Original subtitles

You are welcome in Palestine, Bethlehem City

The Holy Land, the place where Jesus was born

This is my name, Walid The Beast

Did you hear about my story

when I cut the Banksy painting?

Among this destruction you see these paintings

Shadows, they have meaning

They don't say anything in terms of text

you have to figure it out

and this takes some people's mind

No, I didn't see him when he painted this picture

I didn't see him, really, I don't know this man

The team was about 6 or 7 people

They changed their profiles

he changed his face

sometimes in a mask

sometimes with a moustache

sometimes with a beard, sometimes...

He's a revolutionary

he's the ghost

He's like a legend

for the whole world now

They made an exhibition

called "Santa's Ghetto" in Bethlehem

Actually I like the towers

because I see them everywhere when I travel in the West Bank

but it's the first time that I see them in a colorful way

I hope that the Israeli army is influenced by this

Internationals started to come

not the Nativity Church

not to the refugee camps

but to the Banksy exhibition

When Banksy came to the city

for two weeks

and painted some pictures

it meant a lot for Palestinians

and Palestinians are happy

It shows the world

how we are oppressed inside this area

and we can't go outside, we can't move

Seven years ago, at this time

the city was full of people

You could see the streets were full of tourists

from all over the world

they were coming on pilgrimage to Bethlehem

Now we are in the time of Christmas

it's about 8 days to Christmas

but you can see, there's no people in the city

You can talk to the people from here

and ask them what they are feeling

about Christmas

and about the situation in this area

You can feel that...

everything is not correct in this area

Do you need any help?

Yes, what do you want?

Oh my God

What's this Banksy?

He's now very very famous

I was the first to meet him

in Manger square, over there

My name is Walid

Is this your stall?

Is this your stall here?

No, I am a taxi driver

I'm helping my friend

I help him, he's poor

I help him here, he sells bananas

So what do you think about all the graffiti?

This one?

Is this good?

The artist who made these things?

Yes, who's this one?

This one is a friend of mine

his name is Nash, he's from Chicago

he's a very famous artist

I helped him, I brought the ladder for him

and he wrote my name over there

because I helped him

Is that you, Walid?

Yes, Walid The Beast

Every year there's something new

some artist coming, some...

and they speak, speak...

But I think there will be no change

because this wall is forever

and nobody can touch it

I am a taxi driver, this is my taxi

I hope Banksy will give me money to buy a new one

because everyday I have to go to the garage

When I met you at the checkpoint

and I said to you

This is my name, Walid The Beast

Have you known about me

for a long time, or...

No, but it's like we've known you for a long time

Did you hear about my story

when I cut the Banksy painting?

I will tell you about this bad story

On the main road of Bethlehem

he painted "The Donkey with the Soldier"

and the soldier carries the ID of the donkey

The painting was...

very ugly for the people

This motherfucker from London

A lot of people wanted to destroy this painting

But we covered this piece

and we cut it

It was very difficult to bring machines

to take it from the wall

On the left you see the mural

This way

Banksy was angry about this story

but to come to a house in Bethlehem

and to start to paint

and after we cut it or destroy it

you're not allowed to say anything

And you are welcome

When he painted he was like a ninja

nobody knew him

The wall is very good

good concrete

What we are doing now

is a steel frame

to reinforce the concrete

so that when we move it out

it will be one piece

The boss who is the owner of this piece

he's the boss, I am one of his people

he said we want to keep this piece

and we want to sell it

at our price

I was astonished that you are going to carry

four tons of concrete out of Bethlehem abroad

Until now I don't know the idea behind it

but...

this is something, I mean... That's crazy

Four tons out of Bethlehem

in a concrete slab

What for?

Couldn't he draw this anywhere else

on a piece of wood

or a carpet or whatever?

