Since his appearance on the art scene in the 1980s, Banksy has remained anonymous, keeping his identity hidden even as he became one of the most famous street artists in the world. But a new Reuters investigation from Simon Gardner, James Pearson, and Blake Morrison claims to have revealed the man behind works such as “Girl with Balloon” and “Napalm.”
According to the report, Banksy is Robin Gunningham, a graffiti artist born in Bristol in 1973 who later changed his name to David Jones. That’s the same person named in a 2008 report from The Mail on Sunday, which wrote then that it had “come as close as anyone possibly can to revealing” who Banksy was.
A Banksy mural on September 09, 2025 in London, England.
Dan Kitwood/Getty Images
A turning point in the investigation came from graffiti made by the artist in Ukrainian village of Horenka, near Kiev, among buildings destroyed by shelling. According to witnesses who spoke with Reuters, the works were allegedly created within minutes by two men with covered faces using spray cans and stencils. Reuters investigators linked Gunningham, who by then was going as David Jones, to travel to that area—working in partnership, the outlet suggests, with Massive Attack frontman Robert Del Naja, another man who some have speculated is Banksy.
Del Naja isn’t Banksy, Reuters reports, but has likely partnered with him on projects throughout the years, including the work in Ukraine. “The Mail on Sunday had been right in 2008 in making the case that Gunningham was Banksy,” Reuters writes. But by changing his name to one of the most popular monikers in the UK, the artist thwarted later efforts to confirm the Mail‘s claims.
