About 300 people gathered to check out the latest handywork of banksy in the backstreets next to the Thames. Old artwork like the 'Chequebook Vandalism' ("take me to your dealer" city folk) mural had been given a new lick of paint, while new pieces included a large queens head as a monkey chimp complete with crown, on the brick side of the railway arches, and an entrance sprayed on white boarding beneath one of the arches with red carpet on the pavement leading to it, flanked on either side by the now familiar coldstream guards sentries, with their trousers dropped.

The event had been announced as happening earlier in the day but in fact kicked off at about 6pm. Lots of people milling around waiting for lord banksy to show (an ideal opportunity had someone wanted to turn up with spray cans + face mask and claim the glory :)

Later and a car completely painted as a union jack including over the windscreen sweeps up to the red carpet and the boot opened to reveal cases of free beer... lots of folk with cameras snapping away, you could almost have believed a vip had arrived.

A soundsystem turned up but so did pc plod. The two bewildered police checked out the union jack car with people scrambling for the free beer and went looking for the 'organiser'. They seemed chill when told it was a community jubilee event ("Is it? is that what this really is?" :) but wanted to know whether they were going to have to deal with 300 or 3000 people. When they saw the soundsystem in the back of a van they said it'd get confiscated if it was turned on, and so the tunes never kicked off.

The great bloody british weather stepped in and chucked it down for 20 mins sending people into the pub and under the arches and by about 9pm people were drifing away.

All in all a fun evening, as one friend said, this was a pr stunt - club style - gone street level.

For more of and on banksy and the graffiti stencil artwork with a message check out:
 http://www.banksy.co.uk