About the piece... we want to sell it

Until then it's with us in Bethlehem

in a safe place

They say: "Palestinians are bad"

"they want to buy weapons"

"they want to fight Israel"

No

This is not at all true

The boss who is the owner of this piece

he wants to support the church

he wants to give money

to all the people who helped him to cut this piece

and he spent money

for this piece

of "The Donkey with the Soldier"

This is my fuel

This is the best

the king of body building

he's the king

eleven times Mr. Olympia

He pushed 1250 kg

machine legs

He's very old now

I was very thin

I was only 65 kg

Now I am 135 kg

It's a big change

And I like... I like to change myself

If you want to feel full power

you have to think of something very bad

Once, I remember

I was in a competition

and I saw all the people

"Walid! Walid!"

I had a lot of people

pushing me

I looked around and I said to myself

"If I don't do this, the Israeli soldiers will kill us all"

Like I had to save these people

from this bad thing

and I did it

I carried 235 kg

and I won

Wait, wait, wait my friend

Well, I am a merchant in Bethlehem

A businessman you can say, also

I really did not like

the painting

Why?

I saw a donkey

and I saw an Israeli soldier

checking this donkey's Palestinian ID

And it's like he's calling us "donkeys"

This year

I put it on eBay

If you'd like to buy

this wall

we are ready to sell it to you

If you know ABC about this country

you know people would be offended by this

Have you considered it?

Have you been critically assessing

what's the discourse in this place

in relation to the people

to the context

to the history of this place?

Or it's like most of the things around the place

it's like a fast food approach to graffiti

a fast food approach to art

it's quick

it makes you feel bad afterwards

but at that time it's very fulfilling

It gets all your senses saturated

and then you leave

In the Palestinian culture

if you tell someone: "You are a donkey"

it has negative implications

Although the donkey is a great animal

The donkey is a hard working animal

You will never be

cheated by a donkey

or betrayed by a donkey

In this case, I wouldn't really worry

I know maybe older people would take it seriously

but I think the younger generation is taking over

anyway

The first time?

That's a hard question, man

The first time I did graffiti

we decided to make a piece

to protest the visit of Obama

so we made a French kiss

between Abu Mazen and Obama

and we covered the entire city

We had the stencil

and every ten metres

we sprayed

We were like: "Why don't we do this all the time?"

The first time I learned it was illegal to make graffiti

I said: "What?"

Here, when we do something

all the neighborhood want you to make more

so you do it and run

not because it's illegal

you run because

you can't do one hundred

It started during the first Intifada

there was

a political movement

and people needed to get in contact with the locals

to have like one...

one voice

During the first Intifada

Palestinians didn't have any control over the media

So how did they distribute their political ideas?

It was through the walls

You just come and

write the message and...

and disappear

Our way of painting

we are not professional painters, we use like simple materials

but the medium is the message for us

If the soldiers check your house

and they find spray

this is a crime

they could put you in jail for this

The Israeli army used to actually stop

young people on the street

and ask them to erase the sentences

written on the wall

They knock on the door

"Come and remove this"

"Remove what's written"

If you are living in a conflict zone

everything can be used as a weapon

It's not killing

but it raises awareness

it sends a message

It's part of the struggle

part of the fight

to speak on behalf of people

that can't speak

The Arab Spring in general really influenced me

because it was

for the Arab world it was something new

and it was mostly triggered

by graffiti

and street art

and social media

and all that stuff

It really made me realize

how easy it can be

to reach people

it's straightforward

you paint on the wall

that people pass by most frequently

that's it

they see it, they have to see it

The works of Western artists worldwide have always had a bigger impact

than the works of artists from Algeria, Palestine, South Africa

If one thinks of 40 plus years ago,

for instance the War in Vietnam

we know more about it from American artists

than we do from Vietnamese artists

And that's because they are part of an international market

I am not just talking in economic terms

I am not just talking about the art market per Se

I am talking about a symbolic market which is strongly asymmetric

and where a Western voice will always count more than a non-Western voice

Mostly, Banksy's art

it's not about influencing the artists here

it's more about

putting this place in the spotlight

It could make more difference

if he painted

on the other side of the wall

We know what's happening here

Paint on the Israeli side

I don't think it makes less sense

if you want to sell something

You have a house and you want to sell it

It's your house, you can sell it

The artist knows that when he's done with the painting

it's not his painting anymore

They sell it for a few hundred dollars

and that guy buys it and sells it for

100,000 dollars, 200,000 dollars

they just make money out of it

They just take advantage of somebody who's...

