Banksy is a pseudonymous British graffiti artist, activist, and film director whose identity remains unknown. His political and social street art, created using stencils and distinctive styles, have been featured in cities around the world. Banksy's work emerged from the underground scene in Bristol and combines irreverent humor with graffiti. His identity is secret but he is believed to have been born in 1974 in Bristol.

2. Banksy is the pseudonym of a
British graffiti artist, political activist
and painter, whose identity is
unconfirmed. His satirical street art
and subversive epigrams combine
irreverent dark humour with graffiti
done in a distinctive stencilling
technique. Such artistic works of
political and social commentary have
been featured on streets, walls, and
bridges of cities throughout the world.

3. Banksy's work was born out of
the Bristol underground scene
which involved collaborations
between artists and musicians.
According to author and
graphic designer Tristan
Manco, Banksy "was born in
1974 and raised in Bristol,
England. The son of a
photocopier technician, he
trained as a butcher but
became involved in graffiti
during the great Bristol aerosol
boom of the late 1980s."
Observers have noted that his
style is similar to Blek le Rat,
who began to work with stencils
in 1981 in Paris and members
of the anarcho-punk band
Crass who maintained a graffiti
stencil campaign on the
London Tube System in the
late 1970s and early 1980s.

4. Banksy does not sell photos of
street graffiti directly himself;
however, art auctioneers have
been known to attempt to sell
his street art on location and
leave the problem of its
removal in the hands of the
winning bidder. Banksy's first
film, Exit Through the Gift
Shop, billed as "the world's
first street art disaster movie",
made its debut at the 2010
Sundance Film Festival. The
film was released in the UK on
5 March.

9. 3D graffiti, whether it’s in chalk or paint, on walls or
the street, represents a new way of combining the
mastery of Renaissance art techniques with the
gritty, ephemeral qualities of amazing street art.
These 3D street artists gives graffiti a whole new
meaning – one that departs from the conventional
interpretation of graffiti as vandalism in the form of
images and letters scrawled on public property.
Artists like Kurt Wenner, Eduardo Relero and
Tracy Lee Stum create street art that is so
incredible it is almost impossible to pass by
without being sucked in to the worlds they create
on asphalt and concrete surfaces.

11. Kurt Wenner‘s ability to transform Renaissance classicism
into 3D street art is unparalleled and has made him the top
anamorphic street painting artist of our time. Kurt aims to
“reinvent classicism for a new age”, bringing his talent for
realism to the streets, literally, having invented a pictorial
geometry that corrects the specific distortion caused by
viewing his street paintings at an oblique angle. A former
NASA illustrator, Kurt has had his work featured in a lengthy
list of articles, television features, ads, and documentaries.

14. Edgar Muller and Manfred Stader are a German team of street painters.
Much of their work is in the 3D anamorphic style, but both of them often
create traditional street paintings in a style that mimics the detail and
realism of the Renaissance and Baroque periods. Their background in
realism gives them an incredible advantage as anamorphic street
painters, as evidenced in their “River Street” work and the paintings
above. Stader and Mueller have won many street painting competitions,
and have taught street painting at universities.

16. Julian Beever’s world-renowned sidewalk chalk drawings have been a viral
hit all over the internet, and it’s easy to see why: he’s a master of the
anamorphic technique, which he’s been perfecting since the mid 1990s.
Each of Julian’s creations typically take a full day to complete, and by
the next day they’re just a memory, washed away by rain or walked
upon by pedestrians. The English artist has been given the nickname
“The Pavement Picasso”, and he continues to work all over the world.

18. Tracy Lee Stum is widely considered to be one of today’s finest street
painters. She has traveled the world to be a featured artist in many
festivals and events, and she currently holds the Guinness World
Record for the largest street painting by an individual, which she
completed in 2006. Tracy’s work contains many themes, from Biblical to
exotic to the mundane.

20. Eduardo Relero is a street artist working primarily in Spain. His fanciful
illustrative style looks like storybook pages come to life, and indeed
each of his anamorphic sidewalk chalk drawings seems to have a story
behind it.

22. Rod Tryon has been adorning the streets of the world with his chalk
drawings for more than 20 years, and was first inspired to try
anamorphic designs in 1996. Of his paintings, Rod says “Entertaining
the audience by creating an image that looks like it is coming up out of
the street, or the impression of a hole opening up in the asphalt in front
of you, is a special treat for the artist. Seeing crowds react to his 3-D
pastel images, bring great joy to both the artist and onlookers.”

24. The work of Greg Brown isn’t meant to be accessible. His huge
murals seem to jump out at the viewer, but that doesn’t mean
they’re easy to interpret, and that’s how he likes it. Greg’s
murals vary dramatically in style and content from one to
another, due to the intense collaborative process he takes on
with each client. They range from Dali-esque surrealism to
classic trompe leil, with subjects including everything from
construction equipment to miniature ships.

26. Eric Grohe was a professional graphic designer and illustrator for decades
before beginning work on his renowned trompe leil murals. Eric’s
murals appear to jump off of the surfaces that he paints on, and they
grace walls all over the United States and the World, from Seattle
Washington to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Eric’s work reflects a patriotic
all-American theme, and his depictions of scenes such as football
games and picturesque towns have turned blank walls into works of art.

28. Daim is a German graffiti artist who first started spraying in 1989 and
hasn’t stopped since. Daim has become one of the most sought-after
graffiti artists in the world, and has even appeared in the Guinness
Book of World Records for spraying the highest graffiti in the world. The
only “traditional” graffiti artist on our list, Daim creates 3D art on interior
and exterior walls, canvas and vehicles and also works in animation
and sculpture.