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PARIS (AP) — It has seen seven works attributed to the provocative British street artist. The works attributed to Banksy have been discovered in recent days, including one near a former center for migrants at the city’s northern edge that depicts a child spray-painting wallpaper over a swastika.
Nicolas Laugero Lasserre, editor of the Artistikrezo website that broke the story, said he heard a few weeks ago through contacts in the French street art world that Banksy was planning a trip.
He said he started looking for the works and came across the one in the northern Porte de la Chappelle neighborhood. The same wallpaper stencil was used in a 2009 exposition at the Bristol Museum, he said, describing it as “a real signature” of the elusive artist.
It didn’t take long for others to add — or detract — from Banksy’s work. First came the blue tag over the wallpaper. Then on Monday, another artist temporarily covered over Banksy’s work with a poster depicting a woman’s face, but the paper was quickly pulled off and an art restorer frantically tried to cover the works with a clear plastic.
Not all the works directly reference migration. One is a play on the 1801 painting of Napoleon crossing the Alps. Others show rats, including one that appeared to have been altered over the weekend.
“It lands at a key political moment, and for me that’s really the genius of Banksy,” Laugero Lasserre said.
Banksy’s publicist did not immediately respond to a request for comment.