who doesn't really know who Banksy is

who doesn't really know the value of...

of the piece that he owns

"The Donkey with the Soldier"

Banksy made it on a private wall in Manger Street

and that's...

that's very big

Someone I don't know

from Europe or the United States

came here

when he saw that graffiti

he said to the owner of the building

of that wall

"I want to buy it"

and he brought a big sawing machine

and cut it

and shipped it

I don't know where that is now

in a museum

in the United States or in Europe, I don't know

but that's when...

it was sold

and shipped

If you were in Jerusalem, it's not safe

for all, for all

for Arabic people, Jewish people, for all

Many, many soldiers

Here, it changed

it's safer

here nobody's angry, nobody...

the problems are only where the border is

Already rolling?

Peter approached me

in the Summer

about this Banksy piece

To find a street work

that was done in Palestine

it's kind of unique

An artwork

if it's by Banksy or somebody else

has a value

and maybe the owner thinks...

the value is...

too big for them to keep

We were in a position to buy it and we bought it

and I think in the long run, most of the...

a lot of street pieces, they disappear after a few years

they are no longer with us

Banksy is gone mate

He's gone, sorry boys

I got one, I got a smaller one

We are talking about art, so we can't just focus on the ethical point of view

Some artworks will survive the streets even though they don't get stolen

We tend to defend the artist's will, choices, context and message

We obviously need to respect that

however when you move an artwork from its original context

that artwork won't stop talking to you

In a way we underestimate the power of art

but art is still talking to us, even removed from its original context

It is not art becoming mute, it is us becoming deaf

not understanding what an artwork is telling us

once it's removed from its context

Let's get back, guys

It's not only a painting on a wall

it's a painting that reflects

our core cause

our core message

our core existence

And to be honest with you

when one of his pieces was cut

and brought out of Bethlehem

we considered as a Municipal Council

they cut a very important image

that relates to the Palestinian cause

so you are cutting the cause

That was really unacceptable for us

Banksy came from nowhere

Is he the Robin Hood of today?

For me Banksy is...

a philosopher

that we need to infer

from his graffiti and whatever message he is sending

to bring about a better world

Who reads the graffiti he reads the world

Who reads the graffiti he reads the pain

Who reads the graffiti he reads the suffering of others

Are you documenting everything?

Are you documenting everything?

I am going to arrest him

I am Superintendent of the Bethlehem Police Department

As for the paintings by the artist named Banksy

There's very little information about him

We often patrol the province and the city

The patrol officers know where these graffiti are

and if we notice somebody trying to damage them

we are ready to deal with the case

The local police knows the value of these paintings

and what they represent

It is our duty to preserve them and protect them

and God willing we will be able to do so

What these paintings represent

what Banksy is trying to tell the whole world

through his art

is that Palestinian people deserve to live

just like any other people in the world

My message to Banksy?

Keep on

Keep on going

Thank you for everything

You were able to express us Palestinians

as nobody else managed to

Thank you

That's my shop...

Before... before the wall, this was a grocery

not Banksy

but the world was very nice

before the wall

The Palestinian people

and the Israeli people

worked together

no walls, no checkpoints

everything was open between us and them

and no problem

But when they finished the wall

many stores closed

because there was no business any more, no work

I put a chair in front of my shop

and I thought to myself: "What shall I do?"

I saw many tourists looking

for Banksy's graffiti

They asked me

"Where's Banksy's graffiti?"

And the tourists when they ask me

they like my shop

Maikel Canawati?

He's not here

he's on the main road

This way, down

Maikel Canawati?

There's a restaurant there

Mike?

Just straight

Straight

Half km

That's the thing, I saw a guy with a hat

spraying

on the wall

One reporter came to me

and he asked me about it

He asked me

"What do you think about Banksy's work to help the Palestinian people?"

