Banksy

BANKSY (United Kingdom, active since the 1990s).
Fabric from life jackets, hand-sewn onto a fiber doormat.
Item No. 717, numbered on the fabric label: “Gross Domestic Product / #717 / Banksy in collaboration with Love Welcomes.”
Created in collaboration with Love Welcomes as part of the Gross Domestic Product project.
Provenance: private collection, United Kingdom.
Includes a custom, hand-painted frame.
Measurements: 46 x 71 cm.

“Welcome Mat” is one of the most significant objects to emerge from “Gross Domestic Product,” the project through which Banksy presented a unique collection of household items in Croydon in 2019, conceived through his characteristic blend of irony, social criticism, and popular culture.

The doormats were made from fabric sourced from life jackets abandoned on the Mediterranean coast and hand-sewn in collaboration with Love Welcomes, an organization that was then working with refugee women in camps in Greece. The proceeds were used to help refugee communities gain access to essential services. Here, Banksy transforms an object conventionally associated with domestic hospitality into a direct reference to displacement and the experience of migration.

Banksy is a British street artist of unconfirmed identity, linked to the Bristol scene since the 1990s. His style, based on stencils, irony, and the appropriation of popular imagery, frequently addresses social issues, consumerism, authority, and conflict. Among the major milestones of his career are *Banksy vs Bristol Museum* (2009), the feature film *Exit Through the Gift Shop* (2010), *Dismaland* (2015), and numerous international projects and interventions. The British Museum holds works by him in its collection.