' donor to Hezbollah, a Shia Islamist militant group dedicated to the destruction of Israel. A wanted poster issued by American officials makes it clear they consider Ahmad to be a serious player, with a $10million (£7.52m) reward offered for information on his whereabouts. Alongside money laundering and terrorism financing, he is also alleged to be involved in the smuggling of 'blood diamonds' - a term used for stones mined in conflict zones before being traded on the black market. None of this appears to have stopped Ojiri from working with Ahmad while director of his eponymous Ojiri Gallery in the trendy London district of Shoreditch. According to prosecutors, he was fully aware Ahmad had been sanctioned by the US, reading news reports about him on his phone while openly discussing the diamond dealer's alleged links to global terror. Prosecutor Lyndon Harris today told a judge that Ojiri 'dealt with Mr Ahmad directly, negotiated the sales of artwork and congratulated him on those sales'. The businessman had first been sanctioned as a terrorist financier by the US Treasury in 2019. In April 2024, he was charged by the US alongside eight associates of using front companies to acquire more than £120 million in artwork and diamond services. British police played a key role in the case against him, swooping on a high-security depot at Heathrow Airport last year before seizing nearly two dozen works of art in his collection. Linked raids at a London auction house recovered more works he had been planning to sell, including paintings by Picasso and Andy Warhol. The proceeding years had seen a tightening of money laundering regulations that, in January 2020, brought the art market under HMRC supervision. Ojiri is said to have discussed the changes with a colleague, indicating awareness of the rules. Counter-terror police investigating Ahmad's business dealings first arrested Ojiri in April 2023, but he claimed to be unaware of his alleged links to terror. But he backtracked in a second interview in July 2023, admitting to officers that he knew he was the subject of US sanctions. According to a CPS summary to a CPS summary of the interview, Ojiri told officers that links with Ahmad were seen as a 'great accolade' due to his reputation in the art work. He said he was 'sorry' for his actions and claimed to have been motivated by the 'excitement and kudos of dealing with a ''name'' in the collecting world', rather than greed. Prosecutors say the artwork sold by Ojiri appears to have been sent to Dubai, the UAE or Beirut - where Ahmad is currently believed to be located. Ojiri, meanwhile, is awaiting sentencing at the Old Bailey on June 6. It represents a dramatic downfall for the previously respected antiques specialist, who first appeared on screens on the BBC's Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is. He then became a regular on Bargain Hunt, gaining a reputation for his enthusiastic on-screen demeanor and love of hats, before also appearing on the BBC's Antiques Road Trip. Away from the TV screen, he owned a vintage shop in the capital called Pelicans & Parrots, which was dubbed 'the coolest place in London' before shutting its doors in October 2021. Ojiri has described his love of collecting items including contemporary art, paintings, prints, sculpture and drawings - telling the BBC: 'I'm absolutely obsessed, in love and infatuated.' Today, district judge Briony Clarke granted bail but ordered him to surrender his passport and not to apply for international travel documents. He now faces a maximum sentence of five years in prison. In the UK, the entirety of Hezbollah - both its military and political wings - has been banned as a terrorist group since 2019.
Times
09-05-2025
- Times
Bargain Hunt's Ochuko Ojiri admits not reporting sales to ‘Hezbollah backer'
An art dealer who is an expert on the BBC show Bargain Hunt has admitted failing to report art sales to a man suspected of financing Hezbollah. Westminster magistrates' court heard that Ogheneochuko Ojiri, 53, from west London, sold artwork worth about £140,000 to Nazem Ahmad. Lyndon Harris, for the prosecution, told the court that the art dealer, who joined the Bargain Hunt team in 2019, knew that Ahmad had been sanctioned in the US as a suspected financier for the Lebanese militant group at the time of the transactions. On Friday, Ojiri pleaded guilty to eight offences of failing to disclose information about transactions in the regulated art market sector, contrary to section 21A of the Terrorism Act 2000. The offences were committed between