If Banksy wants to do good

let's sell this painting

and do something good in Bethlehem

I come from a Greek Orthodox family

I go to this church in Beit Jala

Saint Nicholas Church

we pray there...

When this thing happened

I saw the furniture was too old

it needed to be, you know...

renewed

I said to myself...

If we manage to sell this painting

I will contribute all the money

to refurbish the church completely

It's not personal...

I don't know why he makes it personal

with me

He came to Palestine on a mission

to help the Palestinian people

He's welcome to help them

Let him send me

a few more paintings

send me some more paintings and...

I will sell them and we can help

the Palestinian refugee camps

the Palestinian sick people

That's my message to him

if he wants to help

But if he wants to do business

then we are ready to cut all of his pieces

and do business as well

God's gifts are shared among all men, each according to their potential

so there are men who resist using weapons

others using their tongue

while others use creativity

We carry an olive branch in one hand and a gun in the other

we hold the brush in our hands

as well as the bullet

and we don't give up

We start from the end and we go backwards

Canawati...

He's a man we know as a member of the Christian community

He's a rich man

I am in favour of shipping around the world

these images and sculptures on our walls

so that everybody can see that this is the soldier and this is the donkey

and what the Palestinian question has come to

Lately there was another piece

that I wanted to cut

but when I started to cut this piece

the whole country wanted to save this piece

They stopped us from cutting that wall

They considered it as...

Palestinian art or something like this

I don't see it as a historical painting

or something from the culture of the Palestinian people

So if you have buyers for me

to buy all the paintings

I will try to cut them and I will sell them

and I will do something good for the people here instead

It was my idea to cut this painting

because a friend of mine said that we would get a lot of money

But the problem is that we didn't get any money from this painting

This wall is very bad

and even when somebody comes, like Banksy

to paint on this wall

he cannot change anything

the wall will stay

and the painting doesn't change anything for the wall

This is our land

this is our dream, to be free

without this fucking wall

First of all I say to Banksy

you are not very famous in Palestine

don't come and paint on this wall

and say this is good for Palestinians

good for Americans, good for anybody

No

Support the poor people, that's enough

Fuck you Banksy

Goodbye

This is art done in secret

for the public

It's art where

it's not supposed to be

I can't read shit, even with glasses

It's art

a secret and...

on serious subjects

put where anyone can see

It's art that's extremely beautiful

to show

how good things could be

Jenny Holzer

The first Keith Haring drawings to appear on the subway

were white chalk on black cardboard

that nobody had used before

At first I would just take pictures

then one day, on Broadway and Lafayette

I saw these subway workers ripping them off the walls...

They just dumped them there, ready for the trash

so I thought to myself: "Taking pictures is not enough"

They looked at me as if I were a Martian

why is he taking these pieces of cardboard out of the trash?

I would spray them

in order to fix the chalk in the drawing

I had this spray bottle with water

and I would use it on the cardboard

and left them there overnight

The morning after I would come back

and between humidity and water

the starch give had evaporated

so I would cut off a small triangle

and slowly peel them off

I am Philipp Teuchtler

Every time you have to be the first to enjoy the art

This is always worthy for me

I would like to have something later

If somebody wants to cut out a Banksy now

or a piece by anyone, by Obey

they should have opened their eyes before

Funny of wild, one or both is good

Intelligent also counts sometimes

But beautiful is, for me, one of the most boring things

Beautiful artwork...

When I want to see something beautiful I go to the park, see nature

You have these two different things

You have guys who go to the gallery and buy all these things

This is the classical thing

And then you have these things

that are from the streets and those you can't buy

so maybe you have to find another way to get them

Also, why you steal?

Stealing...

Maybe it's not good to say it in an interview, is it?

Maybe we should cut everything out

Stealing sounds very criminal

but maybe that is also the nice thing

that I like about street art

the criminal point of view

The people making graffiti

were mainly Hispanics or Blacks from Harlem

coming to neighborhoods

with galleries and museums, like Soho

They were mostly considered outlaws

and actually quite a few were arrested by the police

Maybe we can get a few ideas

of what the end of street art is going to look like

But let's see here... when you...

