Police from Spain's autonomous region of Catalonia announced last Thursday, March 7, that they have shut down a local forgery ring that allegedly produced a stream of fake Banksy pieces and sold them across the US and Europe, with prices reaching €1,500 ($1,642).
The Banksy Forgery Operation in Zaragoza
The Mossos d'Esquadra, Catalonia's local police force, said in a public release that they investigated the crime ring's activities after noticing irregularities in Barcelona's art market, adding that the fakes were made in an apartment near Zaragoza and were modeled after Banksy's "Dismaland" works.
"Dismaland" was a pop-up theme park project briefly installed in a British seaside town called Weston-super-Mare, which is adjacent to Banksy's hometown of Bristol, from August until September 2015.
The project was essentially the graffiti artist's dark satirical take on consumerism and corporate-owned theme parks like Disneyland.
Police said that they are currently investigating four main suspects involved in the alleged forgery operation and have charged these people with fraud and intellectual property offenses.
All in all, the Catalonia police force purportedly seized nine fake Banksy art pieces and tracked down a total of 25 works that were sold in the past to collectors in Germany, Switzerland, the US, Scotland, and Spain.
Starting in July 2023, the investigation was launched after the cultural heritage unit of Catalonia's police detected anomalies during their monitoring of Barcelona's art market, taking the form of online sales, auction houses, and antique stores claiming to sell genuine Banksy pieces.
Investigators eventually traced the fraudulent Banksy works back to the aforementioned Zaragoza building and raided it around December last year.
The illegal operation, as per the release, consisted of works getting sprayed onto cardboard using stencils, with finishing touches that involved applying ink seals and stickers to make them look more genuine.
In Mossos d'Esquadra's video taken during the investigation and posted on FB, stencils of one of Banksy's most iconic pieces "Girl with the Balloon" can be seen.
Investigators also said that the artist's official authenticator organization, Pest Control, has since confirmed that the works are completely fake.
