I don't care about Banksy either and don't feel to despondent having known it was right there, its the kind of crap I'd just walk past every other day of the week. The question does beg though why the hell this is on the front page of HN (and how much was actually sold? I'm guessing not a lot!). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LP5-AjCCNw
I dumped a lot more than that at Comiccon on people with actual talent (non derivative works). Banksy is a very strange thing that I really don't understand at all however I'm glad for him that he knows how to capitalize. Is the mindless kowtowing to rat stencils really just a tip of the hat to those without talent but a distinct political advantage? I can understand how some people would be into that, given the industry we're in.
Banksy is probably here because he's sort of a mystery, it seems that no one knows his true identity even after like 20 years.
Most of his work is illegally painted or pasted onto public walls and he hasn't been caught yet.
This "installment" is ironic because his art was sold on the cheap as if it were knock offs, like basically everything else sold on NY streets.
His style isn't entirely original but if it seems tired it's probably from seeing his imitators. Searching ebay for Banksy and excluding his books turns up 100,000 results, all of which appear to be ripoffs, bootlegs and tag spam.
The point is he was selling his own work as if they were cheap knockoffs, this certainly was not capitalizing on his fame. If he wanted to auction his art at a much higher price he could have. I think this is more like a performance art, think of the selling "knockoffs" that are actually originals and worth far more than $60 as a performance.
Guess I'm not edgy enough for this art.