I mean, it doesn't look bad

Classic, nice

But you have no text anymore

it's so proper that people don't touch

I can't say nice anymore

Here it's so classic...

It's getting worse, it's getting worse

This place used to be quite wild, you know

you had, like, these people tagging

busted by the police

It was a moving space

now there's commissioned work here

Each one has their exact spot

Don't cross it, you know

You have this wall, you have this wall, you have this wall

Then you have people, like, some rich people

who come and invite people to paint

you know, maybe a fake Banksy because it's so cool and so nice

But with money you can't buy taste

as you see on this wall

and then people come and tell me

how great street art is

and how fresh everything is

This has nothing to do with freshness

People don't even think...

I mean

This is a work I would never put in my toilet, you know

I mean, look how fresh this wall looks

I mean, this is still, you know...

You need to have a taste for revolution

On my Facebook page

where they ask you about your school

I wrote: “Institute of Disobedience”

because you just cannot obey

if you obey you become nothing but an artisan

What do you see in this picture?

It means we don't care if it's flowers or stones

we're going to fight with anything

This is what I think

He does't have stones, he finds flowers

he throws the flowers

I think it will be gone in two years

because of the sun, the weather

There is a carwash in this area

a dirty place as you can see

Look over there

the colour is starting to come out

But we have it in magazines

we have pictures on the Internet

Everything is saved

You can find everything on the Internet

There are not better or worse ways of collecting

There are no beautiful or ugly graffiti

It's something that started from the very beginning

as a lifestyle for teenagers who didn't even expect it to come to this

Today it's crazy, it's madness

We've got to respect the will of the artist

The artist wanted to paint on this door?

He wanted his artwork to stay on this door

We cannot change it, we cannot take it off without his permission

put it into a museum and show it and say: "okay, now we've got the door"

The guy painted it on the door, and he wanted the door to be there

If he'd wanted to paint it on a canvas for a museum

he'd have painted it on a canvas for a museum

Personally, if I was painting on this door, and you came and told me

Hey, we really like this door

and it's really important for our culture, for our history

for the preservation of graffiti

We want to keep it in a museum

In that case I would say: "With pleasure, take my door"

I would be pleased that you respect my artwork

that you want my artwork to be in a museum

For me it would be a pleasure

But if you didn't ask me, surely, as a rather aggressive person

I would take action

Somebody in Bologna, for example, took action

There was action and a reaction

And in this kind of situation, especially in a public situation

people do take advantage

they use politics, they involve political organizations

they put out statements, and it's a clash of titans

it's never ending

It's as you like, you're free to collect us as you like

and if you don't like graffiti and street art, don't collect at all

I had already peeled off pieces from the street

wall pieces of no real value

I even took some in Iran, in abandoned houses

and I still have some of those with me

I am talking about the 70s here

so imagine how long we've been thinking about saving drawings

that are disappearing

The first we saved was this young dude playing football

We took its surface and a minuscule brick layer that came with it

The owner of the wall didn't want this drawing, maybe he even complained

because this vandal ruined it with his painting

Except for us this so called vandal has remarkable pictorial qualities

Generally people demonize street art as they do all the tags in Bologna

mixing up these drawings with the tags around the city

which have nothing to do with it

They were both made with a marker, but that's about it

The marker is not the artist

the matter is not the artist

it is the matter of art that's artistic

So we started to figure out ways to save this stuff

Borondo, yes

This one?

Well, this is just an attribution

There is no official document stating this is a Borondo

It's not like, you know, Giotto

In traditional art you have provenance, here you have style

which you can't miss anyway

See these crosses... look at this cross here

That one, that one, this one, these signs

are exactly the same you find over there

just the same over there

See those crosses there?

See those signs? They are identical

It's like when you're doodling while you're on the phone

These signs are your signs

I cannot imitate your doodles, and neither can Marco

Nobody can because when you're doodling you're not thinking

that's your style

That cross, those dots

sure, anybody can do the same

but not in such a systematic, tidy and continuous way

So that's a sign, a style

a style we consider pictorial

It is the style of an artist, as if they went to school to learn it

as if they had an academic background

The controversy behind the Banksy pieces taken off walls worldwide

is just the same as 200/250 years ago

Even in the 19th century some intellectuals spoke out

against this commercially driven approach

But if it weren't for people collecting these drawings

we would have probably lost them forever

I have only recently realised

we are talking about a real art form here

often really high art

and anyway something we can't do without for the future

It is all very simple

these walls belonged to private citizens

so if someone goes and paints on someone else's wall

they don't automatically give away the paternity of the art work

but they give away the possession and the material property of the piece

Blu doesn't want his art to be mixed with what he probably considers shit

but he doesn't understand we are not exploiting his art

His drawings are not for sale

I could post this amazing Blu on eBay

and I would find a buyer in no time, trust me

90% of the people doing this kind of thing are only in it for the money

gallerists doubling the original price of a piece

that's the way of the world

Our goal instead is to recognize the real value of this kind of art

so that it can be preserved in its original location

where it was meant to be

Nobody can do what they want

and decide to play by their own rules

Nobody

Let's make sure everything is back the way it was

Let's clean everything up

Everything the way it was

What most people didn't get in the Bologna exhibition

is that we only focused on a particular story

while actually it's a wider issue and it has to do with our memory

Isaac Asimov described a world where people stop remembering

because all their memories are stored in machines

Today we believe, almost ideologically

that we can content ourselves with the present

while forgetting about the past because we have computers

But if you know the history of the Internet and street art

you also know that what happened in the early 2000s

has already disappeared

A Facebook post stating that street art is ephemeral

and it's useless to preserve stuff, that's very easy to do

but I won't take the responsibility of saying that objects are useless

all you need is the Internet and a digital camera

The way I see it,

at this point a colonial logic is somehow inevitable

in the Western world

but except for Israel, conquering and colonizing a land

in this day and age is a completely different matter

So new forms of colonization are deployed all over the world

finally showing that capitalism can't do without colonization

so this colonization can be intangible

but it can also be tangible

as if we kept conquering new territories

which will produce new images, new objects

so that we can extend our field

because we cannot keep selling the same merchandise

otherwise we might lose customers, if we don't differentiate our offer

and this offer can also include Palestinian political art, why not?

When they opened that hotel

he invited all the press from all over the world

and they came

TV channels from all over the world

from Japan, from all of Europe

from the United States, Canada

and I saw that with my eyes

You came before and you know about my shop

it is small and sells little pictures and T-shirts

But, because he's my friend

he told me: "Change your shop for the better"

"with many new and expensive things"

"because many tourists, many VIPs"

"will come here and will want to buy gifts"

And I changed my shop

and you see it's better than before

They come here to see his graffiti

from all the countries

that's amazing

So Banksy, how is it going?

We are saying hello

at least answer

You entered against the traffic

please let the cars get inside

okay, let him go back a bit

I think this is a stupid work

because this wall

is not a good place

it's not good for visitors to come

it's a shameful place, my friend

And he can't change anything

This is our flag, you see?

Palestine

Our flag is in the United Nations now

My father, my family, my parents

all of them are Palestinian

We are originally Palestinian

I was born in Bethlehem

I started to drive a taxi in 1998

And who broke our business

and our hope?

The wall

It was built in 2000

When they started building the wall

they closed off the area

You see the wall and you go back

You stop, because the wall stops you

not the soldiers, the wall

Closed, finished

When they started to bring the bulldozers

and trucks and machines

to cut the olive trees and clear the area

nobody knew what would happen

and we asked some policemen and some security

"What's going on?"

And they said, I remember, I will never forget this

They said

"Someday you will hope to see the air on this side"

In one year, everything was finished

I was with my friends, we are all taxi drivers

I told them: "Do you remember when the security told us"

"Someday you will not see the air over there"?

This is the day

and it was true

They built the wall

they changed all the area

Nothing

No Jerusalem

You don't even see what's behind the wall

Only one gate for thousands of people

It's a big change

It's very sad

I believe in freedom

Someday

this wall will come down, like Berlin

The same

History will repeat itself